Come Hell or High Water ...it was High Water

James fished some fast high water

Boy we wanted to get out on the South Fork and were not going to be dissuaded by some high water....and high it was.   Optimal fishing here is below 1.75" on the Luray Gauge and we were actually happy to have it around 3" and stable.  Paul, Henry, James and I slid into the greenish stew of what looked like a new river Sunday morning.  Fishing was slow as we fought the surface current and tried to remember the hidden structure of our friend.

We coaxed some bass into action but our dreams of a 400 fish day melted away and we all adjusted our expectations and ended day 1 with maybe a hundred fish between the 4 of us. 

James had to head home to work and Paul, Hen and I feasted on beer, salsa verde, sausage and chicken as rain again began to splatter on the tin roof of our cabin.  The night ended w a great chat and Paul pouring rusty nails (scotch + Drambuie) for all.

Day two Team

Day two the began with the river dramatically rising as you can see on the graph below.

We experienced this rise real time and it was interesting to see it happen.  We couldn't really tell by rocks and shoals getting covered with water they were already well covered.  What noticed was a browning out of the water and alot of flotsam; sticks, a few logs in the main flow. 

Paul, Hen and I quickly made our way through the first mile of river and concentrated our attention where the river spread out under the large cliffs on the right.

Slow activity was the rule for the day and were thankfully interrupted by 3-4 fish here and there.  At about 1400 Paul got ahead of us and stayed ahead of Hen and I for the rest of the day and Hen and I enjoyed more and more success.  Hen lent me to a small popper which I fished on a 9'3" Orvis Graphite Spring Creek and had a blast.   Seeing smallies slash-up from the bottom and nail the popper was exhilarating.

Paul ended the day with some pontoon challenges in the final rapids and out of respect for his wife's nerves I'll leave that as a story untold. 

As the moon came up on our right and sun the sun fell below Massanutten Mtn the bass TURNED ON!   Henry was having success fishing the outflow shoulder of a rock eddy and called up to me.   I sat on my yak and floated down to him about 30' to his right about 50m above the beginning of the last rapid.  I stood on my yak and looked to join in Hen's success...OMG I caught bass on 14 straight casts and then caught 32 before I left the spot on probably 50 casts....amazing.  Hen caught a bunch as well but we theorized that perhaps I was presenting into a bass of bait fish the smallies were crashing.   By the time I was done Hen had moved downriver and was also pulling them out of slack water behind one of the bigger rock formations.   He fished till we couldn't see anymore as as he fought to the southern bank to get into his yak he disappeared in the dark!  We met about half way down the rapid and at that point were thankful for the high water to spirit us over the rocks.

Red Dirt Rich

Dinner night 2 was so good it may turn into a tradition the salad complimenting the seared cowboy ribeyes and washed down with beer...damn it was good.

Day three was challenging from the start and though we caught our share we planned to be off the river by 1530 so we didn't fish the dusk again.

When your on the river you are sharing the river

Thanks for Reading

James River Recon

The water hasn't stopped coming down in the Mid-Atlantic for two months so when I found a bathtub in the River Level on the James river Fritz, Jacob, Paul and I jumped at it.

  The James is the major river draining central Virginia.   Its formed when two magnificent trout waters join, the Jackson and the Cowpasture in Far Western Virginia and runs its course ESE cleaving the Shenandoah Ridge-line before flattening and making its run to the ocean.   On its southern banks, the English  settled Jamestown and Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown. 

 Our Crew was relatively new to the James, Fritz and Paul had each fished a couple sections before and we decided on a popular whitewater stretch as our destination between Glascow where the Maury flowing from Lexington to Snowden, VA 5 miles downstream.   The river's white water features were named and the fishing was supposed to be superb.

After 3 hour drives from NOVA and pretty fair chow at the Pink Cadillac Diner. We bunked down at a local hotel and made it to the water by 0800 Saturday morning.  The river was running clear at a perfect 2.93 feet on the Buchanan river gauge and the overcast skies, dripping mist promised a great fishing day.   Floated by my kayak, Fritz' trusty Old Town Discovery and Paul's new float-fishing Pontoon we shot through a narrow slot and the Maury pushed us into the James.   

 In what I'd later view as odd but fortuitousness I caught 3 bass in the span of 20 minutes then the catching part of fishing got few and far between!

We caught a few in the 12-13 inch range but not the hundreds we'd expected

Fritz and Jacob question a rock strewn pool

This should by all rights have been exceedingly fishy, it had all the elements but over the course of 7 hours on the water we probably only caught 35 smallies between us.   Very Odd.

Paul spins caught in a back-eddy hydraulic of Balcony Falls

Fritz shows me the extent of his massive Raspberry -- youch!

The fishing wasn't great but the scenery and company was magnificent!

