Arkansas, Pueblo, CO

Date: Sunday February 19, 2012

Weather: Partly cloudy, warm, NO WIND :-)

Insect/Activity: Midges emerging from 11 AM until about 3 PM

Patterns Used: Blacktail Baetis, AB Tungsten Hare's Ear, Grey Midge Pupa, Olive Midge Pupa

Flows: 64

My parents were in town for a wedding on the weekend of February 18th. One of the great things when they come to town is there is no question that we will be going to the river. Dad says he prayed when we were growing up, "Lord, let my boys love fishing." He also says that his prayers were answered better than he could have imagined!

33 years later and it's not Dad baiting my hook anymore, or telling me where to cast, how to set the hook, or motoring the boat close to shore so we could retrieve a Mepps #2 that flew well beyond the borders of the lake and into the forrest beyond. Now, we fly-fish, as much as we can, and most of the time Dad is asking Jay and I what flies to tie on, where to cast and when to mend. Life is pretty awesome to be able to share all the great moments we've had!

Dad, with the first fish of the day

Another view of the same fish. With the glare not washing-out the photo it was  a spectacularly colored fish!

We made it to the river by 9:30 AM and headed straight for a spot I hadn't fished but had heard good things about. After hooking a solid, and gorgeous, rainbow in the first 15 minutes we figured it was going to be a good time. Then ... nothing for the next 3 hours. I didn't hook a fish, I didn't spook a fish, I didn't spot a fish. The worst part was I had a few outings to the Arkansas recently that were similar - great fish when you find them, but they seemed to be few and far between, which was a huge contrast to my winter experience on the Arkansas last year. Add in the crowds on the Arkansas this winter and I was just about to give up hope.

Then, the madness began, and hope was renewed. I approached a spot that I knew to hold fish in the late fall, but had not been seeing fish in the winter (usually winter fish get a little sluggish and move to deeper, slow runs). I was surprised to see a good sized trout holding in a thigh-deep riffle (a pretty typical summer riffle). It wasn't long before I had spotted a few of his cohorts, and within 15 minutes I was giddy as a school girl, and frustrated that I hadn't hooked one of these fine specimens. It was time to put on the thinking cap ...

Midge were in the air, so naturally I was trailing a midge behind a tungsten hare's ear and I still had on a large, fluorescent indicator from "deep nymphing" earlier. First thought, "ditch the mondo-indicator". After not much better response from the fish I decided it was time to get serious. I ditched the hare's ear and was now down to a micro indicator, 6x tippet, a micro-splitshot and a #24 grey midge (a classic micro nymphing technique).

My first cast had a fish turn and suck down my midge like it was candy! After landing him, I was feeling more confident, but 10 - 15 more drifts with only a few strikes from smaller fish made me think I was off the mark somewhere. Sadly, to my discredit, I had gone the route of laziness and not actually caught a midge yet. So, I decided to grab one out of the air and sure enough it was a deep olive color. I quickly switched out my fly and began hooking fish after fish for the next 2 hours (Dad and I trading off after each landed fish)!


It was a wonderful thing, only lessened by the fact that I lost all of the largest fish (I hooked 4 fish that were over 16", one of which was pushing the 19" mark) due to the strong current and the fish just running like crazy. All in all, though, we landed some really great fish, including a smaller guy that I have NO QUESTION was not a stocked fish, but born and raised in the Arkansas tailwater!

A smaller guy with some AWESOME color. I know the Ark is heavily stocked, but it's always good to see the stockers are making progress in the "bedroom" department :-)

We finished up the day by heading upstream to a spot Dad fell in love with last year, and I decided to stick with my micro-nymphing rig, even though the slow run we were in was deep. I set my depth to about 3' (the run was probably 5' deep) assuming that as midge were still emerging there was a good chance fish would be hanging up a bit in the water column to feed on the emergers. Right again! I lifted up on one very nice fish, a redemption of sorts from all the lost fish earlier. Then, 5 minutes later I lifted up on a very hefty rainbow. It turned out to be the largest fish I've landed on this stretch of the Arkansas and put a very large smile on my face!

