At last, the Trout can breath (literally) a sigh of relief and drop back into the mainstream after being couped up in the spring fed feeders trying to escape the 80F water temps . The river is now running in the high 60s and dropping on a daily basis.
The long week-end provided some great trout fishing and the small mouth bass are still active.
Friday evening I had 6 trout up to 18 inches and failed to connect on several more, not bad for three hours. The big guy gave up a bonus size 28 rusty spinner and a foot of 8x nylon in addition to my more modest 20 trico spinner. An angler 100 ft downstream claimed the lost fly but somehow it stayed in my flybox :devil:
Saturday saw the first generating release from Falls Village dam for a few weeks, so the river was running dirty but wadeable. After checking out various holes I headed downstream to Bulls Bridge and fished the CL&P access point. The realy nice thing about this stretch is the water level is always constant between the dam and the power utility a couple of miles downstream. I managed to coax a few trout out of one hole on an Isonychia pattern.
Yesterday I fished the upper TMA pools for the first time - "Push em Up pool" and "Doctors Hole". Doctors gave up about two dozen smallies but no trout. Further downstream I must have raised a dozen trout but just couldn't get a hook-set. When I got back to my car I actually felt cold last night - 59F on the ride home - some difference to a week ago!
Today was another Generating release day so I waited until 5pm before hitting the river. The water was still up and colored four hours after shutdown but anglers were having success with BWOs on the surface. The level dropped and cleared over the three hours and I managed another three trout - best going about 18 inches and missed many other strikes. Hot pattern was again my trusty size 20 trico spinner and a size 12 cream spinner as it got dark. There is a cream mayfly which hatches sporadically through the summer evenings but is ignored by the trout until darkness falls - then white wulffs and cream spinners do quite well. Another angler across the stream switched to a white wulff and landed two. I also noticed a number of recently hatched black midges this evening.
The BWO hatches are becoming more consistent. They appear in small batches which get the fish all exited then everything goes quiet until the next flotilla comes sailing by. It can only get better from here on
The long week-end provided some great trout fishing and the small mouth bass are still active.
Friday evening I had 6 trout up to 18 inches and failed to connect on several more, not bad for three hours. The big guy gave up a bonus size 28 rusty spinner and a foot of 8x nylon in addition to my more modest 20 trico spinner. An angler 100 ft downstream claimed the lost fly but somehow it stayed in my flybox :devil:
Saturday saw the first generating release from Falls Village dam for a few weeks, so the river was running dirty but wadeable. After checking out various holes I headed downstream to Bulls Bridge and fished the CL&P access point. The realy nice thing about this stretch is the water level is always constant between the dam and the power utility a couple of miles downstream. I managed to coax a few trout out of one hole on an Isonychia pattern.
Yesterday I fished the upper TMA pools for the first time - "Push em Up pool" and "Doctors Hole". Doctors gave up about two dozen smallies but no trout. Further downstream I must have raised a dozen trout but just couldn't get a hook-set. When I got back to my car I actually felt cold last night - 59F on the ride home - some difference to a week ago!
Today was another Generating release day so I waited until 5pm before hitting the river. The water was still up and colored four hours after shutdown but anglers were having success with BWOs on the surface. The level dropped and cleared over the three hours and I managed another three trout - best going about 18 inches and missed many other strikes. Hot pattern was again my trusty size 20 trico spinner and a size 12 cream spinner as it got dark. There is a cream mayfly which hatches sporadically through the summer evenings but is ignored by the trout until darkness falls - then white wulffs and cream spinners do quite well. Another angler across the stream switched to a white wulff and landed two. I also noticed a number of recently hatched black midges this evening.
The BWO hatches are becoming more consistent. They appear in small batches which get the fish all exited then everything goes quiet until the next flotilla comes sailing by. It can only get better from here on