Cheesman 1/15/2011

I finally made it out for the first fishing trip of the year. Coincidentally, it was also the first warm weekend day in a couple of weeks.  Not that cold weather keeps me off the water, but I'm not going to argue when a warm day and a fishing day happen to fall on the same date.

I was headed towards the mountains on 6th Avenue around 6:45 when traffic slowed to a crawl a mile or so before the I-70 exit.  By the time I got to the on ramp for C-470 traffic on the interstate was at a dead stop with ski traffic.  I love skiing, but I haven't put forth the effort in 6 or 7 years now because of the obvious.  With no traffic the closest ski area is an hour away.  I would be surprised if anybody made it to the lifts before noon.  Enough about skiing and traffic, I was headed south to tailwaters and fins.

I arrived at the parking lot around 8:00 and had the place virtually to myself, so I headed into the canyon.  In previous weeks the water releases from Cheesman Dam had been fluctuating, so I had high hopes of insects being flushed into the current and less wary trout.  The canyon had also been closed for a period this winter due to road construction staging in the parking areas.  I first hiked a ways into the canyon to some of my favorite water knowing I would be the first person that day to present a fly to these fish.  This was great, but it is still winter and the sun was an hour away from getting close to the water.  I spotted some fish and worked hard to no avail for the first couple of hours on the river, but I was greeted by this local when I sat in the snow to re-rig.

Finally around 11:00 when other anglers started to make their way upstream to where I was the fish started to move, staging for the days feeding.  It is usually not that obvious to witness the change of behavior in fish preparing to feed, but there was no question about what was happening. With the change of temperature, sunlight location and the movement of fish, everything started to come together.  It was now time to figure out what they were eating and start catching some fish.  It took a couple of patterns and switching out to 7x tippet before any fish were caught.  My first fish of the day was a healthy golden orange brown 17" long.  Previous to hooking the fish and after a couple weeks off the water the initial tug of the fish made me feel like a heroin addict that finally got it's fix.  Unfortunately, my fish pics did not turn out as I still had the camera set in macro mode and I wasn't about to change camera settings with a fish in the net.  Oh well, next time.

For the next couple of hours I hooked into a few more fish, but no others to the net.  This was no surprise as I was hooking fish in faster than expected water or water directly next to fast water with a size 26 midge on 7x tippet.  Bent hooks, broken tippet and spit flies was the story of the day.  With only one good fish to hand I felt like I had a great day for the middle of January in Cheesman Canyon.  The fish I hooked up with on average were larger than the average fish caught on the past couple of trips on the South Platte.

Just another great day of winter fishing in Colorado.

Flies:   #26 red midge pupae (OK, It was tied proportionally small on a #24 2x short hook), #10 Golden Stone
Flow:  About 140 cfs
Weather:  Cloudy in the low 50's

The Wile Water Wolf

Last night I was sitting at the tying bench as I do everyday trying to avoid the shack nasties now that I haven't wet a line in over 2 weeks. This is the longest dry spell I've had in the past year. This time I was looking for something new to play with. All my nymph boxes are packed full and there are 10 dozen flies lying on the bench without a home, so warm water species was the ticket.

After seeing all the great deer hair work from tyers on the Fly Tying Forum I figured I should step away from the foam divers and poppers to continue my education in working with deer hair. Here is my first attempt at separating hair colors, forming a collar and my first deer hair diver.

The thought of fishing warm water quickly turned more focused with thoughts of chasing the wile water wolf and my flies changed direction once again.  Unfortunately, while I was gathering materials for some pike flies I found I don't have the materials I was looking for.  This seams to be typical for me whenever I set down to tie.  It doesn't seam to matter how many materials I have, there is always some thing missing.  But I couldn't let this slow me down as tying only one warm water fly and walking away would make me feel lazy, unaccomplished or just straight guilty for the half assed effort.  I'm sure we can all agree that a half assed effort in fly fishing leads to a fishless day sitting on the bank with a big knot in our hands to unravel.  So I worked with what I did have available changing proportions and materials to create another half dozen basic pike flies in anticipation of spring, which I'm trying to convince myself is just around the corner.  Here is what I came up with.

They might not impress the fly tier, but I bet the wile water wolf won't slow down a charge long enough to notice.  A trip to the shop is clearly past due...... again.

Is it spring yet?

Urban Tailwater 12/26/10

Christmas had come and gone, the celebration of the holiday weekend has come to a close, it was only Sunday with sunny weather and I had a day to play.  What else is one to do?  I took off early in search of that one last gift.  I headed south driving on freeways and through cities.  This is not my average start to a day on the river, but being the middle of winter and BWO's hatching consistently, it was well worth it.  Besides I had some new fly patterns to test.

I pulled into the parking lot not far from the Pueblo dam before anyone else.  This was surprising to me as this once secret spot is far from secret anymore.  If it was, I would not be openly giving up exact locations.  Regardless, I was glad to find the place to myself for the short while I did.  This allowed me to fish some of my favorite holes before the fish have seen a thousand flies before mine.  The flip side is I found myself breaking ice out of guides for the first hour or so. My first rig quickly broke off to a rock partially due to gauging depth and structure in the water being difficult with no sun on the water.  I quickly re-rigged with a gold cdc emerger I received from Avril at Reel Sisters Colorado and hooked up my first fish of the day on the next cast.

