fishing, casting, and recruiting

riverman wrote:

I SAW A HATCH! I mean, REALLY saw a hatch!

Cool. Fishing a mayfly hatch is the essential flyfishing experience,
IMO. The day before yesterday I went to the Big Wood a second time for
the green drake hatch. These are big bugs -- size 12 -- and the fish go
nuts for them. It was outstanding.

I lost what I thought was my last green drake dry fly on a fish
(AARRGH!), so I tried a a few flies that I thought might work -- a #12
parachute adams, a very small green-bodied stimulator, and a #12 green
EHC. The fish utterly ignored them. Then I found an actual green drake
pattern in my crowded flybox and again caught fish. It brought home to
me the importance of matching the hatch under these conditions.

--
Cut "to the chase" for my email address.

"rw" wrote in message
m...
riverman wrote:

I SAW A HATCH! I mean, REALLY saw a hatch!

Cool. Fishing a mayfly hatch is the essential flyfishing experience,
IMO. The day before yesterday I went to the Big Wood a second time for
the green drake hatch. These are big bugs -- size 12 -- and the fish go
nuts for them. It was outstanding.


Did you, or have you ever noticed what I mentioned about the 'diagonal
rising zone' of the nymphs on a stream? I always sort of figured that the
nymphs would be rising in a sort of inverted snowstorm: all going upwards at
all depths of the water column. What I saw was quite different, up by the
source eddy, there were none near the surface, and I suppose a dozen meters
downstream, there were none at the bottom.

--riverman

riverman wrote:

Did you, or have you ever noticed what I mentioned about the 'diagonal
rising zone' of the nymphs on a stream? I always sort of figured that the
nymphs would be rising in a sort of inverted snowstorm: all going upwards at
all depths of the water column. What I saw was quite different, up by the
source eddy, there were none near the surface, and I suppose a dozen meters
downstream, there were none at the bottom.

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by "diagonal rising zone." I've
never seen nymphs rising to the surface. Maybe your eyesight is better
than mine.

One thing I have noticed, and particularly in this green drake hatch, is
that the bugs weren't emerging all over the river. They appeared in a
certain type of current -- fast and deep. The river is still pretty
high, but clear. These were not places you'd normally expect to find
trout holding. The only reason they were there was to feed actively, and
they didn't have much time to nail the big duns.

One cool thing is that you could tell where the mayflies were emerging
by watching birds. Robin, blackbirds, and western tanagers would swoop
out from the back to nab duns in the air, and tree swallows would pick
them off the surface.

--
Cut "to the chase" for my email address.

"rw" wrote in message
m...
riverman wrote:

Did you, or have you ever noticed what I mentioned about the 'diagonal
rising zone' of the nymphs on a stream? I always sort of figured that
the
nymphs would be rising in a sort of inverted snowstorm: all going
upwards at
all depths of the water column. What I saw was quite different, up by
the
source eddy, there were none near the surface, and I suppose a dozen
meters
downstream, there were none at the bottom.

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by "diagonal rising zone." I've
never seen nymphs rising to the surface. Maybe your eyesight is better
than mine.

One thing I have noticed, and particularly in this green drake hatch, is
that the bugs weren't emerging all over the river. They appeared in a
certain type of current -- fast and deep. The river is still pretty
high, but clear. These were not places you'd normally expect to find
trout holding. The only reason they were there was to feed actively, and
they didn't have much time to nail the big duns.

One cool thing is that you could tell where the mayflies were emerging
by watching birds. Robin, blackbirds, and western tanagers would swoop
out from the back to nab duns in the air, and tree swallows would pick
them off the surface.

You can use the bird situation to model the 'diagonal rising zone'. If the
emergers were coming up at a certain spot in the river, and there was as
light breeze (say, blowing southwards), then the birds would not all be
congregating above that spot on the river, at all heights. The ones who were
feeding low to the water would be right above that spot, but the duns that
got past those birds would be blown to the south as they rose. So you'd
expect the birds at higher elevations to be farther to the south. This is
the 'diagonal rising zone' of the duns.

In the water, its the same. Imagine a deep pool of slow water, with an
outlet on the downstream side. If there are rising nymphs throughout the
water column in the deep pool, then there are nymphs getting sucked into the
outlet current at all levels. But, a few feet downstream from the pool,
there won't be any nymphs at the bottom; they will have risen a few inches,
so there will be an 'empty zone' along the bottom of the river from that
point on down. Dragging a nymph through that zone will be useless. The
'diagonal rising zone' is the diagonal zone where the nymphs are, starting
at the bottom near the pool and rising to the surface several meters
downstream, depending on the current.

In Wales, all the nymphs I saw swhere I was standing were between 1 and 2
feet below the surface: I looked deeper and never saw one go by at knee
level, and (in an effort to keep my sleeves dry) I tried to find one near
the surface to scoop up, but never saw one shallower than 1 foot deep. Also,
there were no fish rising near me, but they were rising about 10 meters
downstream from me, or in the calm pool above me. I suspect the fish near me
were eating nymphs that were 1-2 feet deep, that the fish 5 meters
downstream from me were eating nymphs that were 6 inches to 1 foot deep, and
the fish 10 meters downstream were eating nymphs on the surface.