Thanks for looking

Shenandoah w the Pfeiffers

There comes a point each Spring when the allure of blue line brook trout gives way to wider water, the simplicity of stripping streamers through riffles and the promise of smallmouth bass, the gamest fighter around.  James wrangled a family trip to the South Fork this past Saturday and found the smallies turning on in their summer feeding stations, with that tease Fritz, Jacob and I decided to give our favorite section of the of the Shenandoah and early summer test.

The drive through the countryside to Newport just downstream from Luray was gorgeous.   Like turtles carrying their shells we met, we dropped a truck at the takeout and geared up for the adventure.    Fritz and Jacob slipped into their well-tested Old Town and I lowered myself into a new-to-me SOT kayak.

This is 4-7wt water depending on casting style, fly weight and tactics.   Heavier rods/flies fished deeper nicking tufts off the bottom simulating crayfish produce bigger but fewer bass.   I like the exciting feedback of a strike after strike after strike, so I went with a mid-weight set-up, an untested Orvis 6wt graphite rod that I’d eBay’d this winter and a dual dropper rig with a soft plastic followed by a small golden retriever – fish on on cast three at the Newport Put-in riffle – a great day lay ahead.

The water was warmer and the river fuller (2.36 on the Luray Gauge) than I expected, but its width allows for increased flow without degrading the fishable water.  Turning away from a nesting pair of bald eagles I glanced up-stream, Fritz and Jacob floating on green & blue, a Massanutten Mtn background and the priceless chatter of father and son fishing drifting on the riffles.  

A frequent vice, we spent too much time on the marginal upper lake portion but were rewarded with an 11” Crappie who rose from under a shaded log to sip a golden retriever.   Shaped like a giant sunfish if these guys fought like their sunfish cousins they’d be amazing, as they are they’re beautiful and made for the pan, I slipped this one back into the shady depths and moved along.

We enjoyed running the first rapid, executed fishhook turns and took familiar stations mid-run.  Fritz and I marveled at and heckled Jacob as he brought a bronzeback to hand every other cast.  These bass weren’t big but they’re aggressiveness gave us all the action we wanted.  Every so often I’d hear Fritz exclaiming (to everyone and no-one), “I love these fish” as a smallie tail-walked to hand. We followed the eagles down river and concentrated on the disaggregated water under the large cliff on the right.    The amazing structure in this area invites groups to fish side-by-side working the many lateral channels and outflows.  I associate these cliffs with my friend Paul who always cleans up in the shady runs along the cliff’s base as Fritz did this trip and love using the cliffs as a backdrop for pictures.

I often keep track of fish brought to hand, I didn’t this time, but after 4.5-hours I suspect we each caught 75-100 smallies.  It’s not often that I’ll leave a spot where there’s a strike every cast and a fish every third cast, but we decided to flow with this lovely river and get home at a reasonable hour. We enjoyed running the last .5 mile rapid and as we approached the take-out I came in behind a family playing in the river with a small dog.    The little beagle-type saw my kayak as an island, an opportunity for rest, and swam into the current to meet me.   I scooped up Dixie and after a few licks we were fast friends.

       

Friday afternoon escape

River Smallmouth

Island on rt plan was to fish down the channel viewed here

I had an early-out afternoon last Friday so I ran up to the Shenandoah to get a quick fix as I knew the weekend wouldn't support another fishing opportunity. I really wanted to try deeper/slower streamer tactics on the channel left of the island downstream from the Rt 50 Bridge.  The island channelizes the flow on the left creating deeper & faster water over the rock-cobble bottom.  To get down deeper I used 12 feet of sink tip leader prior to my terminal tippet to sink a size 6 green and black (with flash) barrel-head bugger.

smallie on hand-tied kreelex

As I began fishing a 6wt rod I found that that this pairing found the bottom in all but the fastest current and especially at the end of the sweep.  It felt alot like salmon fishing; tap-tap-tap as the bugger moved over the cobble bottom on the swing.   I began picking up smallies, but not the big ones of my dreams so I switched to a self-tied bead-head kreelex with some white (Rt 33) goose tailfeathers.  This hyrbid kreelex turned out to be the most productive fly of the day.

Swarm of dragon flies rests on downfall

I rounded the bottom of the island with the heavy approaching rumbling of summer thunder reminding me not to linger.  I wasn't planning on fishing the far (east) bank on my way back but its hard not to make a cast (or 50) and I was lucky I did.

Monster carp at my feet

I concentrated on the major deadfall and after catching an oak I walked into the deadfall to find a casting call for River Monsters Shenandoah; three huge carp, 16-18 inch bronzebacks and catfish suspended and patrolling the shady deadfall.  I caught one 11 inch smallie and created such a rucus keeping him out of the wood that I mucked up the area.  With the storm closing in I trundled upstream to Clifford as the rain closed in on a great escape.

Monster smallie hidden in tree limbs