Angler 119's Delaware River Fishing Report

July, helped by a very good Dorothea hatch, was a surprisingly good month for me. I have never, in the 36 years I have owned the Lordville Estate, caught as high a percentage of big fish. While statistics are often misleading I think this months are interesting enough for you to take a look at. Since 1991 I have kept track of the percentage of brown trout in my catch that are over 17 inches each month. July usually shows a decline in the percentage of large browns as they switch from eating bugs to eating fish. Here is a list of both the number of browns browns caught and the percentage of the total catch in July since 2020. Year        # of Browns over 17"       % of browns caught, over 17" 2020 -      24                                          7.8% 2021 -      17              ...

 When I picked on Double Haul's shortcomings back on July 6th, I said I would talk further about eliminating drag which I consider to be one of the two biggest causes of refusals. Drag exists when the fly is moving at a different rate of speed than the water it is floating on. Everyone's flies drag on almost every cast. The goal is to have your fly moving in harmony with the current the entire time the fish you are casting at sees it. If you are blind casting you should pick up your fly whenever you detect drag.   How do you know if your fly is dragging? That is the easy part. Watch the bubbles, (foam), next to it. The bubbles are not dragging. If your fly is not moving exactly in concert with the nearest bubble, you've got drag. I've actually made what I thought were good casts only to watch the fly do a little wiggle, dart a short distance upstream and then race downstream trying to catch the bubble it started out next to.  What causes drag? Variations in the curre...

 With an MRI scheduled for tomorrow morning, I put the trash bag and dirty clothes in the car and headed out to fish at 12:30, uncertain if I would stay for the evening fishing or head home when the afternoon sulfurs abated. Skipped the trip up to Stilesville as the Red Barn/Stilesville congregation has more than enough fishermen. Drove down to the Men's Club lot which has been redone in crushed stone with the potholes at least temporarily filled in. There were a good number of sulfurs hatching and a few fish rising. The lot had four cars and the fishermen were well spaced in the river. Clearly the place to be is the Red Barn. Found one of the better places free of boats and fishermen and waded in with bugs on the water and fish up. Was joined shortly after my arrival by Mike the Cop. We have shared many pools over the years and it's always a pleasure to fish with him. We are both what might be described as hearing challenged so the conversation is limited to mostly sign langua...

Couldn't get excited about the Sulfur Zone today. There were sulfurs on the water in limited numbers while I was there but, few fish seemed to be interested. Yesterday I fished a good enough hatch to get fish up but it was well off the peak hatches I've seen this year. Talked with some of the anglers who said the hatch in the Red Barn pool started about 1:30 Tuesday and it was a good one. My drive-bys were at noon and four and there was nothing doing either time. Today the population of fishermen at the Red Barn swelled to numbers that on a trout stream are incomprehensible to me. Ran into, (no serious damage done), a guide later in the day that I saw anchored well below the melee at 12:30. He said a very good hatch of sulfurs started at about 1:30, which confirmed the report on Tuesday's hatch.  Me? I drove around in disbelief at the number of anglers. Stopped at one of the Dollar stores to buy sponges and popcorn, (they were both on my list last Monday, but I didn't n...

 After three days at home in Lafayette, mowing the pond area grass, seeing the ENT Dr., meeting with the excavator to discuss restoration of the bass pond, and a delightful dinner at the Blue Canoe with Jean and Susan, the surviving spouse of one of the original "couples" who participated in the first, First English Lutheran couples club canoe trip almost fifty years ago, I had things to do in Lordville. Mow the grass for one, hair cut at Vicky's unisex salon for two, and catch some fish before my hands started shaking  from withdrawal.  Scheduled a haircut for 4:00 with Vicky on the ride down, jumped on the mower and did the lawn as soon as I got everything put away in the Lordville Estate, made two sandwiches, packed them in the  little soft sided cooler along with two of Jean's chocolate chip cookies, and a bottle of Gatorade and headed for Deposit. Arrived at 1:00, did the River Road drive from Stilesville down to the Men's Club, 5 cars in the Stilesville lot,...

 Woke early, got the chores out of the way and was in Deposit by 11:45. There were already bugs and fishermen. Found an empty pool in which I've seen little and done little this year and decided to give it another try. Bugs got going by 12:15 and the fish shortly thereafter. Much to my surprise there were a good number of rainbows on display eating nymphs in the water column. Fished for three and a half hours with every cast aimed at a boil, never saw a bug eaten off the surface. Mostly my flies were ignored, hooked four fish each on a different fly, had a few refusals and two fish that I felt but didn't hook up. None of the fish ate my sulfurs or sulfur emergers for that matter. It was a genuine beatdown. Drove back to the fishing camp to lick my wounds and rest up. At 6:30 I walked out of the door and came to an abrupt halt. Laying on the pavement between me and the car, soaking up the warmth was a three and a half foot thick bodied rattlesnake. He was apparently quite comfor...