It has been a long time since we posted a report. A busy spring and first half of the summer as well as time spent with family has kept me off the computer. We had a lot of productive float trips this June and early July with water temps hanging on for the month of June on the Andro and some of our other floats producing through July. Lately the small stream fishing has been very productive with dries and dry droppers producing very well.
A fine male brown that took a size 16 caddis pupa on a float earlier this season.
Current conditions:
With the hot weather this week we’ve been doing some smallmouth floats and have found some larger bass lately. These fish fight hard, jump like crazy and take surface poppers and dragon flies out of the air what is not to like? Today looks to be the hottest day of the summer which is one reason I am sitting here writing this instead of getting out on the water. Fortunately, things begin to cool off tomorrow with rain in the forecast for tonight through tomorrow night. By next week a cooler pattern takes over with highs in the low to mid 70’s and lows in the lower 50’s from Tuesday through the end of the work week. While most of our streams are on the lower side of average for this time of the year there are rain chances again next week and we should see some happy trout as things cool and flows bump a bit.
Cody Floyd of Ledge Brewing holding a trophy smallmouth caught while throwing streamers just the other day!
Bugs:
On our smaller streams We’ve been doing well fishing black caddis in the mornings. An emerging pupae in size 20 as well as adult black caddis cdc dries size 20-16 have been working well. By late morning when the wind picks up ants, beetles and hoppers begin producing. A high floating attractor dry with a Baetis nymph below has been a deadly combo. For smallmouth our own mini crayfish jig as well as Clouser style streamers have done well along with Chris Thompson’s foam dragonfly for when the fish are up top.
We love guiding kids for wild native brook trout. Nate’s nephew Rowan with a fine specimen!
Looking forward:
As we get into the middle of August fish will become a little more educated and fishing 6Xinstead of 5X can make the difference between looks and eats. By the third week of August we should begin seeing some fall hatches of October Caddis, Light Cahill's in the evenings and Isonychia mayflies on the Andro. As soon as the Andro cools off these bugs will be prominent, and the fish will take advantage of this bigger mayfly. Along with these aquatic insects look for flying ant swarms on humid late summer days. I’ve written a lot about these ants over the years as they can produce some of the best dry fly bites of the season. Some years we only get a day or two of good ant swarms while on other years they give us many days of great dry fly fishing. Usually beginning in the early afternoon you will see the larger female ants arrive first typically in a size 14-18 the color of honey or cinnamon the fish are eager to eat these bigger ants. After a few hours the males arrive in droves to mate with the females outnumbering the girls by about 100 to 1 the trout typically switch their focus to this smaller but more numerous food source. fishing to a trout rising to millions of natural size 22 ants can be a frustrating experience but an accurate cast on a consistently rising fish with a small chocolate ant usually gets the job done and can result on very large trout on small dries.
Nicole with one of many nice browns she caught while Tenkara fishing with us the other day!
Availability:
Our books for the fall are filling fast. We still have some dates for late August and early September (5-7 and 13-14 come to mind). October 13th and 15th are still open and we have a good number of dates available with our other guides. After the regular trout season closes October 15th we still have productive trout water open on the Andro as well as the Pike game on the Connecticut and some local lakes and ponds. Give us a should asap if you want to get out this summer or fall! As always thank you to all who have fished with us this season and we look forward to seeing many of you later this season!
Tight Lines,
Nate