Three Streams and Appalachian Caviar

Hit the road at 5am to beat the heat and to meet my good friend Matt on the stream Tuesday. The "Hot and Now"sign got me hot and bothered, so I swung in for a buzz while listening to Mountain Mornings on WNCW. Tony Rice was singing "Brown Mountain Lights" when I took my first sip.

Fuel.  WNCW and the Filet Mignon of doughnuts.

The river was 60 degrees at 6:45 am and had plenty of water. The fishing was never hot, but did slow as the day grew warmer. I duped 6 into the net by 11:30, then hit the pavement home. 

riverside shrooms

first fish of the day

Bonus time came after a phone call revealed I was free to 4pm! I swung off the road on the way home, under the steamy miday sun and wet my feet again. This stream was 70 degrees, the air temp was 90 degrees, and the fishing was TOUGH. The little guy below kept the skunk off. I left the water early in search of a watering hole. Thank you Highland Gaelic.

Early this week I made plans to take some guys to a swimming hole today.  This morning I rose at a civil time, and we departed for the swimming hole at 9:30am. I threw a rod in the car just in case I got a chance to prospect the waters for bows and browns.  I dreamed of finding a chunky brown in one of the deep holes.  Third cast, I found the surprise below.

Wild Appalachian Brook Trout

 I fished maybe 30 minutes between 11:30 and 1pm and landed 2 brook trout, a brown, and missed a few including 14 inch brown that ran under a rock and came unbuttoned. I'll be back to fish more and swim less soon I hope. Here are a few more pics.

Salamander Eggs. You can see eye balls and tails. Appalachian caviar.

the boys

colorful brookie.  reds, black, blue, oranges, greens, and white.

I presume the water quality of this stream is great after finding these painted char. The one above looked aged, even though he was small. 

PS.  The fly in the fishes mouth above is a BH flashback CDC Pheasant Tail. I picked it up in Colorado, and it has been a great fly on wild streams.  

Go fish. I probably can't for a while.

Crooked Creek, Colorado

Willow Choked Crooked Creek, Fraser Colorado

I was at another Young Life property last week and weaseled in a little time on Crooked Creek that winds through the camp there.  It's a tiny stream that carves it's way through thick willows and is full of beaver dams and little brook trout.

Here is a sample of a typical brookie from the stream.

Colorado Brook Trout

The highlight of what little fishing I did was putting two high school guys onto their first trout.  They were both on the trip with me at camp, and even though we live near trout in NC, they had to travel to Colorado to catch their first. I had them dead drifting and skating a foam yellow sallie.  They both missed a few fish, which was exciting in and of itself.  We found a little run that had a number of eager brookies. After a few more missed hook sets, they both landed their first fish on the fly. They couldn't resist that sallie or trude skating across the top of the water.

Here are some more shots of the creek.

pool above a little beaver dam

light rain on a large beaver pond

another larger beaver pond

one of many crooked bends in Crooked Creek

I found a hitch hiker yellow sallie stone that rode back to the cabin with me. 

Brook trout aren't picky. Great starter fish for any bigginers.

Down in a Holler

deep, dark hills of Western NC

Fished a new stream near the NC/TN border with some friends yesterday.  It was down in a holler with some interesting characters and full of southern appalachian culture, including a little patch of marijuana  by the stream.  I walked under a number of personal drive way bridges, some rather dodgey, creepy,  and old.  Being a native of the WNC mountains, i felt like a "feriner*" in the area on this day.


*foreigner -pronounced fer-i-ner by my grandparents. Meaning, he ain't from around here.


The stream is a hatchery supported stream in its lower stretches, but was full of little wild fish and the occasional migrated stocker.

lingering rhodo blooms stream side

The water was off color, and I fished a double nymph rig all day.  I caught most fish on a red fox squirrel nymph (sz #12) with a hot spot, and the others on a red copper john or a cdc fb pheasant tail.  I hooked two fish over 14" but was unable to land either. I played one for a couple of minutes before it had me all turned around under a low hanging tree and came unbuttoned in the rapid below. All and all, landed about 30 fish in four hours with the fish below being slightly above average size for the stream.

Here are a few of the rouge stockers i found.

A stream worth making the 2 hour drive to another day. And I am slowly learning to look outside of the  national forrest and park boundaries to find quality wild fish. There are THOUSANDS of streams in the NC mountains, most of which hold fish.

Arkansas River, CO

Ark River Brown

I know.  A two month hiatus from the blog. I have been on a two month trek into the wilderness, fishing everyday, with no internet access.  Not exactly.  However, I was in Colorado three weeks with work, and did manage to get two quick trips to the Arkansas River near Buena Vista, Colorado in.  Here are the goods.

