Every thing comes to those who fish late.

 It was just "That kind of a day".  It rained where I was about ten times, It was cloudy and overcast most of the day.  The freestone temps stayed in the "OK to fish" zone, all three peaking at about 67 degrees.  With lawn mowing (as soon as the grass dried out) and peach thinning on the work agenda, I decided to give the Lordville riff a try while the lawn was drying.  There were no bugs to be seen, none.  Risers?  Yes, sorta.  You've all seen the rise a trout makes when he/she is eating an iso nymph.  The nymphs are fast swimmers and the trout go after them with gusto and create a splashy boil.  Well this morning, in the hour that I fished I saw about a dozen "iso boils" only the boils were at least twice as big. I also never saw a single iso. Threw an iso at the six or eight of the boils I could reach and never got a sniff.  In the hour I fished I got one rise on a blind cast and hooked and landed, after a good fight, an 18 inch brown.

Returned to camp and got about 25% of the lawn mowed before one of the showers hit.  When the rain stopped I went out and began thinning the peaches. Worked for almost an hour before another shower arrived.  Clearly I wasn't meant to work today.  Had lunch and got in the car to took a drive to assess the current status of the fishing on the Delaware River System. After two hours of driving  I had seen two rises ( in the flat water above the Buckingham launch site) and almost no bugs.. For sure it was an olive kind of day but the olives chose to stay at home, perhaps waiting for their Covid-19 relief checks. (That was for you Dr. M). Nothing came close to enticing me to put on my newly patched waders.  Returned to camp and got about 15 minutes of peach thinning in before the next shower hit.

Left camp again about 6:30 and spent 7:00 to 8:00 in the WB where I could count the flies that hatched without taking my socks and shoes off.  Never got to cast at a rise, rose two fish,  got one refusal and said thank you to a nine inch brown that ate my sulfur. With the clock ticking down, I drove back to Hancock and tried the EB. After twenty minutes of zero flies and an equal number of risers, I reeled it in.  Last stop was the BR.  At 8:30 I was early, by 8:45, on a dark overcast night, the bugs started to come. There were Cahill's, sulfurs, isos and the other ones that blew into my mouth and glasses.  The fish came alive, they were rising everywhere, (several within ten feet of me). Between 8:45 and 9:15 I hooked 5 rainbows and landed four (a big upgrade from last night).

The fishing - It's dreadful. Maybe if it was a clear night I could have fished until 9:35 like last night and lost a couple more, but things are just dead until almost pitch dark.  We all know the river is full of fish and that the summer sulfurs will come soon, but if you have the good fortune to come when you want, don't come now. If you're locked into a trip this week, know that things can change overnight and if they don't it's not your fault you aren't catching fish.  Stay tuned, when things change you'll be the first to know.

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