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Mayfly Hatch Shows Up on Radar in Minnesota
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Mayfly Hatch Shows Up on Radar in Minnesota
On Jul 27, 10:23*am, rw wrote:
http://www.myfoxtwincities.com/dpp/n...y-hatch-nws-ra... A pity they didn't identify the bug(s). The usual suspect for showing up on radar in this part of the world is Hexagenia limbata, but the hex hatch is mostly a June phenomenon.....usually.....albeit there is often a secondary hatch in August in some places. In any case, that's the bug that famously gets fire-hosed or snow-plowed off the bridges, streets and parking lots. It's also the one that brings confirmed bottom feeders like carp, suckers and sturgeon (as well as pretty much everybody else) up to feed on dries. Fishing this hatch is one of the more interesting experiences to be had in fly fishing. giles. |
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Mayfly Hatch Shows Up on Radar in Minnesota
On Jul 27, 11:23*pm, rw wrote:
http://www.myfoxtwincities.com/dpp/n...y-hatch-nws-ra... -- Cut "to the chase" for my email address. LOL, Imagine how many flyfishermen between Wisconsin and Ohio were simultaneously saying "Whow! What a great hatch!" and thinking they were lucky because it was local. -riverman |
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Mayfly Hatch Shows Up on Radar in Minnesota
"Giles" wrote in message ... On Jul 27, 10:23 am, rw wrote: http://www.myfoxtwincities.com/dpp/n...y-hatch-nws-ra... A pity they didn't identify the bug(s). The usual suspect for showing up on radar in this part of the world is Hexagenia limbata, but the hex hatch is mostly a June phenomenon.....usually.....albeit there is often a secondary hatch in August in some places. In any case, that's the bug that famously gets fire-hosed or snow-plowed off the bridges, streets and parking lots. It's also the one that brings confirmed bottom feeders like carp, suckers and sturgeon (as well as pretty much everybody else) up to feed on dries. Fishing this hatch is one of the more interesting experiences to be had in fly fishing. giles. Sturgeon feeding on dry flies? Seriously? I have caught several over the years, however never in my wildest dreams would I think of catching one on a dry fly... My Father and I have always used smelt right on the bottom... While fishing for them as a kid below Bonneville Dam, late night, early morning when it was dark you could see (in the moon light ) and hear them jumping. I always thought they were just jumping to jump, maybe they were feeding on something?? JT |
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Mayfly Hatch Shows Up on Radar in Minnesota
On Jul 28, 10:32*am, "JT" wrote:
Sturgeon feeding on dry flies? Seriously? Never seen it myself. Never even seen a live sturgeon in the wild, for that matter. But I've heard reports from what I consider to be reliable witnesses. I have caught several over the years, however never in my wildest dreams would I think of catching one on a dry fly... My Father and I have always used smelt right on the bottom... While fishing for them as a kid below Bonneville Dam, late night, early morning when it was dark you could see (in the moon light ) and hear them jumping. I always thought they were just jumping to jump, maybe they were feeding on something?? Might not actually be feeding on "dry" flies. Could be they're just chasing the emergers up the water column. I don't know. In any case, serious bottom huggers like sturgeon or suckers jumping just for the sheer joy of it seems to me at least as weird as chasing bugs at or very near the surface. There was a time, early in my fly-fishing career, when I was so fixated on catching fish.....ANY fish, that I pursued suckers with as much vigor and enthusiasm as trout and bluegills. During their spawning runs up the creeks in the spring, I used to see pods of twenty or more holding in runs at the bottom of riffles. And these were BIG fish.....vastly larger than the puny trout I was accustomed to. Some of them probably ran close to ten pounds. I flogged them with everything in my not inconsiderable arsenal......wets, dries, nymphs, streamers, terrestrials.....everything in the book. Never got a single taker. Never even snagged one. In the ensuing years I've heard a good deal about people fly-fishing, successfully, for carp. I've never managed to do that either. Interestingly though, I've heard nothing that I can recall about anyone actually catching suckers (or sturgeon, for that matter) on flies.* I'd be interested in hearing or reading more about it. giles *bait is another matter. LOTS of people around here will fish for suckers and carp (no sturgeon to be caught legally in southeast curdistan.....though there has been some encouraging news about restocking them in the milwaukee river in recent years) and a good few, mostly recent immigrants from southeast asia, who relish them at the table. well, caught from clean water they make good enough table fare.....but the very few experiences i've had with the local produce suggests that one might just as well stick to the reeking, pestilential, rotting chemical time bomb salmonids that swim up the local sewers in their futile annual efforts to spawn. |
