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.

       

North Fork Shenandoah upstream from Covered Bridge -- Meems Bottom

This covered bridge on the North Fork reminded me of the bridge in Jackson, NH.

The put in under the bridge was lovely and opened to the nicest water we'd find on this recon.

Kayaks ready for company

Working upstream remembering old muscles.

Lovely stretch of river but not alot of holding structure.

Not only a dozen brought to hand today between the two of us but a good river recon early in the smallmouth season

Golden day for the Retreiver

Love these guys

When Henry and I last fished the North Fork we turned around at the end of the straightaway down-stream of the low-water bridge off South Hollingsworth Road and the bend of the 180 degree horseshoe teased us.  I was determined to fish all the way to the next low-water bridge on my next visit and found a willing partner in Bryan. 

Bryan & Brookie

We got on the river at 0740 and planned to fish this section in 4.5 hours, but as they say the plan didn't survive contact with reality as the fish started hitting quickly.  The air was cool at 70, the water clear and low, the clouds thick and heavy sending tendrils to the surface of the water.  There was an amazing hatch all day and clusters of juvenile smallies were rising to feed on the surface.  About an hour in we wished that we had brought a few dries to temp the bronzebacks rising from the cobble, but we continued to swing tandem streamers with good success.

Rt 33 Feather Golden Retriever

 By far the most effective streamer today was a #10 golden-retriever trailing a heavier streamer.  Scott taught me how to tie these goldens so it was with alot of pleasure that they were so productive. The smallies were, well, smallish today, none exceeding a foot, but what they lacked in size they made up for in exuberance many tail-dancing across the river to our delight.  While I expected the bronzebacks to be concentrated in the deeper runs on the shoulders of the riffles and in the pools at the bottom of the runs they were actually very much spread out wherever the cobble bottom was three or more feet deep.

Bronzeback

When we completed the bend of the horseshoe, 2/3 of the way to our destination, we were both pooped and sore from the rock bottom and began to move more quickly downstream.  If we had fished more slowly there's no doubt I could have caught 100+ smallies today.  As it was, we ended up climbing out of the river, skirting corn and soy bean fields and climbing a ridge to the back of an old-timers house (don't shoot -- hands-up).  I ended the day with 63 smalmouth, 1 large chub and 4 sunfish.   Bryan didn't count, caught a few less, but caught the biggest smallie of the day, an acrobat that etched a smile that's still on my face.

One of the few today on a crayfish pattern from Murray's

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