See You in September or The Home Stretch

As the season come to it's conclusion and the fish become scarce we have entered the home stretch. Total fish for August I think was five, not that I went out that often and pursued them with any vigor or concerted effort. Kind of noisily splashed around walking though pools and splashing my way merrily upstream. Caution and patience has been lacking, more into just being there and if it wasn't working just leaving. In a few more weeks the season will end  and not that it will be the end of the fishing, lakes and tidal waters will be open, just that the quiet almost alone seen of fishing private public waters will be over.

October, a fresh stocking and the rush of worm dunkers rushing to clean out the lakes of the stockies will commence. The few fish I will catch I will implore them not to be so eager next time unless you want to be someones dinner! Not that I never eaten a trout, killed plenty and if I hurt the fish maybe they become my dinner. I do take more pleasure in putting them back, hopefully to grow into the stealthy fish that hide and refuse my fly with a show of watery distant. leaving me to put another two dozen cast and perfect cast (but usually fruitless) in the same spot hoping that lightening will strike twice. I know better, but you never know!

Art Flick TU will have it's first meeting of the season on September 15 at 7:30 at the Brookhaven Town  Rec. center in Bayport/Blue Point. All are welcome to come down. Art may make an appearance.

Fly of the Year

As we approach September and the end of the season, I have a few thoughts on what fly performed the best this year. My nominee for fly of the year is the old reliable pheasant tail nymph! Worked we'll fished in any part of the water column, and in any size. If I had to use only one fly, this is the one!
Best newcomer of the year, a parachute style blue wing olive made with rabbits foot guard hairs dyed dun for tail and wing. Fly that made the fish jump out of the water to grab, there is a tie. A Hendrickson Emerger and a beetle with rubber legs and a metallic body, both got some spectacular takes and some interesting acrobatics. Biggest disappointing fly: foam ant, RS2, shop vac, 6X, Barr's emerger, WD40, rabbits foot emerger and the list goes on.

Seeing Red All Over

Funny thing happened on the way to the stream the other day! Took the long way via work, yes I know put a full week in to boot. Then didn't fish till Sunday morning, no fish. Then off to a grand-child's party, getting distracted again. So as I was driving I entered a school zone, school is closed and will resume next week for the year. On the side of the road was a van with strobe lights merrily flashing away and giving out speeding tickets like food pellets at the hatchery. Turns out the locals are short on cash and have turned to robbing passing motorist for small infractions like exceeding the speed limit in a school zone while school is closed. I understand they have resorted to such tactics since most are now stopping for the red light cameras and they have succeeded in taxing the death out of everything imaginable. Old Art has come to the realization that the whole world is completely out of kilter and there is no solution. So what's the answer? Maybe take a more direct route to the stream and avoid schools, people, other cars, politicians and other IED's and WMD's! It's a sad thing indeed!

This is the End, My Friend

The end of this years season is rapidly approaching and it seems like we didn't do enough fishing we're running out of pheasant tails and our impatience is showing up in sloppy casting and very poor line control.

Rain or Be Careful What You Ask For

It's been a little dry around here, recent deluge of epic rainfall caused chaos and blew out local streams!

Too Much of a Good Thing

Reported recently the loss of a section of Ivan's tree! Once shaded a very nice pocket that would at times hold fish, and tested one's casting ability has changed forever. Or has it? When you look at trees along the river bank, you see that there has been many breakages, re-sprouting over the years, maybe centuries. All things do change and evolution is inevitable and these changes are above our abilities to control. There is a lot we can learn from these trees, if we only pay attention!

 

My Wicked Ways

I hate August, endless days, glaring hot sunny days, endless nights of nothing happening. Fish early is the advice of Fran Betters. So I caught the first couple of fish for August and in doing so I realized how late in the season it really is. By 9am it was over and with the sun beating down, I pulled up my buff, and trudged upstream back to the car. So what magically flies worked? Mmmm, sawyer killer bug and a foam beetle. The fish seemed as disinterested and were hiding under the rose bush (they didn't have a wide brimmed hat, sun gloves or a buff to wear), but there are still plenty of nice fish lurking around and my guess is that a couple of rainy days and less sun will bring them out of hiding. With a month and half to go, it's been a strange season.

