I hit the Salmon River as often as I can these days, but with sunny days and temperatures that melt your brain inside your skull the trout really aren't biting. Every so often I'll get to go out in the dark or during a rainstorm and the fish will take what I'm throwing, but I am, of course, at the mercy of the random New England weather. Most days the forecast calls for sun and we get random brief thunder showers. When it calls for rain we get sunshine and mugginess. Thanks weather.com. I may as well ask a magic 8 ball.
HOWEVER...
I'm nothing if not stubborn, and I refuse to let the summer heat beat me. I'm making an effort to target bass, though I have few bass flies. Wooly Buggers and Clousers will do the trick, but truthfully any small item moving in the water is prey to them. I've hooked small bass (and numerous sunnies) stripping in a dry fly. Whatever works. Though I have yet to LAND a largemouth bass on a fly rod, it's not from lack of trying.
My new mechanic is on the Quinnipiac river just downstream from the Wild Trout Management Area. The river is low and slow right off the bat, regardless of weather or spring runoff, and it's just a little bit grimy. Naturally I pegged it as a decent bass river, and set myself up with a 3x tippet and a white wooly Bugger. My backcast was blocked by the treeline, and I lost several flies the last time I fished here because I overestimated the clearance. I can only get my fly out so far with a roll cast, but I did my best. I varied my retrieves: short and fast, short and slow, slow and steady, fast and steady...even jerky erratic movements. The sunnies are building their nests this time of year so they were extra aggressive. I was pulling them in left and right, quickly unhooking them, then releasing them back into their pool.
I also had a hookup with a largemouth on a slow drop and a jerky, erratic retrieve. He wasn't very big, but he yanked like he was. I fought him for a minute or two, then he unhooked himself. I'm using only barbless hooks, which obviously means my fish come unbuttoned pretty often. However, I feel the benefits outweigh the detriments, and my conscience doesn't gnaw at me quite so much.
While trying to re-entice the same bass, I saw some large carp swimming by. I immediately tied on a small Klinkhammer dry and started casting to them, only to have them refuse it over and over. I watched where they went and saw the carp were congregating at the head of the pool, so I reeled in my line and got a little closer.
I've been listening to the Orvis Fly Fishing Podcast on a regular basis and watching their videos, and there is a good amount of information about fly fishing for carp. I did my best to remember what I'd seen and heard, and I made it a point to follow these carp and try casting to them. My Klinkhammer was getting waterlogged and I had no floatant with me, so I switched to a smaller dry fly. While casting to the carp I kept hooking up with juvenile smallmouth bass, which, under normal circumstances would have been cool, but in this case it was more annoying than anything else. I did my best to quickly unhook them and get my fly back out to the carp before they swam off.
Eventually the carp had refused my fly enough to warrant changing the pattern. They weren't really hitting the topwater stuff at the moment, and they were clearly digging in the mud for underwater bugs. I tied on a size 12 pheasant tail nymph and began casting to them. I had to get my fly to drop right by their heads or else they would just ignore it. Eventually a smaller carp took the fly and I set the hook, only to have the carp run and snap my line. I did the same thing with a second carp a few moments later.
The third pheasant tail I tied on, I dropped right by one of the biggest carp and he took it. I set the hook and that fucker RAN! He went clear to the end of the pool and back. As soon as i started reeling and putting pressure on him he would do it again, and again, and again...this fish would not let up. I spent a good 15-20 minutes fighting this fish, only to realize my net wasn't big enough to handle him, and besides, every time he saw me reach out with it he ran again. Eventually he had tired enough that I could swing his head out of the water and scoop him up with my puny trout net. He was so big his back half hung out of my net and I had to carry it into the shallows with two hands! I'm horrible at guessing weight, so I won't bother taking a stab at it and making an ass of myself. All I know was it was a solid fish. I unhooked him and released him back into his pool relatively unscathed.
So I'm going to continue to target carp when possible during the summer months. Connecticut is full of them in just about every small pond and slow river. Hell, theres a large group of them in the river right behind my tattoo shop! They are quite hard to hook, even harder to land, and are pretty damned fun overall. I need to tie up some carp (and bass) flies and put them to good use over the rest of the summer.
Trout are great, but fuck 'em if they don't want what i'm selling. any port in a storm, as they say.
Thanks for looking!
