You Know They Don't Come Easy

 

It's Saturday night, I'm back in Lafayette attempting to type a report on a notebook. 

Yesterday's fishing was the same as the previous three days. Fished both the BR and the EB. Found very few bugs during the day, but if you floated a fly over a fish that hadn't been hooked since last June, he ate, (no matter what fly it was). If you cast at a recently hooked fish the best you could hope for was a refusal. How do I know? Just for the fun of it, I went back where I fished Thursday again on Friday. Caught five nice rainbows, none of which had a recent hook mark in their mouth, The fish that were willing to eat were all caught either upstream or downstream from the area I fished the day before. Got three refusals in the area I fished on Thursday. 

Fished two other places with similar results. Had several fish eagerly eat what I offered while others that I saw rise wouldn't give my fly a look. Ended the day with nine rainbows all but one of which was between 14 and 19 inches.

The outlook - For whatever reason there are next to no isos. The fish have obviously found other things to eat as they are all quite heavy for this time of year. There have been small olives hatching with stream temps and possibly brightness being the controlling factors as to when they hatch. The colder the water, the more likely the olives hatch earlier in the day. The BR olives, where I've fished, have come very late and the fish have fed on them with great care. There are a smattering of other bugs, (Cahills,  hebes, white flies and a a few fall caddis, but nothing can be counted on to get the fish up and feeding steadily.

What to do? It's a beautiful time of year to be outdoors. There are now fish throughout the entire river system. The colder the water, the better the chance you have of seeing bugs hatching and fish rising. If you are an experienced blind caster you have a reasonable chance of getting fish to come to your fly. If you only cast at rising fish, for sure your arm won't get tired.

Note - I did a page on blind casting a couple of years ago and may have even reprinted it. It may or may not be in one of the books and can be found by scrolling back through the page titles. If anyone remembers where it appeared feel free to let everyone know. Spending a day blind casting should do wonders for your casting skill, may teach you some of the places where trout lie, and could even result in your catching a fish or two. 








tBlind casting has proved productive for me 



















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