Productive Pond Fishing

Another good day on the pond.  I got to use my new eskimo 949i shelter.  AWESOME!

Alec Iced this nice 26' Northern Pike

And he jigged up this over sized smallie.

I managed one decent pike and a smallie on the jig rod.  You will have to check back to see the picture.  Alec should be sending it to me soon.  It will be worth another visit to the blog.

Good Ice- 4"-5" solid under-foot and hard.  Best ice I have been on so far this year. 

UPDATE:  This guy was fun to land with the ultra light jig rod

Ice Is Nice

Icing- Slowly

Don't get all excited and race here expecting all kinds of ice.  We have ice but it is building very slowly.  Most of the ice I saw today was new over the past 36 hours.  Brant Lake stitched up about 40 acres from when I checked it Saturday.  Some ice I did try walking on, some I wouldn't try.  Most of the ice I walked on cracked and broke.  Alec & I did find some good ice (of about 4" thick) so we are going to try fishing tomorrow.

The word at The Crossroads today was there were some fisherman on Loon Lake.  I have not encountered safe ice this year for me to be out there today.

Stay tuned for a report Tuesday night.

Brant Lake looking NNE.  Open water in the distance

Brant Lake again looking SSW tight but still a bit too thin

If you do venture onto the ice, Have a rescue plan.  Bring your picks, some rope and most importantly- COMMON SENSE

The time in between.......

Well, I started typing up some sad excuse post but the fact of the matter is this week just sucks for fishing.
The GOOD News: Alec is home and we spent a good share of the day fishing and the weather was perfect for Christmas eve day.
The BAD News is ice is just getting started and the good open water is either closed or super slow on the bite.
here are some pix from the day:

Christmas Shopping

Yes, In my house we do Christmas Shopping, NOT HOLIDAY SHOPPING.  If you live in a house hold of another denomination and do another type of shopping- YOU DO IT.  I will never ask, require, nor think lesser of you and your traditions if you do.

             Political correctness makes me sick. 

You do your thing, I'll do my thing and we are both OK.

Now on to the report:
DEAR SANTA:  GIFT CARDS WOULD BE GOOD

Nuff Said

Saw a sticker(s) on a truck in the mall parking lot I liked:

John Deere, Thomas Jefferson & ADK- a combination hard to beat

Getting Hungry...........................................................................

6 with the works

- You can call it New Way Lunch -

***But, It's always going to be DIRTY JOHNS'***

CHRISTMAS SHOPPING IS WHAT YOU MAKE OF IT!!

Back to Fishing

I have spent the last few weekends preparing for winter. Not much time to fish.   Camper, Boat & the "estate" have all been in need of winterization.  Now that winter has arrived (see Fig 1)  and the work is done,  I'll be on the water tomorrow morning for a Thanksgiving hook-up or two.

Zombie King Salmon

My final trip to the SR this year was a good one.  Trevor & I made a day run with father & son , Bill & Will.  This was a plan that was born at a couple of scout meetings throught the year.  Everyone was pretty much a novice salmon angler so I wanted to make sure everyone got to fight a fish.  Mission accopmplished. 

Bill with a hefty spawned out hen.  He is admittedly not much of a fisherman and hasn't done much fishing.  Welcome to your new addiction Bill.

Here is his son Will fighting one of 5 or 6 hel landed throughout the day.  He got the nack of things only after a couple of hours toutering on spotting fish on proper presentation.

My son Trevor fought several kings today and finally got this male to come in to get his picture taken.

The salmon season is winding down as you can tell most of these fish are spawned out and headed out.  We saw lots of guys fighting steelhead today.  It should be a great chome season .  I have a couple of friends in Oswego County now and I should be getting reports from them soon.  More to come.

KING SALMON

Al, Greg & Derrick joined me in Pulaski this weekend for some salmon fishing.  Great to get together with old friends for some time on the water.  Saturday proved beyond expectations with comfortable and sunny weather for most of the day on the DSR.  Saturday night was like hurricane conditions off Lake Ontario.  The awning on the camper made a great sail that rocked us all to sleep.  Sundays weather was nice again until we left and it rained all the way home.

Being sucessful at King salmon fishing takes a lot of practice and you gotta pay your dues.  It's a totally different game than trout.  I have put in enough time in the Pulaski fishery to learn the way to do it right.  Legend has it that Kings do not bite during the spawn.  This picture is proof that they do.  If this fish had been lined/flossed, the hook would be stuck from the outside of the mouth in not from the inside out.  Obviously this fish "took" the fly.




