Monday, November 8, 2010

Year End on the Upper C


Each year on some random sunny day in November reality sets in that my Brown trout friend, Big Jim Brown, is going to sleep in the cold water of the Colorado River. Like any helplessly insane fish head, I like to cast about two thousand times to make sure. This year that happened yesterday. Check out the pic above... sunshine, November, and cold water, and Big Jim is settling in for a long winter nap.
Two weeks ago the streamer fishing in the river was great. It seemed like there were two or three fish behind every rock. We were catching fish in places where they never are. Everyone I talked to that had been floating then said the same thing. It was on!
Since then it's been snowy and cold and frosty at night and sometimes tricky sunny during the day. It's that hour or two of tricky sunny during the middle of the day the last two weeks that had me believing.
As it went, we launched on the Upper Colorado well before noon under cloudy skies with snow and rain in the distance. The water temp had slipped to 40, and the fish, every one a Brown, were picked up on slowwww moving hooks. The sun came out bright and shiny every once in while, and that was about the pace of the fishing. When we made plans to go on Thursday we were wearing t-shirts in the sun. When we launched eight of us were wearing a over a 100 lbs. of fleece and waders, and everyone was wearing a winter hat.

What makes these floats memorable is the other hope filled fly flingers along for the ride, and the chatter that occurs when people try to talk a fish on their line. I like the count down... This happens when someone throws a great cast in the perfect place and goes: "3,2,1... boom!" Sometimes it works. As the day floats by the countdown is often repalced by a phrase from a song or movie like "Jimmy don't you know my name?", or "baby, baby, please, baby, please".








Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Geen River Brown's Park 3/29/10

I have had a trip planned to the Green for a month or so to deliver a boat to Trout Creek Flies. They now have one of our boats for rental, which is a great way to enjoy a day on the river, and be in one of our boats. Here's a link to their web site... http://www.fishgreenriver.com/ From here you can make a reservation.
Doug agreed to meet me in Brown's Park, and save me from having to drive all the way up. I mentioned the prospect of a "D" float to a couple of folks, and we came up with a plan to camp Sunday night, and float Monday. This was new water below Swallow for all of us. . The river down there is dominated by cut banks, gravel bars, and grass beds. We saw herds of deer, lots of geese and ducks, canyon beaver, and open range beaver, red tail hawk, and maybe an otter. The fish we caught were all Browns. The weather was variable. It could have snowed once or twice, When the wind wasn't howling it was almost warm. The sunny and warmer day before must of kicked Red Creek loose. The water color was a little off.
Here's a nice fish Herb caught. I'm thinking it's a little over 20". He ran into this one lurking between two refrigerator size clumps of grass about ten feet off a very steep bank. It ate a small black leech. We threw tandem rigs, and big segmented numbers, but the most productive was a # 8 or so single streamer. The fish didn't necessarily cartwheeel over the top. The water is still cold. The Green is lining up to having an old fashion kind of good year. The water is running a steady 900 out of the dam. I'll be heading back to check in on our boat, and see how the blue wings are coming along around the terrace pool.