Rose River trout 2/27/12

02/27/12: Scott and I headed to the rose river on a delightful 70 Feb day.  We parked at the end of 670 and walked up the fire road for 15 minutes descending to the river about 400 yards before the bridge. The conditions were amazing and Scott started picking up fish immediately. I was not having luck until I tied my prince nymph dropper onto the bend in the hook of my elk hair caddis.  once I did it was one fire and I felt like I had solved a puzzle.  We leapfrogged from pool to pool until we hit rose river falls where we turned back to the fire road. NOTE: Hike in gear to bridge next time. GREAT DAY!

12/23/11:  Scott and I fished the Piney and North Fork of the Thornton River two days before Christmas.  It was a great warm day w perfect water flow but the fish were very slow.  Scott finally caught one on a elk hair caddis.

Scott on the Perfect Thornton River

Stripers 7/2/11

7/2/11: Henry and I fished with Captain Mike of Rip Tide Charters out of Eliot, Me.  We didn't have a lot of luck at first in the Piscataqua but Henry caught one 19 inches along the old pilings. We then went to the Isles of Shoals and didn't get anything.  on the way in, nearly disappointed, we saw diving birds and we were on the fish.  For about 30 minutes we hitter hard with fish ranging from 32 to 39 inches. We kept a 34 to eat later.  I ended up catching 3 and Henry 4

Rapidan River 3/8/2012

3/8/12: Scott and I fished the Rapidan starting at the junction pool and heading down the fire road to the ford.  It was very windy and the wind disturbed the surface.  Fishing below the ford was not productive.  We started catching fish in the small pools upstream of the ford. This is some of the nicest trout water I have ever seen. After we left the junction pool we headed upstream/up the road till we came to Camp Rapidan.  We fished here as well.  The flow was about 1/2 the flow at the junction pool.  Scott caught four beauties here. I lost my dropper and didn't catch any.  We think that the road still had a mile to go before the gate downstream from Camp Hoover (we'll tackle this stretch later). All and all it was a great day.  I caught 6 and Scott probably caught 18!  I needed to get 3wt line as the level 4 I had on there killed my presentation.
 

Confluence 5-18-2012

Friday ~ Confluence

      

 I fished the confluence for the first time this year as a scouting trip for Bill Pfeiffer's trip to Va next weekend.

       I parked at the end of the Richards Ferry Rd and Mt biked in, 10-min.  The weather was sunny and 70 with light wind.  I noted when I crossed the Rappahanock at Ely's Ford that there was a lot of water in the Rapidan and it looked quite brown.

       When I got to the confluence campsite I found, to my surprise 15 dudes there with 10 canoes, they were from the Spottsylvania Fire & Rescue and had put in the day before at Elys.  They were messy but pleasant enough.  It was apparent that there was far more water in the Rapidan than the Rappahanock.  The Rapidan was really unfishable and borderline dangerous. The Rappahanock was high but much clearer and just fishable.  The reading on the Fredericksburg gauge was 3.28. This reaffirms that I really want to fish the confluence at or below 3 on the Fredericksburg gauge.

       There was one other gent fly fishing the Rapp lower into the confluence his name was Lindsey and he was from Southern MD. I began and fished the nearside of the Rapp up about 100-150 yards from the camp site.  I used a 4wt rod and line and found that it was too light for the   #6 bead head bugger I was casting, I'll bring a 5 wt next time.  I primarily fished back into structure along the bank as the flow in the middle was too much for me to target runs and holes.  I caught 4-5 good sized panfish, great fighters, and 3 smallmouth in 75-min of fishing. 

          As I exited and looked over to the Rapidan there was a large moccasin slithering in the roots close bye trying to avoid the current.

This was a good recon as the hike in is probably 20-min and I don't feel safe bringing Bill here unless the water level is at around 2.9 or so. Mm

Stripers with RipTide Charters 26 June 2012

Henry and I hooked up again with Captain Dave Guerrard of York Maine for another 1/2 day with him and RipTide charters. We met and fished the Merrimack River in NewberryPort, Ma from 0630-1230, 23 June. We began by fishing the obvious tidal rips in the mouth of the river and caught fish immediately. We had equal success throughout the day casting 7 inch off-white slugs and a 5-inch pencil poppers with medium weight inshore spin casting rigs. Henry caught the first striper of the day at 24" on the pencil popper. I followed suit shortly after with a 30" on the Slugo. We were generally able to follow the bait fish by zoning in on the seabirds as they feasted on the churning bait balls. We ventured out the mouth of the Merrimack for an hour and caught several as the water was piling up the bait fish on the north side of the jetty on the north mouth of the river-mouth. Henry ended the day with 2 stripers and a gorgeous 30" bluefish...what a fighter & I had 3 stripers all in the 30 inch range. Captain Dave caught another couple which he let us reel in for fun. Towards the end of the charter I moved to Dave's 9 wt fly rod with full sinking line, I casted (with some challenge) a large kitchen sink silver minnow fly. I had 2-3 nice hits but couldn't hook a striper on it....next year!http://www.mainestriperfishing.com/fishing_reports.html