Seeking Delaware advice

[Nocktavius]

I hooked into an absolute tank on the EB this weekend that made me truly regret switching to 5x for a few minutes "just to see if it made any difference". I might just start fishing 3x up there

 

[caddisflyer]

I prefer 5x or 4x but will often go to 6x. All flouro. To each his own. Have landed plenty of 18-24" trout on Delaware and elsewhere on 6x. Fishing a tiny olive or sulfer on 5x usually does not work well for me. If you are breaking them off you have other problems. Likely rod too stiff and not anticipating runs etc. Take a piece of 6x and experiment with breaking it. It is stronger than you might think.

 

[krayfish2]

I hooked into an absolute tank on the EB this weekend that made me truly regret switching to 5x for a few minutes "just to see if it made any difference". I might just start fishing 3x up there

Tail hooked shad! They'll do that to you.

 

[Nocktavius]

Tail hooked shad! They'll do that to you.

Are there shad up as high as the Beaverkill? It sure ran like a trout and got hooked in a nice meaty back eddy but I've never hooked a shad so I wouldn't know!

 

[krayfish2]

The shad run up the main, up the lower east to the jaws. 90% bust a left and make their way up the upper east but I believe there's a smaller group that head up Beaverkill. Sometimes they run like a hot salmon and other times you think you've hooked an old t-shirt off the bottom. If you find a school, keep swinging a brighter wet or something flashy like a prince across their nose. Do it 1-3 times and they'll spook or eat it.

Since it's the longest undammed river in the east, you have an awful lot of fish movement that just happens. It's a complicated fishery with some of the things that transpire over the course of the season. You have stripers that come up from the Delaware Bay pretty regularly and that's hundreds of miles. If I'm not mistaken, when they did the radio tag study 20 years ago (or so), it was pretty normal for fish to move 15 to 30 miles as seasons progressed. I believe there was one rainbow that they tagged near lordville that made a run all the way down river to narrowsburg once the river began to warm. So, that fish ran down river towards what we assume is warmer water but maybe it wasn't. There is another rainbow that I think was tagged near Long Eddie that was then located under the covered bridge at the fly fishing museum on the willowemoc. I believe that was over 70 miles traveled. Pretty amazing stuff

 

[falcon]

The Delaware bows evolved differently than other trout. Some do apparently migrate down river to cool spots and spring holes. There are bows at Skinners Falls in the summer. I have seen Shad at the covered bridge pool at Downsville on the East Br.

 

[krayfish2]

Oh yeah, the shad run all the way to the dam.

 

[mcwillja]

I never fish a leader less than 16' - I always have a minimum of 3 feet of tippet. long tippet is the key not really the size of the tippet. Rarely go 6X unless fishing sz. 20 sulphurs late in season when things get very spooky.

 

[JeffK]

My best day for shad on flies was at the Trout Bk pool on the Beaverkill. It was late morning and the rises quit so I started streamer fishing. Thought I hooked a monster (that pool holds some large streamer gulping browns), but it turned out to be a shad. Was on the pod for an hour with non-stop action. Only happened once for me in the Beaverkill.

I have seen hickory shad in the upper Willowemoc. Only get that far every 5 to 10 years, but they do make it.

BTW, I generally fish 5X on the Delaware system. One night a buddy told me to cut back to the 3X and fish a large attractor fly. Didn't cut much and lost a giant one. I believe it is more about proper presentation and I don't want to play fish long. I fish tricos with 6x.

 

[JeffK]

Here is the NY DEC page for that area. Plenty of info to rummage around with.

East-Central NY Fishing

 

[ryansheehan]

I hope you get a really hot rainbow also known as a crackhead. You see the rise and as you raise the rod tip to set the hook the fish is already 20 ft by you. Scrambling to get the line tight and just as it goes tight, 180 and runs at you full throttle. I've had plenty where my line is tight downstream but the fish is jumping parallel to where I'm standing which is mind-boggling. Keep in mind, this isn't a five or six pound fish causing that kind of chaos, it's a 15 or 16 in fish with blistering speed. It's awesome

A couple fish like this I will never forget!

 

[Oregon_OwlII]

I've been invited on a kayak fishing trip to the Delaware in late May. My host says to expect lots of fish rising and they are hard to catch. While I highly prefer fishing dries, I tend to be a little lazy about it. Even though I've assembled a box full of pattern matching flies, I usually start with a caddis and stay with it as long as it works.

Can anyone offer advice to minimize my chances of getting skunked?

Match size and color of the hatch. Don't be afraid to fish underneath with nymphs and soft hackles.