I was able to fish a private section of the Arkansas near Nathrop twice during my 3 weeks at Young Life's Frontier Ranch.  This section was full of cookie cutter 14" wild brown trout.  The flows were lower this June (typical run off season) than they were in August 8 years ago due to the non-existant snow pack this winter. By lower flows, I mean it was running at 350 cfs as opposed to the 4000 cfs it was running last June. It made fro great wading in this typically big water.

Double stone fly rigs were the ticket. A big foam dry with a bead head stone dropper in the evening, or a double stonefly nymph rig in the heat of the day.

The fish below took me to my backing.  I think it was the first time that's ever happened to me on a trout.

Leroy made a run

This brown below was maybe the prettiest brown I have ever landed.  It was on fire with red fins and spots.

A total of 3.5 hours, 45 minutes one night at dusk and 2 hours and fifteen minutes in the heat of the afternoon, yielded about 10-12 fish.  3 rainbows, and the rest wild browns, most of which were 14 plus inches, but none bigger than 16".

Back in the winter, I didn't even think I would bother fishing during my three weeks in Colorado due to the traditional run off that would occur.  Turns out, run off was a non-event this year.  Fish have been fattening up and feeding like crazy with low flows and warmer water temps.  It will be a banner Spring and Summer on the Arkansas. Wish I had more the 3.5 hours to fish it.

Later Leroy

Fishpond Waterdance Guide Pack Review

I have owned my Fishpond Waterdance Guide Pack for about 5 years now, and it is by far the best on-stream storage system I have ever owned.  It was my first step from a fly vest to a pack, and though it looks much smaller, it's storage capacity was easily double that of most vests.

I wanted a pack that could hold everything I need on the stream so I could just grab my waders, boots, rod, and pack and hit the road for a fishing trip.  I store 3 reels, 4 fly boxes, split shot, frogs fanny, leaders, tippet, etc. in this bag.  It has two water bottle sleeves on either side that I usually use for indicators and little plastic cups of flies. The front pocket unzips to look like the inside of a fly box. This is where I store streamers, san jauns, and flies I don't want to return to the correct box when I'm on the stream and in a hurry. The middle compartment has a hook for you car keys that I always use. The middle compartment is where I store my reels, leaders, and other miscellaneous items. The back compartment is the big one where I store my fly boxes in.  It is constructed of primarily ripstop nylon, so flies don't tend to get permanently lodged in the pack.

The pack can be worn as a chest pack or a lumbar pack.  I tend to wear it off the front and to the left to leave room for casting.  I've found that as full as I keep the pack stocked, it can get in the way if I wear it on my chest.  If you don't remember to zip a compartment back up, when you lean to land a fish, you may dump a lot of its contents in the river.  Thats user error though, not poor product design.  When this pack is empty, it is super light and compact.  It almost functions like an accordion, allowing you to easily store a lot or just a little gear. If you need a new pack or vest, I highly recommend the Fishpond guide. I also have an Orvis sling pack that is cool, but it doesn't compare to the the Guide.

Video of the Day

One in Winter from ryan peterson on Vimeo.

Colorado Quickie (part 2)

View from the rappel site at Frontier Ranch

We had less that 12 hours to fish on our Colorado trip before our meetings started, and 3 of those hours (6am-9am) were expected to be cold and slow.  We opted for more sleep Tuesday morning, visited the local fly and coffee shops in BV, and drove 45 minutes downstream to access some warmer water on the Arkansas River that promised more bug life.

riggin up

We were armed with BWO emergers, caddis larvae, and other bed head nymphs, but we were surprised with about 2 hours of dry fly fishing.  We fished for about 5 hours and never moved more than 100 yards upstream.  At first, the emergers where the ticket, but when fish started rising, we tied on dries and fished a slow and steady hatch. Caddis and BWO's where in the air, and the BWO (baetis) seemed to be the snack of choice.

cookie cutter 14" wild brown

The hatch would come in waves, and risers were everywhere on the left side of the river.  Wild browns tearing up the surface is flippin' awesome. A size 18 parachute olive produced the most fish for me, and a number 20 barr's emerger after that.  I never picked up a fish on the emerger when they where feeding on the surface.  I thought I had some cdc comparadun olives, but I didn't.  I think that would have been money. Ward caught exclusively rainbows, one over 16 inches.  I caught more browns, but did have a few rainbows in the mix.

Ark river bow

I enjoyed fishing the Arkansas more than the Dream Stream simply because it was clear, big water, and fish acted like fish.  You also had views of white capped fourteeners in the background. All the browns in the Ark are wild, and all the bows were stocked 10 inchers at one time. You can see how quickly they begin to look (and act) wild in the above picture. Note the white tips on the fins. I even did a stream side survey for a biologist who filled me in on the colorado river strain, whirling disease resistant, rainbows they stock.

Dry fly fishing pre-runoff was great.  Can't wait to get back. That river is loaded with fish.

A bazzillion caddis larva waiting for the Mother's Day Hatch.