A great fish, with a really thick girth! My best to date on the Arkansas below Pueblo Reservoir.

Needless to say, Dad and I left the river pretty happy campers! 


Tight Lines,


-Jeff

South Platte, 11 Mile Canyon, Colorado

Catch-up: This event occurred in the Spring of 2011

Date: Friday April 22 and  Saturday May 7, 2011

Weather: Sunny, beautiful

Insect/Activity: Small amount of midge and baetis activity

Patterns Used: Blacktail Baetis, AB Tungsten Hare's Ear, Grey Midge Pupa

Flows: 52

Fortune smiled upon Ben and I as we took to the river a couple of times in a two week period! I can't remember what stopped Michelle from coming, but I think it had to do with bridal showers, or baby showers!@?! Needless to say, upon hearing my tales after fishing, Michelle rued the day she was born a woman and "showers" became a required event for her gender.

That's a really long way of saying: Ben and I had two amazing days. The weather was amazing—sunny, calm winds, low flows, clear water and cool enough to wear a hooded sweatshirt—and the icing on the cake was the ridiculous amounts of fish we caught!

One of the beauties of late winter/early spring is the low flows and lack of fishermen on the water. It's a great time to get out there and catch fish that, in my opinion, are feeding recklessly because they are hungry from low metabolism in the winter and haven't been pressured for a few months.

With really low flows, it's easy to see fish too, and you can get away with fishing nymphs that aren't too weighted. It's one of the best times that nymph fishing feels like dry-fly fishing.

Here are some great photos that Ben and I got of the course of two days. Make sure to check out the rainbow with the spots on his eyes! I had never seen it before (in person). Really cool looking (though it's possible he took my fly because his eyesight isn't so good :)

Enjoy!

-Jeff Allen

Beautiful, dark colored rainbow. Notice the how his spots are covering his eyes! Amazing!

On the River: Norfork River, Arkansas

June 3, 2010

Ahhhh Arkansas! Land of my fly fishing birth! One of two really. I started fly fishing somewhere around the age of 12. Jay (big brother) is 5 years older than me and he started somewhere around that age too. A friend of our fathers had a fiberglass rod in the rafters of his basement and he gave it to Jay. After about 5 years of Jay being self-taught, on mostly bluegill and bass, he started to pass it off to his little bro (me).

I don't remember which came first, Arkansas or Pennsylvania, but I do know that the very first places I ever fly fished was the Norfork and White rivers of Arkansas, and Penn's creek in Pennsylvania.

Ever since then, we try and make a pilgrimage to Arkansas every year two and they are almost always worth it! The times it's not is when you show up for 5 days and the water is high the entire time.

That wasn't the case for this trip (or at least not exactly). We had been watching the Norfork flows pretty closely and the rhythm was the generators shut down at 9 PM and turn back on at 12 noon the following day. The White was out of the question since it was mostly running at full generators.

If you've never fished these rivers they are tailwaters, but they water flows are dictated by power demand. On low flows, I think the Norfork runs around 70 cfs, but when they turn the generators on the river becomes a raging torrent at about 6000 cfs. Kind of a dramatic change ...

Nevertheless, fate was kind of on our side and we adjusted accordingly to make our fishing day from 5 AM (on the water, in our spot fishing) to 12 noon.

This trip was prompted from an article that told of the "rebirth" of the river due to massive flooding two years prior (I think it was two years ago). Jay and I can attest that the rivers were getting a bit stagnet, with algae blooms replacing the beautiful cress grass and vegitation. Fish were looking sickly and bigger fish seemed to be more scarce. The rumor was that the flood gutted the river, blew out the algae, and washed a bunch of dead baitfish into the river below. I don't know about all those factors, but I can say that the slime of the river was gone, the underwater vegitation was looking better than I've seen it in many years, and the scuds were ... abundant (to put it lightly).

