We made the best of a bad hand dealt by mother nature and the NYC water authority. Up and down flows make it hard for the fish to settle in and be comfortable but we managed to find some. Beaverkill and Lower East were in horrible shape so we left them alone.
Sunday was an overcast day with little wind. We set out to find a streamer bite but it was pretty slow. Water was the typical milky / dirty you get when the reservoir gets run low in the fall. It's perfect for streamer fishing but not this day. We ran through every color combo in the boxes and managed 1-2. When we got a little lower on the river, I did sneak one on an ISO and another on a nymph. Big Frank had the biggest brown in my boat.
Monday we went a little lower on the river. Since I had Norm in my boat, I wore a shirt & tie trying to inspire his best behavior. LOL. "Respect the tie Norm". Stimey was also with me on Monday and those 2 guys put on a clinic. #1, you always hear guys say they caught 25-35 fish a day.... it's rare that the D gives up more than a handful to any angler. Well, my boat hooked up on 25-30 fish that day. Stimey must have had 12-15 fish shake his fly as well. Highlight / lowlight was Norm's brown. He yelled "There's one" but Jim and I both said "You're snagged". I rowed back to get his rig off the rock when the indi went zipping by the boat. He fought it for a while and it swam back to us and I got a good look. Giant!. The fish ran, I pulled anchor, dropped anchor and chased on foot. (My net frame is 16" x 18") I had the fish on top of the frame TWICE. Several inches hanging over each side. Shook it for him to fall in the bag but he flopped out and almost emptied Norm's reel. The fish came back up eventually and I knew my only chance was to get it in the net head first. Norm pulled the fish's head up and I stabbed with the net....just as the fish went back down. Hit the leader and it was gone. I felt awful. Norm wasn't done there. He got one less than a mile away that we never got a look at. I chased the fish dead up river for 75 yards before it snapped the line. The day finished up with Jim hitting 4-5 fish in the last 300 yards. I just checked with HR and they think Jim should smile more in his grip and grins. LOL. We also rescued a chipmunk and took him to the opposite bank where he was trying to reach.
Tuesday, it was me DaveS and Mkerr. Fishing was still pretty decent....at least I thought so. Not sure what happened but I was stacking them like cord wood using the same rig and floating it right behind the guy in the front of the boat. Before the take out, we saw an Osprey take a fish and hop up on a boulder in the center of the river. An Eagle swooped down and took his fish. I was wildly snapping pics and actually got a few decent frames. I've tried to get an Eagle with a fish in it's claws for 5 years. Finally. Is that Norm in a "Kosher Bacon" suit? Sure is. Don't ask about Dave's headwear. :lol: :-o
Wednesday, the dam decreased flow to 150!!! No option but to find a likely spot and wade. Norm, Fishwagen and myself poked around on the main for a few hours. I walked about a mile to a riff and fished the top 300 yards (bank to bank) and never touched a fish. Went back up 1.5 miles and sat for an hour....nuttin. Back down 3/4 of a mile when a dorsal and tail in 6" of water caught my eye. I crawled up to him and prepared to cast.....then a merganser flew right over him at less than 12" off the water. The fish freaked and was gone. Sat for 2 more hours before I found a rise. Hit him with 6 different caddis patterns before a flock of geese bombed us killing the action. When the bear started bulldozing the knot weed on the far bank, I was outta there before I had an unwelcome eye to eye.
We made the best out of the hand we were dealt. I really enjoy fishing with you guys. Super company, decent fishing, beautiful place to hang out and good grub. I'll be handing out gas-x at the next one. ;-)
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