West Branch Report

With last night's rain, the water levels were up a bit (~450 cfs at Walton) and the water was a bit more cloudy than its been for a few days. According to the pros, the higher water and cooler temps should be good for fishing so here's hoping. While out on the West Branch near Hamden I did see some decent bug activity, though the surface feeding was sporadic for most of the evening.

Best guest at what I was seeing is that we had Hendricksons, Blue Quills (dark bodied, dark winged mayflies), and the occasional bright green apple caddis. I fished a few different patterns throughout the evening, starting with a basic March Brown wet fly, and then progressing to a Hendrickson parachute, a blue quill, a BWO with CDC wings, and a rusty spinner. Dark flies definitely seemed to be the most effective tonight. I had trouble seeing the small #18 blue quill though I think it was probably the best choice based on color and size of the naturals. I tied on the #14 BWO since it was a little bigger and floated a lot better making it far easier to spot. It caught a beautiful 16" brown that casually slurped it from the foam. I admit, I knew he was there, but I thought he was a much smaller fish when I casted to him.

CDC Emerger

As promised, my first fly that caught me a fish. It's a great little pattern that's quick to tie and represents a number of bugs. I originally tied it to be a BWO, but last night it did duty as a spent caddis and/or a blue quill or quill gordon and landed me a beautiful fish on the first presentation. 

Hook: #16 emerger

Thread: 70 denier, black or olive

Abdomen: stripped peacock herl

Thorax: olive dubbin

Wing: 2 dark dun CDC feathers tied facing rearward and then pulled forward over dubbin ball to form a wing case and tied behind the eye to form the wing.  

Blue Quill

The West Branch Resort report says the blue quills are popping on the Delaware so to the fly bench I went.

Hook: #14-18 dry

Thread: black 70 denier

Tail: natural dun fibers

Body: stripped peacock herl

Hackle: natural dun

Wings: natural dun hackle tips