Labrador Pond and Lee Wulff

When fishing the pond, I always expected Lee Wulff to fly in. There was an older couple driving a Buick who did show up and fished for bluegills, bass and perch with fly rods. They would tell me stories about another fabled haven of real fishing the Adirondacks. Spent most of my youth dreaming about all those lakes, rivers and ponds up north. By the time I was 18 and the opportunity arose to go to forestry college up north, I leaped at the chance to spend my extra hours idly fly fishing for brook trout, then the reality of attending classes, the long and snowy winters showed how really short the season was. I went fishing but never to the extent I originally intended. I did have a professor how taught a wildlife management class who spent as much time on where to catch trout and the best type of cover for grouse as he did in population dynamics. He never bypassed road kill, fly tying material or dinner if it was fresh and not too mangled.

Back at the pond I can still see my Aunt Etta (her nickname, my great grandfather apparently like to assign names at his leisure)  calling everyone in for dinner. Mmmm, frogs legs, venison meatballs and wood chuck stew! Dig in the squirrel is fresh, Kelsy just shot them yesterday!

Labrador Pond today

The Great Lakes

When I was young I lived in a town, a very small town surrounded by much larger towns. The main streets east and west were named after the great lakes and the  north south street or boulevards were named after states except the main drag which was named Commonwealth. Eventually I got it, that each of the states used were commonwealth of this or that. I used to day dream and think about what it would be like to live by each of those lakes and what kind of fish I could catch.

Episodes of Gadabout Gaddis or American Sportsman would only peak my interest more in my fantasy. One year for Christmas, my Dad bought me a Cortland fly rod outfit and I guess endless hours of watching Curt Gowdy fly fish with his buddies on the TV helped me to self learn how to cast and eventually tie flies. We were hundreds of miles away from any real trout stream, I did talk my Dad into taking a ride out to Smithtown were I discovered the Nissiquogue River. We got lost and ended up talking to an escapee from the psych center nearby. My Dad's aunt owned property up north by Syracuse and we spent many a summer plying the waters of Labrador Pond (another fishing fantasy, brook trout up north in Canada) for bluegills, perch and bass. On rainy days I would sneak into my uncles stash of gentleman's magazines (Argos, Esquire and the like) until one day I discovered the Conservationist magazine. One of my favorite mags even today, but what caught my eye was an article entitled " The Monster Rainbows of Whey Pond". I wore the pages out reading and rereading that story.

Soon after entering college I realized that Whey Pond was just a stones throw down the road and even closer was the Ausable and the west branch, and numerous ponds loaded with fat brook trout. I lived what I use to just dream about. Later on I did live by one of the Great Lakes, and fished in two others for Salmon and Walleye. I can still see in  my mind Curt Gowdy and Phil Harris sitting on some shoreline  and the guide preparing them a shore lunch of some walleye, onions and fried potatoes. I can smell it!

Life's all about dreams and living out your dreams. A philosopher ( forgot which one) once said "if you can dream it, you can do it"! Dream big my friends, adventure awaits!  

PTFD

Post traumatic fishing disorder or lack of proper fishing, it's been two weeks since my last fish (maybe more)! Everything these days is a disorder and one or another drug company will latch on and create a market for it. Then create a support group, hot line and Facebook page! PTFD, resulting from not catching any fish or only tiny fish or not finding the time to properly fish. Do you have the following symptoms; sweaty palms, desire to visit an Orvis store, can't tie any knots properly, every time your online you linger on fishing related website, casting dysfunction or CD and worse of all, you sleep in your waders! Then take this little olive pill (a medium olive, with long black wings) and send old Art ..... Hey dummy! Just go fishing, it is the only cure!

View From Afar

Probably a good spot for striper's a couple of weeks ago

O for August

Not often that old Art strikes out! So as a change of pace took the canoe as far upstream as possible. Upper lake the scene of last years dredging, past the small islands through some tree choked channels, past some dilapidated docks and through some small passages. Maybe a mile or so before it was apparent that silting had blocked the way. Water depth of 6" and struck the muddy bottom, what and why? Looking at aerial photos it appears there may be more dams, weirs and culverts ahead. unlike the stream above lower lake this is a silty mess and no habitat for trout or brook trout spawning. Perhaps the biologist should consider the entire stream when doing their planning and studying. My guess on why is the farms and developments upstream between Middle Country rd, and below Cathedral Pines Park. Next on my investigation is the houses on Rustic Lane, and the culvert on Bartlett rd. If there was a way to see if that truly is a dam by that farm without trespassing, then see if soil and fertilizer runoff from that field on the east bank is a problem. All things run downstream, you just can't flush your problems away!