By 10:00 the sun was bright and good hatches of midges starting coming off followed by consistent rising.  It was also around this time when I looked around and found myself surrounded by at least 6 other anglers and a steady stream of anglers still showing up.  I took off walking to escape the crowds and hopefully get some circulation back to my feet which were numb.  There was no way to get away from people as there were always a half dozen anglers in site at all times no matter how far I walked.  I decided to jump in and fish the less desirable water that has seen fewer anglers.  The good thing is there seemed to be fish every where I cast.  During the warmer part of the day a good number of BWO's that hatched earlier returned to the water to lay their eggs.  The fish were eating on the surface consistently.  I was able to fish a size 16 BWO dry with a dropper and fool fish one after the other for the next 2 hours until the sun got low and temperatures started to drop.  I re-rigged to a nymph and caught fish on the way back to the parking lot ending with four fish in the last few minutes.

Overall it was a very good day with at least a couple dozen fish to hand.  Most of them were in the 10 to 12 inch range (hence no fish pics) making for an action packed day on the water.  I didn't hook into any of the larger fish, but I wouldn't want to eat either with people walking in and disturbing the water every couple hundred feet most of the day.  A great conclusion to the holiday weekend and that one last gift to myself.

Flies:  They ate everything I threw at them including streamers, Czech's, BWO's, midges
Water Flow:  ~90 cfs
Weather:  Mid to low 50's, mostly sunny

A few things coming off the vice

On Friday my dad convinced me (that was real tough for him) we should run to the hills and wet a line.  It was a nice day out, little breeze and mostly sunny.  With the days only getter shorter (only 6 days left until the days start getting longer) there were more shadows on the water than sun.  We got a late start on the day so we didn't start fishing until 11:00ish.  We both found some fish and had some hookups and missed strikes, but neither of us successfully brought a fish to hand.  We decided to head down river to a stretch of water neither of us has fished in some time.  Upon our arrival we found a river mostly choked out with gravel only leaving small pockets and seams of deeper water.  These small pockets were the only places where any vegetation was able to survive.  When you did find deeper water compared to the shallow gravel choked stream bed, you found fish.  There were not many and they were very spooky.  The day went quick and the sun dropped below the ridge shortly after 3.00 making things that much more difficult.  Only one fish was landed all day between the two of us and I'm glad to say it was not me.  Yes, I got skunked.  It doesn't happen often, but it does happen to all of us.

By the time we made it back home I already switched mindsets from fishing to tying.  Since I have no great fish stories or pictures to share, here are some recent ties coming off of the vice.

 

 A couple dozen midges tied with Saturday morning coffee.

Here is a Crawdad pattern I'm working on.  These are still in the testing phase.  Tie some up and let me know.

This is the Drop Nose Dace originated by Gary LaFontaine.  It hooked 50% of the largest fish I got into last year and is now a permanent staple in my box.

 

Here is a random shot of some flies recently off the vice.  Some drys, midges, caddis, RS2's, Todd Special,  Bugger variant, Golden Stones, Hairs Ears, etc, etc.

It's winter.  Short days, tough fishing and plenty of time at the vice.

Todd Special a BWO Emerger

Todd Special: 
Tying Materials

Hook:               Tiemco TMC 100 #20

Thread:             Uni Thread 8/0 Gray

Tail:                  Dun Hackle Fibers

Body:               Thread

Rib:                  Gold Wire BR

Wing:               White Foam

Thorax:            Gray Dubbing of choice*

*The original pattern was tied with Super Fine Dry Fly Dubbing

The Todd Special was named by my friends and fishing partners with the understanding that it can easily be viewed as a variation of several other patterns out there.  It originated after tedious study of real Blue Wing Olives on the San Juan River including lots of trial and error sessions tying new flies and testing them in water until I was satisfied with the results.  I finally got a fly matching the samples I was working off of, so it was time for the real R&D; what do the fish think?  The Todd Special became an instant hit with the fish and has probably landed more fish to date than any other fly I’ve ever fished.  Now that is making quite the statement. 

 

1.  Place hook in vice and crimp barb.  Wrap the hook shank with thread.  Remove a clump of hackle fibers from the stem of a large rooster neck feather and attach to the top of the hook shank.  I find that 15 - 20 hackle fibers to be about right.  Wrap to about the 60 percent point on the hook and trim off the excess material.

 

2.  Attach a piece of gold wire at this same point on the hook.  Wrap the wire to the hook bend completely covering the wire.  Palmer the wire back towards the eye of the hook and tie off.

 

3.  Cut a small piece of white closed cell foam.  Attach to the top of the hook shank as shown below.  Trim and tie down any excess foam.

4.  Apply a small amount of gray dubbing to your thread.  Wrap over the foam wing forming a thorax leaving the foam exposed towards the bend of the hook.  Whip finish.

5.  The finished fly.