--riverman

riverman wrote:

You can use the bird situation to model the 'diagonal rising zone'. If the
emergers were coming up at a certain spot in the river, and there was as
light breeze (say, blowing southwards), then the birds would not all be
congregating above that spot on the river, at all heights. The ones who were
feeding low to the water would be right above that spot, but the duns that
got past those birds would be blown to the south as they rose. So you'd
expect the birds at higher elevations to be farther to the south. This is
the 'diagonal rising zone' of the duns.

In the water, its the same. Imagine a deep pool of slow water, with an
outlet on the downstream side. If there are rising nymphs throughout the
water column in the deep pool, then there are nymphs getting sucked into the
outlet current at all levels. But, a few feet downstream from the pool,
there won't be any nymphs at the bottom; they will have risen a few inches,
so there will be an 'empty zone' along the bottom of the river from that
point on down. Dragging a nymph through that zone will be useless. The
'diagonal rising zone' is the diagonal zone where the nymphs are, starting
at the bottom near the pool and rising to the surface several meters
downstream, depending on the current.

That clears it up. As I understand what you're saying, the current is
taking the emerging nymphs downstream as they rise through the water
column, so you find them at different depths depending on how far
downstream they are from the bottom.

Fishing emergers is something that's mostly beyond my experience. I've
had some success with midge emergers on the San Juan, but I mostly try
to dead-drift nymphs near the bottom. Willi is the by far the best
emerger flyfisher I've ever seen. I've watched him catch some big fish
that way, when everyone else was getting frustrated fishing dry flies.
It seems to me like something that has to be learned with much
experience and great attention to what's going on with the bugs and the
fish.

I'm going to offer a question for ROFF: What are the coolest hatches
you've ever seen? Here's my list:

- Brown Drakes on Silver Creek, Idaho. These huge mayflies (#8) make a
phenomenal spinner fall in the evening, and continue through the night.
You can catch fish in the pitch black of night, striking by ear.

- Morning Tricos on Silver Creek. Another spinner fall. It requires a
dead calm, or the tiny bugs are blown off the water. The fish feed on
pods, hoovering in rafts of bugs. You fish downstream, aiming your fly
into a mouth.

- Salmonflies on Marsh Creek and the Middle Fork of the Salmon. Huge
gyrocopter-like bugs that always look on the verge of crashing.

- Black caddis on the Bighorn. Keep your mouth closed.

- Green drakes on the Big Wood.

--
Cut "to the chase" for my email address.

I'm not sure of the insect type, as it was early in my ff experience but I
saw a hatch on Wilson Creek one time. The bugs were comin' to the top of
the water and looked like popcorn poppin'--HONESTLY. Their wings would
unfold (?), they would float with the current momentarily and then fly off.
It was really neat, as I had never seen anything like it, and I wasn't sure
what was happenin' at first. Finally it dawned on me what was taking place.
I had only read about hatches, in books, at that time.

I have since seen many bugs emerge in numbers, but never like my first
experience.

Mark
"rw" wrote in message
m...
riverman wrote:

You can use the bird situation to model the 'diagonal rising zone'. If
the
emergers were coming up at a certain spot in the river, and there was as
light breeze (say, blowing southwards), then the birds would not all be
congregating above that spot on the river, at all heights. The ones who
were
feeding low to the water would be right above that spot, but the duns
that
got past those birds would be blown to the south as they rose. So you'd
expect the birds at higher elevations to be farther to the south. This
is
the 'diagonal rising zone' of the duns.

In the water, its the same. Imagine a deep pool of slow water, with an
outlet on the downstream side. If there are rising nymphs throughout the
water column in the deep pool, then there are nymphs getting sucked into
the
outlet current at all levels. But, a few feet downstream from the pool,
there won't be any nymphs at the bottom; they will have risen a few
inches,
so there will be an 'empty zone' along the bottom of the river from that
point on down. Dragging a nymph through that zone will be useless. The
'diagonal rising zone' is the diagonal zone where the nymphs are,
starting
at the bottom near the pool and rising to the surface several meters
downstream, depending on the current.

That clears it up. As I understand what you're saying, the current is
taking the emerging nymphs downstream as they rise through the water
column, so you find them at different depths depending on how far
downstream they are from the bottom.

Fishing emergers is something that's mostly beyond my experience. I've
had some success with midge emergers on the San Juan, but I mostly try
to dead-drift nymphs near the bottom. Willi is the by far the best
emerger flyfisher I've ever seen. I've watched him catch some big fish
that way, when everyone else was getting frustrated fishing dry flies.
It seems to me like something that has to be learned with much
experience and great attention to what's going on with the bugs and the
fish.

I'm going to offer a question for ROFF: What are the coolest hatches
you've ever seen? Here's my list:

- Brown Drakes on Silver Creek, Idaho. These huge mayflies (#8) make a
phenomenal spinner fall in the evening, and continue through the night.
You can catch fish in the pitch black of night, striking by ear.