We had a great trip! Most of the grey mornings were spent blind fishing gentle riffles, and once the sun was up it was a sight nymphers dream! There were also risers to be had on midge and baetis, but the vast majority of fish were active sub-surface.

It's always hard to say what was my favorite, because I love the subtle strikes of blind fishing, but how can you go wrong with sight nymphing? If you've never fished the area before, you're probably asking how I can compare blind fishing with sight nymphing, but this place is different. There are so many fish that will be tucked up into 8" deep, broken water that it really means blind fishing is unique and nothing short of awesome! So, you end up blind fishing these shallow, broken riffles that a two-year old could walk across without much trouble, but if you pay attention to these lightning micro-strikes, you lift up on a 14" rainbow that you never even saw there! It's pretty sweet.

As far as flies and tactics go, it's pretty straightforward nymphing. You can fish standard runs all day long, or you can fish tight (as described above), or you can get crazy and fish flat water for bigger fish, feeding lazily on midges. Our staple flies ended up being the Gammarus Scud and a #24 Cream Midge with a thread head (which we don't currently sell, but we hope to correct that sometime soon!). Sow bugs were working well too, just not as well as the G-scud.

Really, if you wanted a bigger, picky fish, you needed the cream midge with 7x and a micro indicator. That's where the money was at.

All in all, we landed a ton of 12" to 14" fish, a good amount of 15" and I think five 18"+ fish. Never really spotted any Monsters in the 6 lb.+ class, which was a bit of a shame cause that is our favorite target.

A good time was had by all, and the days were filled with friends and family. Ben joined us for the trip and I think he will chime in and verify that our tales of Arkansas were not too highly exaggerated.

Until next time,

-Jeff

On the River: East River, Gunnison, Colorado

May 15, 2010

A short jaunt to the East River during one of my favorite seasons to fish it! Sadly, living in Colorado Springs now, that is a statement you won't get to hear much from me. In the Gunnison days, we really could head out to the river for an evening hatch after work. Living a minimum of an hour from trout water makes that a little tougher to do.

I love fishing the East River in the pre-runoff season because you can hit days where the water is just starting to come up (i.e. greenish murky) but is easy to wade, and the fish are stuffing themselves with any and everything being washed down the river by the slightly increased flows.

If you are just beginning your love affair with this sport and are in need of some encouragement here is my best suggestion: Buy some flies with a tungsten bead (AB hare's Ear, AB Pheasant Tail, AB Prince Nymph) and fish them below an indicator in slightly off-colored water. It's the best time to catch fish when they aren't too spooky, are feeding like crazy, and lots of nymphs that the hare's ear/pheasant tail genre are in the water. The strikes will be solid!

Having said all that, that is pretty much how our few hours went. Numerous fish, slamming a single Hare's Ear set about 3 feet below an indicator.

If it's not pre-runoff season, just look for summer days when there has been a light rainstorm recently and you may get a taste of what it's like!

-Jeff

On the River: Black Canyon of the Gunnison, CO

August 29, 2009

Oh, the Black Canyon ... If I've said it once people, I'll say it again, "this is a must fish destination sometime in your life."

Yes, that is a seriously fat, 20" rainbow.

I have never been to the Black Canyon and walked away empty handed, even if there are some days that you may not do as well, you always are seeing large fish, actively feeding in some way. It really is like fishing a natural version of the Taylor River C and R. I say natural, because let's face it - the C and R is a freak of nature.

With the Black Canyon, you've got a lot of amazing fish, that grow large, tucked into an amazing canyon that has very little easy access. Even at East Portal, if you don't cross the river in some sort of floatable device, you can only fish a couple of hundred yards that gets pretty pounded by the RV fisherman.

But ... if thou shalt pass through the waters to the other side, thine shall be a reward of big rainbows and browns, feeding eagerly ... thus saith Jeff.