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Mayfly Hatch Shows Up on Radar in Minnesota
On Jul 28, 8:04*am, riverman wrote:
On Jul 27, 11:23*pm, rw wrote: http://www.myfoxtwincities.com/dpp/n...y-hatch-nws-ra... -- Cut "to the chase" for my email address. LOL, Imagine how many flyfishermen between Wisconsin and Ohio were simultaneously saying "Whow! What a great hatch!" and thinking they were lucky because it was local. -riverman An amusing visual that I suspect not too many locals actually fall prey to. A "hatch" as the term is used in fly-fishing is a concept that takes a bit of enculturation to absorb. Where I grew up, in a fly-fishing sense, the "hex" and the "mother's day caddis"* were THE hatches that defined the term. Since both (like most hatches) are temporally restricted, most nascent fly fishers in the region are likely to hear a great deal about them before actually experiencing either. Where the hatches are huge (as demonstrated by the radar images at the start of this thread) most people are at least dimly aware of their extent even if they have never heard of fly-fishing. giles *when's the last time you had a hundred or more.....maybe SEVERAL hundred....bugs crawling all over you (inside your shirt, inside your waders, under your hat, on your glasses, in your ears) while you were watching several million more in the air, millions more swirling in eddies on the stream, millions more still awaiting emergence on the bottom, and many millions more on every surface in sight, and thought....."wow, THIS is cool!"? |
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Mayfly Hatch Shows Up on Radar in Minnesota
"Giles" wrote in message ... *when's the last time you had a hundred or more.....maybe SEVERAL hundred....bugs crawling all over you (inside your shirt, inside your waders, under your hat, on your glasses, in your ears) while you were watching several million more in the air, millions more swirling in eddies on the stream, millions more still awaiting emergence on the bottom, and many millions more on every surface in sight, and thought....."wow, THIS is cool!"? I believe it was May 25, Stan's Pool, Penn's Creek. Tom |
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Mayfly Hatch Shows Up on Radar in Minnesota
On Jul 28, 6:51*pm, Giles wrote:
snip In the ensuing years I've heard a good deal about people fly-fishing, successfully, for carp. *I've never managed to do that either. Interestingly though, I've heard nothing that I can recall about anyone actually catching suckers (or sturgeon, for that matter) on flies.* *I'd be interested in hearing or reading more about it. giles snip I used to flyfish for winter steelhead (PNW) - using either heavily weighted maribou or leech type patterns or unweighted standard steelhead patterns with a fast sinking tip line and short leader. It was not at all uncommon to hook 1-3 suckers - in the mouth - on each trip. They were generally in the 3-5# range, but the adrenaline rush of feeling a decent fish on the end of the line was always followed by the disappointment of a very sluggish fight. Bob Weinberger |
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Mayfly Hatch Shows Up on Radar in Minnesota
On Jul 31, 3:27*am, Bob wrote:
I used to flyfish for winter steelhead (PNW) - using either heavily weighted maribou or leech type patterns or unweighted standard steelhead patterns with a fast sinking tip line and short leader. It was not at all uncommon to hook 1-3 suckers - in the mouth - on each trip. Not to disparage your angling skills, Bob, but in the absence of testimony to the contrary one must suppose that if you caught suckers frequently then others must have done so as well. Makes me wonder why so few have reported their successes. They were generally in the 3-5# range, but the adrenaline rush of feeling a decent fish on the end of the line was always followed by the disappointment of a very sluggish fight. Ah, perhaps the answer to my question lies therein. Maybe others have managed to find a way to avoid catching them and yet maintain a sense of decorum and modesty sufficient to refrain from gloating! Unfortunately, neither scenario does me much personal good as I cannot honestly claim membership in either camp. In any case, thanks for the report. I know that many people actively pursue suckers, as they do carp, and that they then frequently pickle or smoke them for consumption. I've tried both and found the results satisfactory. The sluggishness you mention undoubtedly explains why suckers, unlike carp, don't appear to be targeted for "sport" fishing. Still, if catching them on flies of one sort or another is effective (as it is with at least some other food fishes.....bluegills, my own personal favorite, come readily to mind) I wonder why so few meat fishers appear to rely heavily on fly fishing. giles. Bob Weinberger |
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