- Morning Tricos on Silver Creek. Another spinner fall. It requires a
dead calm, or the tiny bugs are blown off the water. The fish feed on
pods, hoovering in rafts of bugs. You fish downstream, aiming your fly
into a mouth.

- Salmonflies on Marsh Creek and the Middle Fork of the Salmon. Huge
gyrocopter-like bugs that always look on the verge of crashing.

- Black caddis on the Bighorn. Keep your mouth closed.

- Green drakes on the Big Wood.

--
Cut "to the chase" for my email address.

"Mark H. Bowen" wrote in message
...
I'm not sure of the insect type, as it was early in my ff experience but I
saw a hatch on Wilson Creek one time.

i have only seen a literal handful of hatches (as might be classicly
considered) in the carolina appalachians. first time was on hazel, on one
of the few times we were on the creek near dark. they were creamy, probably
sulphurs, based on what i saw described as such on penns. fish rose
everywhere, we would catch the odd riser, but nothing spectacular.
then, about ten years ago, at snowbird, during the first weekend in
april, a sort of reverse drizzle of little blue duns just went on for a
couple hours or more; i can honestly say that, for the first time in my
north carolina experience, i truly "matched the hatch" with the smallest
adams para in my box, and actually caught more fish than with a standard
attractor.
couple years after that, there was a green drake hatch on lower hazel
that only lasted about 30 mins. i didn't see the first fish rise. the duns
looked like little toys, bouncing down the riffles.
i've probably forgotten a couple more events, but you get the drift.

yfitons
wayno

From: rw


I'm going to offer a question for ROFF: What are the coolest hatches
you've ever seen? Here's my list:

- Brown Drakes on Silver Creek, Idaho. These huge mayflies (#8) make a
phenomenal spinner fall in the evening, and continue through the night.
You can catch fish in the pitch black of night, striking by ear.

- Morning Tricos on Silver Creek. Another spinner fall. It requires a
dead calm, or the tiny bugs are blown off the water. The fish feed on
pods, hoovering in rafts of bugs. You fish downstream, aiming your fly
into a mouth.


- Salmonflies on Marsh Creek and the Middle Fork of the Salmon. Huge
gyrocopter-like bugs that always look on the verge of crashing.

- Black caddis on the Bighorn. Keep your mouth closed.

- Green drakes on the Big Wood.

Siphlonurus Alternatus on the Swift in MA. The spinner fall rather than the
hatch. The big size 10 spinners drop right at dark, and sometimes in such
numbers that attempting to fish it is useless. Sadly, this hatch seems to be
disappearing on this river for no apparent reason.

Trico spinner fall on the Battenkill. Same as you described on Silver Creek.
The Eastern Tricos are *small*, 26 and 28 toward the end of the hatch. I used
to tie a "double" fly on an 18 or 20 so I could use a decent sized hook. Worked
to an extent, but was far from perfect.

Hendrickson/Red Quill hatch on the Farmington River in CT. Here again sometimes
so heavy at it's peak it is nearly impossible to fish.


George Adams

"All good fishermen stay young until they die, for fishing is the only dream of
youth that doth not grow stale with age."
---- J.W Muller

the only true "hatch" i've experienced was penns creek 2000, march
browns, sulphurs, black caddis, and grey caddis. a blizzard of bugs
that excited the fish for hours throughout the day, not just minutes
near dark. it's caused me to return each year since, but i've not seen
it repeated. this year, for about 20 minutes around dark was
close...even saw my first green drake.

the waters, wildlife, and scenery of montana and idaho, not the hatches
(so far), have seduced me as well... maybe this year the bugs will sing
the sirens' song, eh?

jeff

rw wrote:

I'm going to offer a question for ROFF: What are the coolest hatches
you've ever seen? Here's my list:

- Brown Drakes on Silver Creek, Idaho. These huge mayflies (#8) make a
phenomenal spinner fall in the evening, and continue through the night.
You can catch fish in the pitch black of night, striking by ear.

- Morning Tricos on Silver Creek. Another spinner fall. It requires a
dead calm, or the tiny bugs are blown off the water. The fish feed on
pods, hoovering in rafts of bugs. You fish downstream, aiming your fly
into a mouth.

- Salmonflies on Marsh Creek and the Middle Fork of the Salmon. Huge
gyrocopter-like bugs that always look on the verge of crashing.

- Black caddis on the Bighorn. Keep your mouth closed.

- Green drakes on the Big Wood.

"Jeff Miller" wrote in message
news:RBFDc.5744$mN3.1637@lakeread06...
the only true "hatch" i've experienced was penns creek 2000, march
browns, sulphurs, black caddis, and grey caddis. a blizzard of bugs
that excited the fish for hours throughout the day, not just minutes
near dark. it's caused me to return each year since, but i've not seen
it repeated. this year, for about 20 minutes around dark was
close...even saw my first green drake.


I remember my first green drake, at least I think thats what it was. I
posted on roff about it. My overwhelming thought was of recognition from all
the pictures I had seen. It was an amazing feeling.

--riverman