"Healing"

I spent a few hours yesterday fishing a stream I have not visited in some time. Well I should say i visited it several weeks ago but it was so high that I could not effectively fish it. Yesterday was some what more tranquil, and the few hours I spent here were very enjoyable. This river has given up some rather large brook trout in the past, in fact one of my best brook trout came from one of the delightful pools that I fished yesterday. A couple of our annual New Years Day meetings were held on this stream. This stream had some issues I'll not go into these here but lets just say they were not the best. I will say this the river fished as good as it did several years ago, and it is as beautiful as ever.

The morning started out slow, a fish could not be located. The air temp overnight as well as the morning time was cold. I don't know what it was but I guess it was in the mid thirties. A few times I had to remove ice from the guides. I dropped my thermometer into the stream and was surprised to such a low reading 33...that makes for poor feeding.

I fished several flies, from dries to streamers and soft-hackles.

I finally got a brookies to take a slow drifted black spider. In moments the spunky brookie was at hand. She was lacking color but a few spots were quite nice. I eventually took a couple of more fish from the pool above. Time said I must head home.

On the way back to the car I noticed these trout lilies pushing through the dry leaves, a wonderful sight on a cold April day.

"Bumblepuppy"

Good morning friends. This will be a simple post, short and sweet, and interesting to you I hope. On Wednesday April 11th I have the pleasure of tying flies at the Connecticut Fly Fishermans Association "Fly Tyers Round Table". The event is a great one both for fly tyers as well as fly fishermen and women. Lots of tyers creating patterns from salt water to farm pond bluegills. The event is free and open to the public. If you have the chance come see us. It's located at Veterans Memorial Clubhouse 100 Sunset Ridge, East Hartford CT.

I'll be tying the "Spruce" the original and a few variations.

In addition to the Spruce I'll also tie a couple of patterns that have worked well for me this past winter and into the spring.

Basic Black....

A pretty scene. This one is located on one of CT's class 1 wild trout streams. It also looks like a photo from the book Voelkers Pond. This leads to a project I'm tinkering with, and that is to tie all of the fly patterns from that book. Below is the first.

The "Royal Trude" the fly is featured in a couple of pages in the book.

Now "Bumblepuppy" Theodore Gordon's streamer fly....just need to get a couple of more materials. Coming soon.

Making The Best Of It

Fishing has been a hit or miss situation this early spring. For the most part conditions on the days I've ventured out have been OK. As far as weather issues and water conditions I can not complain, well maybe a little, with the wind that is. As far as catching is concerned the score has been mostly disappointing. I contribute this to the night time temperatures. Nights have allowed the mercury to fall below freezing and the daytime temps take awhile to rebound, this makes for slow insect activity as well as very little fish feeding.

It was my last outing on Saturday that I finally found active fish. It was afternoon when I located some small brookies that were willing to take a starling and purple soft-hackle. This fly worked probably because of the small stoneflies that were about. That little frenzy lasted about a half hour and then shut off.

Moving down a bit I fished a great run. I managed to bring a fish close to hand but it was not to happen.

I moved onto the other side of the log and tangled with this lady.

Luckily she did not free herself, judging by the way she is hooked a mere shake and he would have been gone. So as we move on into April, hopes are high.

More "Spruce"

The "Red Spruce"

Again from the pages of Streamer Fly Tying and Fishing comes another variation of the Spruce Fly. This pattern is called the Red Spruce. Bates was told that the Red Spruce was designed for eastern brook trout. It was first seen at the Meier and Frank Company of Portland, Oregon in 1943. It is believed it was brought out by husband and wife combination working under the name of Smith-Ely of Blue River Oregon. The fly is basically the Spruce with the addition of a red hackle feather tied in along with the silver badger hackle. This added color of red is a plus when fishing for brook trout.

Taking a key from the Red Spruce I created a couple of more variations of this great streamer. In this pattern I use a orange saddle hackle along with a silver badger. The collar is a golden badger feather.

The "Orange Spruce"

The contrast in the use of a golden badger collar can be seen here. The orange is also a brook trout favorite color.

The "Royal Spruce"

This pattern is a Royal Spruce. It uses an under wing of a golden pheasant crest, along with Jungle Cock.

A great pattern representing a smelt or other bait fish.

A stand of "Spruce"

I will be tying these at the Connecticut Fly Fisherman's Association fly tyer's roundtable in April.