Last Shad of the Year

Looking Upstream at the island pool, note fisherman in the pool

With a doctors appointment at 1300 I grabbed opportunity and a 6wt, one more chance to play with hickory shad before the run eases.   The weather was beautiful, sometimes it can be too sunny for good fishing and true to form the shad were deeper and less aggressive as the water was clear and bathed in sun as it dropped over the fall line in Fredericksburg.  Last outing, fishing from the bottom of the island, I noticed that with the lowish water another pool and run was accessible downstream toward the bridge.   I waded easily across a secondary run and found a great casting position.  With a cast cross-stream toward Falmouth I was able to swing streamers across the main channel and then settle them on the deep shoulder of the main flow on the Fredericksburg side. I used 5wt switch line and was well into the red running line when the shad hit at the end of the swing.   As Fritz said the other day, "This doesn't stink".

Looking downstream from my perch, my line traces the deep shoulder of the main run (fish deep here)

Fly Fishing is to fishing as ballet is to walking

Snow Squal Shad

Frtiz tied this gig-head hybrid which worked great

With Jenny and Liz headed to UVA to watch Conor play water polo and Emma still soundly asleep I rigged up in my warm garage and headed to the fall line of the Rappahanock in Fredricksberg to get a taste of fish after having been skunked on the Gunpowder yesterday. I was lucky to get one of the four prime spots at the tail of the island so late in the morning.

The lower 40s temp, 25 mph wind and snow squalls kept many of the locals away, thank goodness. I was in the least effective downstream position, I had alot of action but probably caught only 60% of the Shad as they fellow two spots upstream from me.

I had equal success on both a red and silver shad dart and a small weighted golden retriever, each trailing a 6-foot sink tip section which was needed in the fast flow. The formula is easy here, find the shad, present them something small and shiny at the right depth and hold on!   Geez this is fun fishing.

The Osprey and eagles agreed as 16 of them (hard to count) kept us company and provided an exciting aerial show.  Your mind kind of tunes them out as they soar and glide and then when they stop in mid-air and hover for a second your brain reads ' pattern disruption' and you pick them up as they dive 100 feet straight down and slam into the water talons first.  A thrashing of their wings and they beat back into the air with a herring or shad fighting to escape their clutches.   It's awesome.

Thanks for looking

Gunpowder Falls Recon

Hen tries his luck above Falls Road

Heading up I-95 I've always been intrigued by Gunpowder Falls, not only does it have a cool name, but I'd heard that it's a great fishery.   After some trophy-trout research I found that Gunpowder Falls is the homewater of flyfishing's Lefty Kreh (there are no falls, "falls" is another name for river) and spills out of a PrettyBoy Reservoir just south of Pennsylvania and West of I-83.  It's one of the best year-round fisheries on the East Coast.  Ground Zero for fishing the Gunpowder is the small town of Hereford about 30-min north of Baltimore and that's where Henry and I decided to meet in the parking lot of Back Water Angler at 0600.   This recon fishing trip was a point of light as Henry and I came through busy weeks at the office and we were both happy to share an early cup of coffee when we reached Hereford.   Our plan was to fish the upper section (see map below) from Falls Road toward the spillway first so we headed to that section and found the river pumping grey steel. We knew that it was high but now we knew first hand how a 2.49 flow at the 'Falls' gauge looks and feels.  Powerful, constricted and cold. Next time we'll heed good advice and fish this area when its at 1.8 or below.

Note the spike in water we were dealing with

Upper Gunpowder Falls from Fall Road Up

The Upper Gunpowder is a non-stocked special regulations area populated by a self-sustaining population of brown trout with a few rainbows and brookies in the mix, oh but to find them!

This is not a high-gradient mountain stream, but is bolder-strewn and channelized in a small gorge making it rugged and gorgeous. No luck here,  I tried both nymphs under an indicator and streamers.  It was really hard to move in the deep stream so we sipped some coffee and drove to the thoroughly interesting Pretty Boy Reservoir Dam (Damn big) and then headed downstream to the Masemore Bridge access point.  

a wreath of scrub frames Henry on the Upper Gunpowder

The normal bottom release can be seen...all water over the top was unfortunately extra

Lefty Kreh Water trail marker

We plied the waters here again for 90-min and though the wider banks mellowed out the strength of the river it was still roaring through.  A lesson I relearned today was to wear multiple layers on my legs when I'm going to be in deep water...brr it was chilly.  Henry was happy to have found his icebreaker gloves in his Salmon River Kit, all-the-more-so when it started sleet-snowing on us for 20-min.  

The Gunpowder widens as it heads south, hen caught his brown off the bank on the righside

We left Masemore and hopped into the water the Gunpowder again off Falls road just East of I-83.  Again the river had mellowed and widened and Henry Flicking a golden retriever into a bankside back eddy was rewarded with the only trout of the day.  Well done Hen. 

