This weekend was a chance to review my priorities about casting techniques. I took the weekend and went to my hunting cabin in the southern part of New York state. It was suppose to be a wash out because of the rain and wind. For the most part the weather kept me from driving anywhere from my cabin on Saturday. I did managed to get a few casts in at a pond about a half mile walk from my cabin. And pestered some creek chubs in a small stream high in the Allegany mountains.
But that's not what you came to read about. Trout is the reason for this blog and for the most part I have been unsuccessful at catching any.
I think because I have been lackadaisical about my technique. I had been applying salmon drift techniques to all my fishing. That means I stand on the shore and cast perpendicular to the run and drift the current in hopes I will be on the correct side of the currents seam.
So Sunday I got into the Genesee River upstream from Belmont, NY and walked into the most impressive trico hatch I've seen in a while. The shore rocks were covered with dead Trio's possibly from the heavy rains the day before. Or....and I'm not an entomologist but if I were to guess they had spent their life cycle and had crawled onto the rocks after depositing next years eggs. They were also covering the overhanging branches. A group of three male and three female Cedar Waxwings were busy eating them off the twigs. I do not own a camera, so this link may show you what I'm referring to.
Anyway, it was late morning around eight o'clock and this hatch must have been going on for a while cause the water was just boiling with trout nipping at the surface film. I chose a size 22 Trico I had purchased from Panorama Trail Outfitters Fly Shop and began my quest. I was doing my usual thing and realized all I was doing was pushing the trout back into the tailout with each passing of my fly line. So I rethought my tactics for this type of dry fly action. I thought maybe they are following the hatch up from the bottom. So I retied a small nymph with some flash. Then cast it upstream from where I was and drifted it down through a two foot deep cut in the summer vegetation. It was immediately hit by a 14" Brown. After landing and releasing my prize. I noticed the water was no longer boiling with rising trout. So I tried unsuccessfully to raise another out of the same cut.
This made me evaluate my position in the stream and where the seam was that was making the tricos gather the trout in great numbers. I moved down into the tailout of the stream and began casting up stream and drifting back so the line was coming back into my legs. And another trout measuring 12 inches took the nymph. There was plenty of casting after that. The rising trout returned and took up their water ballet, so I knew they were still hungry for top water action. I tied on some other flies. Some drifted on top nicely and some that fell below the film. Some small mouth were biting, but only one more trout would I catch. The fish were still nipping the surface, but I did not see any more Tricos floating. It was getting toward noon and I wondered what they could still be chasing after. So I looked more closely at the surface film and on top was a little pure white insect smaller than a Trico with a single tail about an inch long, twitching back and forth. It had not formed wings yet. This is something you could barley see. So I searched my tackle for anything closely resembling what I think might be a mayfly species. And I fished it casting up stream alike an emerger. A few casts in the right place and I hooked up with a nice, really fat, 16 inch brown. I only wish I had photos too show for it. After I released him, I left to go try some deep holes which only produced a dozen or so good sized small mouth bass.
This river, so far from destructive farming and development, still has an over abundance of aquatic life. I hope any future fracking does not ruin my fishing spot. I saw after noon large mayflies coming off the water. I spoke with a friend today and he said the salmon were just beginning to come into the Salmon River. But this weekend was a good weekend for fishing the Genesee source with three different hatches. What a great day for reviewing my approach and technique of casting.
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