April 1, 2012

Delaware River Report / Conditions April 1, 2012

Happy Opening Day! As much as I’d love to prank everyone with a photo of a Green Drake, I shall refrain. We did have large hatches of Paraleps and Hendricksons on the West Branch and Main Stem throughout the day, regardless of the cold. The activity has been consistent in one way as well – the Main Stem fish, being in colder water, have been much more sporadic and pickier then their West Branch counterparts, who fed voraciously once the water heated up in the afternoon. More rain is expected today, as well as warmer temperatures than yesterday, so we expect to see the fish get friskier – get here now!

Home Pool this morning. Photo by: Bart Larmouth

Hatches:

Paraleptophlebia adoptiva (Blue Quill) – #16 & #18

Baetis species – #20

Ephemerella subvaria – Hendricksons (down river) – #12 & #14

Chimmarra (little black) Caddis – #18 & #20

March 31, 2012

Delaware River Report / Conditions March 31, 2011

Well, it appears I blew it with our email blast sent last night, in the fact that something happened on the West Branch that I failed to mention – HENDRICKSONS ON THE WEST BRANCH! Good hatches and good fish showed up for the first time this season. Otherwise, there mixed reports from yesterday, and while it snowed throughout the night, no accumulation to report, due to the warm ground. As for the fishing – the lower Main Stem had BLANKET hatches of Hendricksons, but sporadic and picky fish were all that were found – likely due to the colder water temps. The lower West Branch  was significantly warmer than the Main, accounting for the hatching and active fish. We’ll see what happens with the colder weather moving in.

A crippled female Hendrickson. Photo by: Jeff White

Hatches:

Paraleptophlebia adoptiva (Blue Quill) – #16 & #18

Baetis species – #20

Ephemerella subvaria – Hendricksons (down river) – #12 & #14

Chimmarra (little black) Caddis – #18 & #20

March 30, 2012

Delaware River Report / Conditions March 30, 2011

Hello! Get ready, as of tomorrow, we are OPEN FOR THE SEASON! The upper reaches of the West Branch and all of the East open up on Sunday, but with how well it has been fishing we decided to open up a day early this year. It will surely be different from last year, when I was shoveling snow off the deck to open, and we didn’t see fish for two weeks into April. We are expecting some snow overnight, so there is a bit of uncertainty as to what Saturday will bring, but Sunday for sure will be good, as the temps will be back in the 60s. We still have stone fly galore, and you cant walk on the shore around home pool without crunching 20 or more Paraleps (Blue Quill). Fish have been rising all day, so I am settling back into my normal feeling of bitterness as I am now chained to the shop once more! All for  you, good readers! Also, as of tomorrow, we will FINALLY have Dark Brown Dubbing available! I will put it on the webstore shortly – sorry for those who have been waiting forever and a day for it, sourcing has been an issue, but is now resolved – just in time for the Hendricksons to pop, which they did in SPADES downriver (Long Eddy and below), and are slowly moving upstream. It’s going to be an early one! Daily updates will also commence starting, well, I guess today! Enjoy, and I look forward to seeing all of you this season!

Ken House with a CHUNK of a brown caught on the Main Stem - built more like a shad! Photo by: Jeff White

An attempt to show the width of this fish - my hand is 4.5" from that thumb to heel - he was close to 6.5" !!! Photo by: Jeff White

Hatches:

Tiny Black Stoneflies – very infrequent, #18

Paraleptophlebia adoptiva (Blue Quill) – #16 & #18

Baetis species – #20

Ephemerella subvaria – Hendricksons (down river) – #12 & #14

Chimmarra (little black) Caddis – #18 & #20

March 29, 2012

WEEEEE’RRRRRE BAAAAACK!

Sorry for the downtime everyone, had some issues with our web host over the last few days, but all should be rectified! Thanks to everyone who let us know it was down, we greatly appreciate it! I’ll put a new post up later today with some pictures (and hopefully video!) if the tech Gods will it.

March 26, 2012

Delaware River Report / Conditions March 26, 2012

What a swing from the weekend to today – it’s near 40 out, with 40MPH wind gusts forcing you into a ski cap (toboggan for you Canuckistanians out there) if you want to head out. We had good hatches over the weekend, with the Paraleps and Baetis making their presence known river-wide. The fish still seemed pretty keyed in on the stone flies kicking about, but I am sure they will work that out of their system soon enough. There have been SCATTERED sightings of the OCCASIONAL Hendrickson floating around. Please notice the emphasis. They haven’t started yet, and with temperatures dropping below the 20s here tonight, it’s unlikely that they will get started in the next week. So reports you may be hearing about them being full-blown ‘on’ are hotter than the air we had here this weekend.

A Baetis vagans dun with a bit of a crippled wing. Photo by: Jeff White

Hatches:

Tiny Black Stoneflies – very infrequent, #18

Paraleptophlebia adoptiva (Blue Quill) – #16 & #18

Baetis species – #20

Chimmarra Caddis – #18 & #20

March 22, 2012

Delaware River Report / Conditions March 22, 2012

Will someone PLEASE explain to me why I am wearing shorts in the middle of March? We are already over 70 today, and it looks like we will get to 77 or so in ambient air temp. Bugs have been reported from about 12:00 to 3:00, and our first ‘magic hour’ flush happened last night at 6:30 or so. We have a few test subjects out on the river today, so we’ll give you a report once we hear from them!