Michelle and I had a great day! The gammarus scud reigned supreme. Early in the day there was a large fish that wasn't having it (or more likely, I stung him with it and he just wouldn't take again) so I switched up to a midge and then a blacktail baetis for a bit. I got some looks and even a small fish or two, but before long I switched back to the gammarus scud and never looked back. All day long fish were going out of their way to hammer it.

Our mission was to really hook Michelle up. It had been a while since she had a real quality day on any river - the kind of day where the weather, water and fish all cooperated - so the deal was she would pass the rod off to me after every 3 fish she caught ... Neither of us lacked for the day.

We estimate that Michelle landed close to 20 fish, leaving me with a meager 7 fish, but when I had the chance I didn't waste it on small fries. The whole day was fishing the scud 16" below a micro-indicator sighting big rainbows and browns.

The best part of the day definitely came last. Michelle was sworn to end her day on a good fish, so she persevered and at around 6:30 PM she hooked into what was her biggest fish of the day, about an 18" Brown.

Take my advice, go to the Black Canyon, and call me when you're on your way ... I'll try and meet you there if I can!

-Jeff

Michelle's final fish of the day! and the victory shot afterward.

On the River: Cheeseman Canyon, South Platte River, Decker, CO

July 18, 2009

Well, it's always a good thing when you've been fishing too much to blog about it. I write this quite frantically too since I need to catch up on 4 epic adventures since I last blogged and I'm doing it all so I won't be so back-logged when I get back from 4 days of fishing Spring Creek near State College, PA. It's been a long time since I've got back to my roots of spring creek fishing in the east ... a love affair I've long had.

But back to the subject, because this story is about the Cheeseman Canyon, one of the closest resemblances to an east coast spring creek that you'll find out west (at least in the public water sector).

It had been far too long since I last visited (it's a solid 3.5 hour drive from Gunnison) and even longer since I'd fished it in good weather. Yes, my last bout with Cheeseman, that was under blue skies, was my bachelor party, August 25 2005.

I met my buddy Ben at 8 AM at the Donut Mill. [Yes, biscuits and gravy is an excellent way to start a fishing day.] When we rolled up to the river around 10 AM we were met with blue skies and clear water. I was pretty excited about the day. At minimum, you know you won't walk away from Cheeseman on a sunny day without at least seeing lots of fish.

I had my first 15" fish in the sights and tied on a #24 olive midge. Alas, after 8 good casts it was clear he wasn't moving for the midge so I tied on a gammarus scud and the first drift I put past him resulted in a gentle take and a solid fish.

It wasn't long before I was into my 4th or 5th fish. All day long they were divided pretty evenly, the browns either took a gammarus scud, midge, or dry (we picked up a few sporadic risers on caddis, and poly-wing baetis), and the rainbows almost exclusively took the AB hare's ear.

It was around lunch time that I spotted a nice looking fish at the head of a riffle, and since Ben was a little lower on the numbers I gave him first crack at the fish. First drift produced a pretty obvious take and Ben lifted up on this monster rainbow (see left). A couple of hours later, further up the stream, Ben hooked another rainbow of similar caliber (see left) ... I'm not going to give Ben the first crack at a fish anymore.

All in all the day was pretty awesome! We were never lacking for feeding fish and I even got my fair shot at a rainbow that I'm guessing was pushing the 10 lb. + mark. Yes, I came to Cheeseman and got exactly what I was looking for ... intelligent fish that you could sight cast to with small flies, light tippet and a micro indicator (or none at all).

That, my friends, is the definition of a good day.

-Jeff

Allen Brothers strike indicator

I just posted a sweet article on the primary indicator Jay and I use. You can check out the full text (along with a simple version too) here at:

The Allen Brothers

Or, here is the you tube video I loaded up:



It is a great indicator because it can be made as small or as large as you want. The super micro versions are awesome for sight nymphing to delicate fish, or you can make them large enough to float just about any amount of weight.

Hope it helps,

-Jeff