If You Get To Throw At Rising Fish, You Have To Call It A Good Day.

 

Woke this morning hoping for an all day soaker that would raise the rivers and send the trout back to their home pools, get the olives going and the fish up.. The drop in the release from Cannonsville to under 500cfs in anticipation of the rain, opened up the entire WB for fishing but, it wasn't meant to be  as the first rain didn't arrive until 4:00pm. It has rained on and off since then. Oquaga is still at 5cfs, up from 4cfs this morning and down from 4,000cfs that it reached twice during May and June of this year.

It was another late summer/early fall day with cool early morning temps in the 40's and mid afternoon readings in the high 70's. With the wind blowing from the south at 15/20 both leaves and small branches were raining down on local roads. Called Vicky and she got me in at 3:00 and asked why I wasn't fishing. I just pointed at the leaves blowing across the parking lot. Drove down to the Men's Club after the pruning job, saw one pontoon boat at the sewage treatment plant and one wade fisherman in the run below the Men's Club. No bugs on the water and nary a rise. Returned to the Lordville Estate and waited for the rain. After my return from Deposit I shot the bow, moving back from 20 to 25 yards and upping the number of shots to 20, (don't laugh, at my age you can sneeze with the bow drawn and end your archery career). Put the target under the porch just as it started to rain.

At 5:45 the rain was but a light drizzle and I headed out to fish. Found an empty spot down river on the WB, (there were lots of them), put my vest on under my raincoat, (the radar had shown more rain coming), and was glad I did as it rained all the while I was fishing. Was in the water for just short of two hours. It was dead for the first half hour, the middle hour had rising fish and they were willing to eat my flies, the last half hour the fish were still rising but were not the least bit  interested in what I was throwing. Hooked and landed six fish, two 'bows and four browns, all between 12 and 14 inches. Hate to say it, but right now, that constitutes a good day. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Fishing A Cold Blow From Out Of The North.

  Jean came down and we spent the weekend watching wildlife in the backyard, driving around the area and enjoying two "nights out", one with David and Maryann, (the apprentice Troutfitter Inn cleaning lady). A shout out of thanks to her for spending four hours on the road to have dinner with us. Not sure the company or the meal was worth the drive. We drove up to Stilesville to witness the hordes of anglers, and then along the reservoir all the way up to Walton, where we usually stop and go in some of the shops. It was threatening to rain so we elected to keep going. It was raining on top of the mountains but we took route 206?? to Downsville anyway. We hit the rain part way up the mountain and then drove down the other side to Downsville in a torrential down pour. Came out of the rain at Downsville and drove down route 30 with the intention of checking  out the trout in some of the BK's thermal refuges, saw the muddy water at "Jaws" and drove back to the Lordvi...
Read more

Don't let that that rain come down.

 My South Holston river friend, (one of only two people who will fish with me), (the other is currently on injured reserve), is up for a visit (he brought his boat) and today we floated. There might have been some question about where we chose to float (no one else launched where we did), but we enjoyed the fact that we never saw another fisherman, let alone another boat, on the river all day. The weatherman might well have gilded the lily a bit when he predicted a chance of showers and a high temp of sixty degrees. It rained all day, and the temperature peaked at fifty three degrees. When I read the forecast for the rest of Mark's stay (rain for the next four days) I was thankful that we got in the day that we did today.  How was our day? We sucked it up, paid an extra $5.00 to launch (didn't have the proper change), parked in the wrong place (got a note from the owner where we put in), never made it to the predetermined takeout place, and had a delightful day counting bugs (...
Read more

The closure.

 Picked one of the most beautiful November days imaginable to drive down to Lordville and shut down the estate. Bright sun, early morning fog, with flocks of geese on their way out to cut cornfields to feed. Temps varied from 45 to 35 depending on the fog density. The trees are bare, save for a few oaks  and larch with color but the hills are basically gray.  I've been busy in Lafayette. Spend an hour or two each morning and evening up in a tree hoping for a buck to come by. So far the only buck I've seen in real life has been what is now a unicorn. A week ago when he walked around not 20 yards in front of me he sported two slightly curved six inch spikes. Last night when he walked right under my other stand he was missing one of his horns.  In addition to the hunting we had loggers come and fell almost 100 dead and dying ash trees that had fallen victim to the Emerald ash borer. While they were at it they also took down a dying maple that leaned over the house and a...
Read more