THE REPORT: I limited out on Saturday with two males about 24" and a spawned out hen in the 12 to 14 pound range.  I caught 2 more and released them.  The real heart breaker was a 25 pound hen that came unbuttoned.  Sunday I was in the right place at the right time to land a 20 pound hen just upstream from the Tressile Pool.   My buddies are getting closer to payday with every trip.  They all were able to get a tug and understand more about spotting and presenting.

Now the work begins.  Filleting and preping for the smoker and canning.

The Rewards of Autumn Fly Fishing

What a great weekend.  Fall  colors are splashing up and the fishing was just as good as the Adirondack eye candy. 

Every winter I spend countless hours pouring over maps and pick brains of other local outdoorsmen to put together a coming season "To-Do" list.  Most of these waters I go to investigate are potential Native Brook Trout locations so I'm not going to name them on the blog.  Saturday I went to "check off" one of those places.  What I found was way better than I expected.  Huge granite cuts recently washed and scoured by hurricane rains. The brookes are making very light takes this weekend.  I landed one but in true brookie style he was blasting crazy and photo shy.  I need to work on my camera skills so no photo.  I did hook and land a surprise brownie in this plunge pool  

Sunday was a super "bluebird" day.  I set the truck northward and fished the Boreas for a couple hours and landed a brookie in full fall color.  Drat! I left the SD card in the laptop.OK another beauty with no image to remember but the one in my brain.  I left the Boreas and stopped at a reliable spot on the way home.  All the salmon this summer were just over par size.  this one was about 13".  Super jumps! A nice way to finish the weekend of fishing.  

Early Fall Brown

What a nice crisp fall day.  I went to check out one of my "usual" place.  The flow is still up from Hurricane Irene.  The water temp was 59 degrees with a few gray mayflies and white midges in the air.  I didn't see any fish rising but hey, it's fall, no big deal.  I fished an Ausable Ugly tandemed with a brown backed scud.  My first fish was this German Gentleman

As I left, I called a buddy who fished the DSR today.  The words "Ya' shoulda" been here today"  came through the cell phone.  Enough said; Trev and I are packed and ready to leave early for Pulaski tomorrow morning.  Huge Coho run today.  Looking for a little payback for last weekends trip.

A Pulaski report to my buddy Alec

Alec,



Pulled into Selkirk at 6 Friday night. We decided just to bring a tent. Just me and Trevor so why not? SKUNKS! We had a skunk fight in our camp around 2am. I packed all our food & garbage in the truck so the skunks were probably angry about that too. Can't describe how nasty a skunk fight/breeding is, just something you have to experience to get the full effect & experience from for yourself. The guy next to us had racoons the past 3 nights and they trashed everything he had.






We did make it to the DSR around 5:30 the following morning and down to the river at 6. Nothing was moving. We hiked from the Flats to the Lower Clay and up to the Wall- I saw one small Atlantic Salmon splashing his way down through the run just above the Flats. Wasn't really interested in that. We poked around in all the places I know hold fish. Joss Hole was the only place to find a king. We squeezed in between the some snaggers and spent sometime casting to non-players (about 4 fish in the pool; best as I could figure). You know snagging isn't my thing so we went up to the truck for lunch. We hiked back down to the holding spot where you landed yours last year. Nothing. I looked though and casted to the big pool just above there for 45 minutes- no fish. We went to Selkirk, packed our stuff & left. Lots of cars at the Tressile. All the Tuesday run, I figured, was probably there by now but my feet hurt and my Orvis waders are now Orvis soakers. I had had enough. Got home around 6.


Stiles

I love e-mail questions

I love e-mail questions.  What better way to expand the next level of fly fishing than to learn and share with other anglers?   I have had several questions from the inbox over the last few days asking about September fishing on the Schroon River.  

I believe that a picture speaks a thousand words.

Any Questions??

NOAA has predicted 4 to 7 inches of rain for the Eastern Adirondacks in the next 72 hours.  The Schroon watershed drains 600 square miles of  the Eastern Adirondacks.  Doing the math, this means the river is going to be blown out and unsafe to fish for at least two weeks.

My fall weekends are spent chasing King and Coho Salmon in Pulaski ever chance I get.

Can you blame me?