Today's' trophy

 There are trout in here, no doubt, but the river simply had not recovered from the Trauma of the deluge Thursday.   We grabbed Subway for lunch in Hereford and skipped down to the stocked put and take section which is lovely big water,  it looked like prime smallmouth water but alas no more trout.  

Little Falls joins Gunpowder Falls behind Henry to from the left

Hen throws a nice loop at the far bank

As we walked out we crossed Little Falls, a major Trib of the Gunpowder and met Gene who works at BackWater Angler (support your local fly shop) who was very pleasant and gave us some advice for our next trip. 

Shad Picture Story

Fritz prepares at sunrise -- we got prime spots

1st Shad of the day -- Fritz had a bite on 1st Cast

Fish on for me at Sunrise

Small shad darts and golden retrievers were the streamers of the morning

Nice view of our fishing hole, Fritz works the downstream slot

Great Morning -- hit those shad while they are here -- thanks for looking

Lazy Friday in the Mtns

With a Friday morning unexpectedly open I took off to my favorite mountains for a revival. The weather was warm and rainy when u arrived with the promise of clouds and rain to follow. After a 30 min walk in and up I began trouting at the boulder pools at my newly favorite stream. After three casts I had my first trout and the day looked great. I grabbed my camera to capture this fine spec and found that my SD card and camera were not on the same page so no pictures of this adventure. I fished up toward the 40-min waterfall but never made it there as I took my time and pulled trout from near every stayion. After a sandwich And three hours on the stream realized that I was on a bit of an energy low so I decided to head back to NOVA and see my girls. 27 BTH. 

Spring has sprung in SNP

There's this stream I've grown to love. I've fished the top mile and the lower mile and was determined to fish the middle section last week.   My knees and heart ached for the 60-minute walk -up and I was tempted to slide into the water as I made my way past the great lower stretch to the highest point I'd finished up to before. The water was a trouty 46.2 and the air was a refreshing 51. The run shrugged the marine layer off the gorgeous pool tucked into the hollow before me.  I downed the last sweet drops of my coffee and eager brook trout sipped small black stone flies from the top of the pool in front of me.  See below ~

Disguised by drops from trees, trout rose and took the stone fly hatch from the surface 

The early morning spring hatch was a size 20 black stone fly -- the hatch blossomed through the day

Intent on covering a good section of the river, I didn't fish all the water like I would on the Rapidan but concentrated on the bigger holding pools looking for bigger fish -- I was not disapointed.

When my 1-wt nearly doubled over I knew I had a great fish -- he turned out to be a hair shy of 11 inches!

As I made my way further and further into the beautiful unspoiled darkness of this long SNP Run I was near heaven.   I found that the water flattened out the in the middle three fifths, still gorgeous water but more shallow runs and less pooling.    One of the easy secrets to this stream is to fish it from the top when the water is high and from the bottom when the water is low so you can enjoy the magnicent pools and if you don't get to the very middle -- no worries.

I didn't catch many small brookies today. I caught many in the 8 inch range and 4 more than 10 inches!   Great fishing, they seemed to hit equally on the dry and dropper.   I'm trying my best to wet my hands before touching these jewels and if I take them out of the water at all its only for the shortest period of time.

You can see the more gradual nature of this run with yet another near perfect pool.

One of the lessons I re-learned is to slow down and fish the bottom of the pool before I spook it, because spook them I did on several occasions as I greedily sought a casting angle to the top of the pool.   Yes: the biggest trout in the pool are in the top of the pool feeding station, but the tail channels funnel food too and almost always hold eager trout. 

Yes -- no kidding the specks were big today

This photo reminded me of the classic gaping mouth Jaws photo --dorsal fin and all

 I've had a double before with smallies, but I'm not sure ever with trout -- until today.   When I caught the first trout on the dry school of his friends kept following him, this played out right in front of me, and one of them decided to hit the dropper and go along for the ride.    Both released unharmed.

I stopped my ascent after my 50th trout and knees barking I  headed back down the path.   I'd covered another mile of the stream, so there's still 2 remote miles unexplored, perhaps I'll do an over nighter  to check those off the list.   As I headed back I decided to see how far downstream trout remain dense.   I slipped back in the water at the boulder-pools where I'd first started my fishing on this run.  The deep pools and glides here are amazing, hard to access as they're squeezed between two moss-slick gorge walls.  With diminishing returns, I caught another 8 in this section as I hung on to roots braking trail, almost an arm, and made my way downstream.  I made it all the way down till I could see the first residence then hand over hand climbed a feeder stream to make it out of the gorge back to the trail.   This was exhasting but verified to me that the best fishing on this run starts with the boulder pools about 25-min into the hike. 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks for sharing this adventure