Tag Archives: sight fishing

early outing

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Went to my favorite river real early. Slightly cooler lately. Cool in the mornings. Felt there was opportunity. So I did the long drive. Fog was mixed in with smoke. A large coffee helped me get there. It kept me on watch for roadside deer in the low light. Water temperatures were good in the river flow; marginal in the shallows. Water levels were the lowest I’ve ever seen. A lot of standing water. A lot of mosquitos. The sun came out when I arrived. I figured I’d give it a few hours and then leave and fish another river on the way home. In SW Alberta you always have angling options. A fellow from B.C. arrived right after me. No other anglers were around. He parked his vehicle one pool upstream from me and started fishing it and then worked his way further up. Hmm….

I carefully walked the long pool I was on from the tail to the head. There were some smaller fish at the bottom end rising. I watched them and figured things were going to heat up fast (air and water temperature) so I decided to focus and search for a good one. The light was good for spotting. At the head of the pool, just on the edge of the flow, I saw a good trout. It was moving around (feeding); nosing into the shallows with a decent flow; working its way right to top of the pool with the best flow (oxygenated water and food) and then cycling back. Several times I lost sight of the trout due to its movements from the shallows to deeper water and when moving over darker bottom sections.

rainbow

The fish ignored a small hopper. Maybe it didn’t see it. A few casts later it took a black beetle. A lot of splashing when I finally landed it. My camera lens got soaked so many blurry pictures but I think it made the fishing net photo even more intriguing. One pool, one fish, a couple of hours and then it was time to go. The fellow from B.C. had left before me.

small beetle fly
same rainbow

Cuttbow

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A bank feeding trout. An impressive one. Spotted last week rising to a sparse hatch of Golden Stoneflies and other insects. It ate my offering then but no hook up. I returned this week to the same location hoping it would be there and watched the water under a heavy smoke filled sky. Hundreds of fires are burning west and south west of here. We need rain. A lot of it.

While stalking the trout a few angling boats drifted by. I protected my spot and pretended to watch the bank downstream of me instead of upstream where the fish had been. River traffic has increased the past few years. Sometimes you have to deceive other anglers while trying to deceive a trout. It’s getting tricky out there. A few days ago a Drone flew over my head.

The trout made an appearance mid day when the river started to liven up. It ignored the smaller insects but broke the surface for the mid-sized and larger ones. This time I made a connection. The large stone fly impression held when the fish went downstream through a series of fast riffles with me and a retriever in pursuit. A long 13 foot knotted leader and a steep embankment made landing it challenging. Seconds before netting it I had to grab my leader mid-way to guide the trout to within reach. It’s an angling move that can often result in a lost fish. I had no other option. I got lucky…

river thermometer

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I’ve been waiting for a break in the hot weather. The last few days have been somewhat cooler. Somewhat. So I got up early and made the long drive to my favorite river on the Plains. I’ve been avoiding it due to the intense heat and waiting for an opportunity. When I arrived I checked the temperature in the main flow. It was fairly cold. In the shallows it was passable. A kid was standing mid river smiling and casting frenetically. I saw no rises. He said he had the whole day to fish.

I can’t remember a past season where I used my river thermometer as much as I have been. It seems I’m checking water temperatures several times a day. And I’m watching river levels and flows, the 7 day weather forecast and the 14 day forecast at night on the internet. I feel more like a Weatherman, than an angler. And it’s only July 6th, the start of the summertime angling season. Prime time. The best the year has to offer. I can’t imagine what temperatures are going to be like in mid August. Fires are already burning in British Columbia. Smoke could be on the way as I write.

I walked several pools I know well and carefully watched the water. Nothing. I waited until lunch for a hatch. Nothing. The air temperature started climbing. The river pelicans landed and hunkered down.

I decided to venture to a different stretch of the river and hiked back to my car. The kid was still on the same pool smiling and casting away at the same pace. As before I saw no rises.

At the new location I checked a long straight bank where I missed a great fish late last season. I looked it over from high above. The lighting was good for spotting. The trout was there. It was also rising occasionally to small minuscule, invisible stuff. I dropped down and checked the river temperature once again with my thermometer. It was still good.

The trout refused my first offering, a size 14/16 ant. Absolutely no interest. Then a tried a size 18/16 PMD dry fly with some segmented wire wraps on the slim body to make it sit low (in the water). I think any fly the right size and sitting low would have worked. When I finally got the fly on target the fish ate. Luckily the small fly held and I landed it. A wonderful trout. With that I decided to call it a day.