Hydraulic Fracturing and Environmental Water Quality

Preface/Disclaimer/

As my life time goes by, I find that I personally am doing a better job of environmental stewardship. Gone is my burning barrel in the back yard (and most of my neighbors too). I return & recycle all of our steel, aluminum, glass and plastic. My motivation to do this is primarily economic but I do "feel environmentally better" after the work is done. I'm not an environmental radical. I am, however, very skeptical of big business when they tell you "It's perfectly safe" & what they do will help insure our liberty as Americans.

I know bullshit when I hear it.

Lately, There seems to be a lot of news media coverage on the subject of hydraulic fracturing.

Drilling horizontally and using clean water to pressurize and then retrieve hydrocarbon based fuels just sounds like a bad idea.  Just a couple of years ago, every Mom & Pop gas station had to replace their in ground fuel tanks to avoid fuel/water contamination, right?



Think about it: Commingling fresh, clean water with toxins. Hmmmmmm?

An industry-supported fund to pay for potential environmental damage caused by hydraulic fracturing in New York State
is just stupid. (my opinion)

 

What if people get sick from drinking contaminated water? 

What if the fish are all dead?

 

Money can't fix that.  (common sense)

I encourage you to do some reading & research. Consider your sources and make up YOUR OWN MIND.

Essential Question:

Why is hydraulic fracturing exempt from the

Federal Safe Drinking Water Act ?

Here are some links:
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s111-1215
http://www.tu.org/press_releases/2010/trout-unlimited-calls-on-gas-companies-to-disclose-chemicals-used-in-marcellus-s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAWawNVziXI
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/07/31/us/natural-gas-water-contamination.html?scp=4&sq=hydraulic%20fracturing&st=cse
http://water.epa.gov/type/groundwater/uic/class2/hydraulicfracturing/index.cfm
http://www.riverkeeper.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/Fractured-Communities-FINAL-September-2010.pdf

All About the Streamer

Day 1 on the Battenkill was all about streamers and getting the fly down to the fish. Windy and rainy weather conditions put a halt to most hatches on the day, although we did see some sulphurs hatching late. My one fish on the day came from a deep run on a seam between faster and slower moving water. This guy hit almost immediately when my fly began its swing.

Most fish that we encountered today were holding on the seams or in the deepest part of pools.We continued to fish the deep pools past dusk when Chris hooked into a pig. Barely able to see, we only got one good look at the fish before he spit the fly only feet away. It was a tough loss but it was a successful evening fish, as we both had strikes long after the sun set. It was a very interesting experience fishing tonight with winds howling in the trees at over 20 mph, making for some difficult casting conditions. Overall day 1 was a successful day. However, tomorrow we will be covering much more water in hopes of hooking into some true monsters.

STAY TUNED FOR TOMORROWS' REPORT!

-Alec

Skinny Water, Big Browns & Quality Friendships

My friend Al called last week and said he wanted to get together and fish.  Our halfway meeting point was the Ausable River.  I tied up a bunch of fresh tricos with indicator posts for the trip.  I left them on the vice this morning and lost my sunglasses before the first cast. 

NOT looking like a good start. 

At the first pool, Al did a good job with the little mayfly, landing a nice brown then a rainbow.  I was "Ohfer".  We moved up river and went back at it.  After and hour or so, I spotted a nice fish just off the bank feeding on terrestrials as they dropped in the water from an overhanging bush.  Third cast and I was on with a heavy, then off.  We moved again, this time down river to pocket water.  After a few casts in some very skinny water, I found a deeper pocket across the river.  I cranked up the St. Croix and fired the stimulator cross-river to the farside pool and saw a flash under my fly.  Two more casts and everything came tight with this nice fella'.  2 hook ups and one to hand.  With a fish like this one, I'll take that anyday.

After spending the day together fishing, Al and I have resolved that we need to get together and fish more often.  Great Day!  The fish are just a bonus. 

TOMORROW- BATTENKILL WITH ALEC

- STAY TUNED-

WIFI "LIVE ON LOCATION" REPORT FROM THE CAMPGROUND SOMETIME AFTER DARK

TRICOS

I fished the West Branch of the Ausable yesterday.  Whether you like to fish them or not, the Trico mayfly hatch is on.  The water was in the mid to upper 60's.  I was on the trout from 7 to 9:30 am, then all went quiet.  Eleven browns in that time, not bad considering that I can't see the fly (SIZE 22) and setting the hook is a guessing game.  Low water calls for a longer leader and longer drifts too.  I did spot some more fish later in the morning but the just weren't "players".  Hot summer afternoons on the Ausable call for spot, stalk and presentations with hopper patterns.  This can sometimes pay off with  a big brown if you put the time in.

