Wednesday, July 11, 2012

The past 3 weeks

Well It has been a while since I have had time to do a new write up on the fishing trips. Sorry for the long drought, hopefully I can make up for it with some good stories and pictures.

Typically, This is the time of year that I am fishing my 5 wt. The Drakes are here along with PMD, caddis, flavs, and a whole lot more topwater action which makes for some amazing days on the Henrys Fork. Salmon flies are going strong on the South fork of the Snake, and all the small streams that I love to fish are open and fishable now that runofff has come and for the most part gone.
This rainbow was one of the few trout I have taken on a dry in the past 3 or 4 weeks. It also was trout number 1200 for the year, which has me right on track for my 2500 trout goal.

Like I said, Typically this is dry fly time, well this has not been my typical fly fishing year in any way, shape or form. The past 3 weeks has been nothing but BIG fish on streamers. I fished my 5 wt with a dry a few days ago for about 5 minutes and put it down and busted my 8 wt back out and went hunting for big fish again. The 5 just felt wierd in my hands. I never thought I would say those words, but the 8 wt feels at home currently. Right now you are probably asking, Why on earth is he fishing an 8 wt for trout? Well the simple answer is its alot easier to chuck 2 articulated streamers on an 8 wt and when you are hooking up with many fish in the 20-24 inch range, its a little easier to control them. Here are some of the fish from the last few weeks that shane, Chris, and myself have brought to hand.











This isnt even remotely close to the amount of fish that we have got into lately. I kinda got away from taking photos for a while because it was getting boring. I would hook into a good fish and think in my mind, "man not another 20 inch cutt, I have enough pictures of them." I guess looking back on it now, its a great problem to have.

I have learned so much over the past 3 weeks about streamer fishing. The thing I have learned I feel is most important, is the speed you are stripping corresponding to depth. I notice the deeper the water the slower the fish want it. Another thing is you need to find the "Streamer water" in a given river. Not all holding water is alike when fished with a streamer. We have been doing great where there are sharp ledges that drop a foot or two in depth. Also any kind of pocket water going back under willows or brush consistantly produced fish for us.

Over all I guess I cannot complain about the fishing the last few weeks. It has been nothing but EPIC!!!!!! The takes were amazing, most fish would hit the streamer like a torpedo, sometimes coming from 4 or 5 feet away to take it. It really doesnt get much better than that.

On a side note, I will be headed back to Pennsylvania the last week of July through the first week in September, and will be home chasing Carp, Muskie, Bass, and of course trout. I will be sure to post some reports and photos while I am home. My number 1 goal while home is to get a muskie on the fly so stay tuned.

I am so grateful for the time that I am able to fish. Its funny, I am known everywhere on campus as the fisherman. Its all I do when not doing school related stuff. This year has been stellar in so many ways. I landed a job helping to teach the fly fishing class on campus. What an awesome job! its extremely rewarding to teach others to fly fish and pass my knowledge on to them, but also frustrating. Its really hard trying to get students to make their casts count and to fish effectively. It was really good to see their progression over time though.
 One of the perks to the job!!!!!! I get access to these!!! I am really enjoying getting to learn whole river systems over just the sections you can wade.

Here are some of the students from this semesters class and some of the fish they caught. Their faces show it all if you ask me.





 Me (second from right) and half of the students for the spring semester class
 Students on this trip got to experience salmon flies!!!! how awesome is that?






I love my Job!!!!!






1 comment:

  1. Josh, my name is Brandon Larson and I've been trying to find good places to fish. I've done quite a bit around Rexburg and I've gone up to Warm River but I'm trying to find some places that are a little closer. I've been fly fishing since I was 10 but haven't done it for a while so it's taking a little time to get the hang of it again. I love your blog and I've sent it to a couple family members because of how cool it is. If you could shoot me an email that would be great because I've got a few questions if you don't mind me asking you. My email is brandonplarson@gmail.com. Thanks Josh.

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