I looked over the river and thought that with the heat I might not get back to it until mid to late September. I pointed my car towards the mountains and drove home windows open thinking about the kid casting away, about how the tiny hook held on a great trout, and about the river I was just on. My favorite one. It could be the best sight-fishing trout river in North America (that you can drive to) if water (reservoir) management slightly increased the flow throughout the summertime, and if ranchers kept their cattle out of the water. On the Plains ranching and farm irrigation take priority over trout and other things but that’s an old story.

POSTCRIPT

That kid is probably still casting. That kid was me fifty years ago…

light terrestrial dries

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Some small CDC beetles. Lighter than foam. Less of a plop/commotion when they land. Sometimes that’s good, such as in low, slow, clear water and with trout that have been fished over repeatedly and therefore easily frightened by any disturbance. I remember one particularly challenging river in NZ where the heavy plop of a foam beetle, even some distance away, sent more than one trout fleeing. I could have made these ties even lighter by also using CDC for the legs instead of fine rubber ones.

 

Leggy things

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” Life is trying things to see if they work”…Ray Bradbury

Winter tying. It’s how you stay in the game mid- winter when it’s -25C outside. You can’t travel anywhere far. So you dream of warmer weather and open rivers, and you tie flies for the next opportunity. You tie for when the door opens and you get to walk through. Here are some summertime options for when the sun is warm again. Some big and small, leggy things…

small

big

small up close

early october

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It’s winding down. Most rivers close at the end of the month. A nice weekend. Sunny on Saturday. Warm. Fished in shorts. Minimal wind. No surface feeding. The water looked dead. Lifeless. Late afternoon, when shadows were lengthening, I decided to sit and watch a pool. Noticed the occasional bright green grasshopper drifting by. Waited. Waited. Then a sizeable surface disturbance. Casted a small greenish hopper pattern…the only good fish of the day.

 

september-ten days

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There’s a great river out there

SEPTEMBER. IT HAS BEEN CHALLENGING. FEW BUGS ON the tailwater rivers I frequent and therefore few rising trout. I’ve had some luck searching the shallows for moving shadows and prospecting the deeper water with terrestrial patterns. I recently had ten days off of work so I was able to spend some full days on the water. So far September has been beautiful. Smokey at times from the fires west of here, also a few brief cold snaps but generally warm mid-day into early evening. I was able to wet-wade the past several days. Rivers are low and most clear. Tourists are gone. Few anglers around. It’s silent out there. My favorite time of year to spend a day, or ten, on my favorite rivers. Some fine trout on dry flies…

 

I casted small grasshoppers, large and small black beetles.

a cuttbow

sunset and smoke

photographer

shallow flats

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    full sun

I was able to locate a few nice surface feeding trout last weekend in spite of the full sun and few insects. Their rises were inconsistent and subtle. If I didn’t know the river section I was on real well, I would have never seen them or I should say “hear them”. On the broad shallow flats that I like to fish, below or to the side of a good run, it is often the sound of a rising fish that first catches my attention. When I hear something I focus on the water in the region where I think the sound emanated from. I often take several soft steps up or downstream to change my visual angle depending on the light and glare. Most importantly I try to be patient, refrain from casting and wading, and wait for another sound or even better a surface disruption. Sometimes I hear the fish multiple times before I can actually visually pinpoint its location especially when the lighting situation is challenging. Usually these trout are closer to shore than I originally thought. If I was in a hurry and didn’t take the time to locate them, I probably would wade right through their feeding position, or cast over them and they would be off to the safety of deeper water.

cuttbow

Many drift boats/rafts beach on the flats that I frequent. Anglers generally get out of their boat, immediately wade through the shallow relatively calm flat to reach the main current flow or edge where they repeatedly work their nymph rigs. Usually they catch fish. However with this tactic they miss some of the best visual angling that the river has to offer. Some large trout like to feed lazily on the slow water flats. They slide in from deeper water and position themselves wherever there is some sort of gentle current channeling drifting food. If you can find (see or hear) one of these subtle feeders and make a connection, you are in for a real treat. A large trout hooked on a shallow flat heads for deeper water at breakneck speed. Often they take me into my backing.

slow flat off of main flow

When sight-fishing  I always try to pick a shallow flat where the sun is going to be on my back. If it is cloudy it does not matter as trout rise more frequently and confidently when the light is low and a hatch, if there is going to be one, will be stronger.

 

 

 

The featured trout were caught on the shallow flats of a local tailwater river.