Epic Brookie water turns Epic Landlocked Salmon Windfall

Alec & I returned to his secret water to visit the brookies again today.  What we found was beyond belief.  Landlocks, big ones.  All taking a dry in a river pool- who'd a thunk it.  I also managed 2 brookieswith some spectacular coloration.  Alec caught the pig LLS of the day-20" and est. 3lbs.  I was right behind with a 17" LLS that made a spectacular jump over our head level before coming to hand.  Neither of us expected to see salmon, let alone the size in that location.

Dry

I fished with Alec last night to do some scouting for today's client.  We need rain.  Many of the brook trout streams we visited last night were still cool but not as cold as they should be to keep fish healthy.  We also went to *###***###* River and found good fishing during the evening hatch.  Browns and rainbows rising to emerging caddis and stimulators skated along the surface film.

Pray for Rain

BROOKIES!

Hey, the brown trout bite is off and has been for a week or better.  You will do best to fish the magic half hour before dark.  I took my brother on his first ever fly fishing trip today and the brook trout fishing was good.  The water conditions are "boney". we went to some Adirondack wilderness streams and managed a few on caddis and a Mickey Finn. 
Photos by Alec

Shot

Well the trout season has come and just about gone for the Lower Schroon 2011 season. The water temps are in the upper 70's and the trout population mortality is in the "negative exponents". I fished early yesterday morning and saw one fish rise at day-break.



Can you still catch a trout on the Schroon? Sure, but they are going to severely underweight and few and far between.



HOWEVER- many of the cooler running Adirondack rivers and streams are in good shape with a wicked size 12 gray caddis hatch this week. If you don't mind the bugs and like hiking in the woods, Small brook trout streams are going to be the best bet for fly fishing for a while. Don't forget that smallies on the FlyRod are a kick too. Trolling with downriggers or leadcore is always an option. Ever pulled up a Lake Trout  from 100' down on a 9" 5wt? Big fight, big fun. Be flexible. Get away from the roads and you might be surprised with what you find.

Morning at Tumblehead (Schroon River)

I fished the public access at Tumblehead this morning from 7:30 to 10:00. 

12 trout (11 rainbows and 1 brown). 

The rainbows averaged 11-12 inches & were in good shape for Schroon River Stockies this time of the season   ie. they ain't dead yet!.    They all took a black bugger or a white wet fly fished 2 feet below the surface.  As typical for rainbows, the take was tenacious.  The fish are holding in the faster water.  Reaching the seams was critical for a good swinging presentation.  

This Little brown was the only fish to take a Stimulator fished dry.

Not much hatching in this morning.

Traditionally Battenkill

I grew up along the banks of the Battenkill River and still fish there often.  Yesterday Alec & I drifted the trophy section.  It was a day ment for streamer fishing: high off colored water put the nymphing and dry action at almost a standstill; streamers were the ticket.  I like to use traditional Lew Oatman streamer patterns on the Battenkill.  That is where he lived and developed so many patterns that work well today.  I also like to incorporate some of the new- specifically fishing full sinking lines ala' Kelly Galloup style.  Streamers of choice yesterday were the Oatman Battenkill Shiner and the Bunny Sculpin of unknown origin.

A Nice Battenkill Brownie

More big water

Well, I guess that the Schroon isn't going to behave this season.  Fish are spread out nicely but finding good wading is a challenge.  Temps are in the high 60's and low 70's.  Not much stellar to report about hatches.  Fish really aren't rising with the water levels.  I have resorted to finding some other waters to fish.  Nymphing & swinging streamers is producing very well.  I'm quickly getting adicted to that brown trout "smack" as they inhale the baitfish immitation.

Epic Brook Trout Trip

Maybe I should call it the trip of One Hundred Thousand BLACK FLIES.
My face looks as though I have been in a fist fight.  But, it was worth it

Boy Scouts on the creek

I took a couple of scouts out to work on the fly fishing merit badge this afternoon.  after some bug hunting and casting instrution, they both managed a nice brown trout each.  Excellent work for a couple of boys who have just started casting a fly rod.  Water was sixty(ish) not much hatching or rising but the prince nymph did the trick.