Jeff's little black stone pattern that has been uber effective. Photo by: Jeff White

What we now have in the shop (and WISH we were using!) - the SLG courtesy of Jeff White. Photo by: who else? Jeff

Hatches:

Tiny Black Stoneflies – very infrequent, #18

Baetis species – #20

Chimmarra Caddis – #18 & #20

March 20, 2012

Delaware River Report / Conditions March 20, 2012

It still stymies me that I am doing a river update in March, and it all revolves around the late-May-esq weather we are currently experiencing. Water temps have been jumping up above 50, so we anticipate the fish will be getting more and more active. Proof of that was Jeff White fishing Home Pool yesterday, and in a two-hour stretch caught a slew of pint-sized rainbows – which is in itself odd for this time of year. We have tons of little black stoneflies hatching, and some Chimmarra (black) caddis are starting to materialize as well. The temperature balance also helped create a bit of fog on the river yesterday – looked more like August than March. Yikes!

MARCH fog on Home Pool. Photo by: Bart Larmouth

Early black Stonefly. Photo by: Jeff White

Hatches:

Tiny Black Stoneflies – very infrequent, #18

Baetis species – #20

Chimmarra Caddis – #18 & #20

March 16, 2012

Last-Minute Off-Season “Fun”

The warm weather has finally gotten Jeff and I in gear, as both of our boats needed new gel coats on their respective bottoms, and shipping them to Idaho for repair seemed a bit unreasonable. The rocks in this river (and some in the mountain west for mine) took a pretty good toll on these work horses. Deep gouges and exposed glass are signs of a ‘well-loved’ boat. What ISN’T well loved – all the dust from the three hours of sanding. My hands still feel like they’re holding a orbital sander! Hopefully the good weather will prevail tomorrow and we can finish them up. Also, we will open the shop for limited hours this weekend (i.e. appointment only!) for those of you who are going to venture out. We will not be FULLY open until April 1, as usual!

Jeff sanding is Low-side while I take a break from my High-Side. Photo by: Bart Larmouth

This was just the start - I looked like an albino after awhile. Photo by: Bart Larmouth

March 14, 2012

River Report / Conditions March 14, 2012

Why, hello summer. We hit almost 70 degrees here yesterday, and the bugs were definitely responding. We had large numbers of tiny black stones, and even some super-small (#20) Baetis kicking around as well. It doesn’t seem like the trout have caught on to this fact, however. No matter how much I stared at Home Pool, the fish just didn’t seem to materialize. The water temps are still mercifully low (we don’t want everything hatching out too early!) We will see what this spate of warm weather brings over the next few days. Rain in the forecast is a  blessing as well, as it will hopefully bring the reservoir level back up, as NYC is drawing it down at a pretty good clip through the aqueducts.

Hatches:

Tiny Black Stoneflies – very infrequent, #18

Baetis species – #20

March 5, 2012

River Report / Conditions March 5, 2012

Ok, ok – it’s been more than a week. Sorry for the delay, your amusing reprimands are heeded, faithful readers! Here’s an actual report for you!

On the plus side, very little has changed insofar as conditions are concerned here as of late. A bit of snow, followed by warm weather to melt it off brought the flows up a little bit, but the water temps are still (mercifully) cold, so we’re not worried about Hendricksons popping as of yet. With the water temps staying below 40, there has been little to no surface activity out front, and the fish have been sluggish as well. Occasional little black stones will get an occasional rise, but not frequently enough to really get anyone excited.

Cannonsville is down to 86%, which makes me think that NYC must be drawing water from the lake via the aqueduct, as there is definitely more water coming in than is going out – ice could also be a factor in that measurement. Here’s hoping for more snow / rain before April!

A little black stonefly crawling on the driveway yesterday. Bad cell phone photo by: Bart Larmouth

Hatches:

Tiny Black Stoneflies – very infrequent, #18

February 16, 2012

Dreams of the Future

Ok, not the distant future. Maybe a couple of weeks. With the reservoir hovering around 90%, and no real snow pack to speak of, this is a bit of daydreaming,but I am REALLY looking forward to the early season streamer fishing. In a perfect world, we will get a bunch of spillage right as the alewives are hovering near the warmer water at the surface of Cannonsville – much as we had last year!

Let’s hope these pictures get you through the day today:

Dead Alewife from last March. Photo by: Jeff White

Big, White Streamers - what's better? Photo by: Jeff White

February 8, 2012

Where is Winter?

Hello Everyone!

I hope the “Winter” has been treating you well. I put Winter in ” ” since we really have not had much of one up here in Starlight,with only one storm dropping enough snow to mention. That being said, we are still above-average insofar as precipitation is concerned, the only problem is that we are looking at starting the season with no snow-pack up on the mountains surrounding the river and reservoir. Let’s hope that February decides to send us a big pile of the white stuff, otherwise we will be starting VERY early this season. I will be updating the blog once a week from here on out, due to popular demand (and since everyone is tired of looking at that Halloween cat picture), and to keep you updated on the river,  etc. Have a great week!

A look down Home Pool this morning. Notice the grass is getting green already! Photo by: Bart Larmouth