[Butch]

I was flyfishing last Friday night. It got cold(40's) when the sun went down and the drakes and feeding quit before 10pm. On the way home I stopped by another river at 11pm to find numerous good fish rising:yikes: . By now the air was mid 40's and still dropping, with lots of river mist. I had 9 fish rising near me, all over 12" and more half of them 17+. I couldn't even get a short rise from any of them on assorted dries . As action died down about 11:45(by now, air was about 40 deg) I tried a waker out of desperation and finally hooked one, about 18". I had 2 others halfheartedly pop at the waker.

The fish were feeding near the lower end of a shallow gavelly riffle area. Rises were mostly calm slurps in the main currents. I didn't see any bugs in the air or on the water. I fish into and during the dark of night quite often, but I've never encountered anything like it under the cold conditions. Does anyone have any good guesses about what these fish were feeding on?

Butch

 

[everlast1]

The fish were eating spinners

 

[Butch]

The fish were eating spinners

So it seemed by their (mostly) unhurried rises. However, if I find good fish feeding on top that long after the drakes are done swarming, it's almost always in the slack water where the dead spinners collect, not in fast mid-river current.

In any case, none of the fish showed any interest in the patterns I used(drake spinner, fished dry and soggy, Adams, sulphur, even a caddis-first dry, then twitched, after I saw 1 fish come out of the water 1 time). The mist and fog from my breath made it hard to change small flies or I would have tried more. Frankly, under the circumstances(fast water, occasional rises, darkness) I don't usually find the trout that picky about patterns. Something was different this time.

It occurred to me afterwards that maybe there was an attempted emergance from the 60+ deg water, but the emergers were "stillborn" when they got to the surface and encountered the cold air/fog?

Butch

 

[joefsu]

What type of spinner pattern were you using? Parachute style? Bright color parachute so you could easily see it? I ask because I noticed the other night as it got later in the evening the fish actually became more selective. I could not get any on the parachute style spinner I had tied, so I then switched to a thinly hackled (and clipped to simulate spent wings) grey drake spinner and then didn't have a problem hooking fish.

Just a thought, but you never really know.

Joe

 

[Shoeman]

Just throw something big that makes a wake.
Large muddlers, madonna's, mice. Better make sure your ticker's in good shape. :SHOCKED:

If you're stuck on the hatch, go a little bigger than what's floating in the film

 

[Riverkeeper]

Shine a light on the water next time to see what's hatching or dead on the water. You won't spook the fish.

I can't wait to hit the Sturgeon River for those big boys

 

[axisgear]

Just throw something big that makes a wake.
Large muddlers, madonna's, mice. Better make sure your ticker's in good shape. :SHOCKED:

If you're stuck on the hatch, go a little bigger than what's floating in the film

Had one of those big hogs just about take the rod out of my hand last night:yikes:! A five pounder smashing your streamer at 11:30pm is almost scary:lol: .

I agree with Shoeman,don't pay too much attention to what's going on at the surface.The big boys(and girls!) are feasting on the little risers you're fishing dries to.Big sculpins and trout imitators worked very well last night during a decent drake hatch and I didn't catch anything under 15".

 

[Butch]

Thanks for the ideas. I tried assorted wing styles and sizes. I always try a size bigger than the naturals.

As I mentioned, I didn't see anything on the water. Obviously, if I had, it would have given me some more info.

As for big flies after dark, that's already a favorite of mine. As I mentioned in my first post, when I couldn't dial in the fish and rising slowed down, I eventually put on a big surface disturber and promptly caught a nice fish that wouldn't eat my smaller dries and drew interest from 2 others. In fact, I just counted up my fishing nights for the last week, and realized I've used a big waking fly on 6 of the last 8 night(despite the full moon), sometimes just for one fish that I couldn't hook with a drake or get a drift over, and sometimes covering water for at least an hour or two(I stayed at it until 4 am one night).

I was hoping to get some ideas about the unusual(in my experience) feeding activity under the cold conditions that one particular night.

Butch