The WBD has been an even tougher fishery these past few weeks w/ irregular air temps, windy days, rain and dropping water. Inconsistent hatches and marginal surface feeding proved to be the case in both trips. On Sunday, we arrived at Stilesville, just in time for Deposit’s Annual Raft Race Day. Emergency crew in their air boat raced up and down the river, escorting 50 enterprising rafters. Although this was a fun local spectacle to watch, it did little to help fishing conditions. The afternoon sulpher hatch was slow w/ no good trout snouts visible. Late afternoon we fished a riffle below Hancock and I managed to lose 5 decent fish. All taken on tiny sulpher/brassie style nymphs on 6x and I put a clinic on how to lose fish. Sunday’s evening hatch never materialized and we left the water close to 9:30. We did manage to see two eagles, a coyote, deer, a turkey and a host of other birds. However, no decent trout brought to net and no sustained surface feeding.
On Wednesday we experienced a better sulpher hatch from 11 am to 2, but w/ very few decent fish feeding on the surface. Plenty of 4″ to 8″ feeding in pods, but no big snouts. Now that we are in summer mode, these larger fish are less likely to feed on the surface and prefer the nymphs/cripples/emergers that lie 2-6″ under the surface. I fished a 16′ leader w/ 6x, double flies and had very few shots @ decent fish. Several times I spooked larger browns handing tight against grassy points, never showing themselves w/ feeding or breaking the surface. All the while, the 6″ smaller yearling browns are feeding all over the place. It is nice to see a healthy population of young fish in the system. There wasn’t enough bug mass on the water to get the larger boys interested. Late afternoon we nymphed two riffles (including Balls Eddy) and only managed several small rainbows/browns. To end the night, we fished the Lower Gamelands and again, the hatch/spinner fall never materialized. The WBD is an awesome fishery, but it sure was stingy w/ us these two recent trips.
I took my Tribalance kayak to the Eel Bay /Wellesley Island Region of the Thousand Islands in early July and enjoyed a pleasant week of fishing and family time. Many days I fished 3-4 hours, exploring various flats, rocky points, drop offs, weed lines, tiny rock islands and other visible structure. . Windy conditions and rain made sight fishing difficult, but most nights I was treated to a superb sunset
I fished w/ an 8wt intermediate clear line and a 7 wt floater. During the trip I landed 7 pike up to 28″, several dozen smallmouth up to 3lbs and a posse of scrappy rock bass and perch. Most fish fell for a chartruese clouser or some type of leech/crayfish imitation. Anchored up or slowly drifting, I was able to catch fish between 3′ and 20′ of water. All of the pike hit on weed edges and I only used 12lb flouro leader, only breaking off 2 pike the entire time. The flourocarbon leader provided more hook ups over wire, and smallmouth were more likely to hit w/out the wire. The smallmouth seemed to prefer broken structure/mottled bottoms and transition areas. Oddly, my two best smallmouth each fell for a tiny 1.5″ clouser.
It is worth noting that I did miss a hefty 5-6 lb smallmouth that taunted me within feet of our Island (where we stayed). In addition, I spooked a hog of a muskie one night as I was admiring the sunset and taking pictures. There certainly are bigger fish around. Next time you have a chance, consider making a short trip to the Thousand Islands. This regional warmwater fishery w/ a fly rod is very manageable and there are plenty of perch/rock bass/sunfish/smallmouth/largemouth/pike to target.
Went fishing on the Oatka with my father-in-law and my friend Will. Water levels were high but they were on there way down from several days of rain. At 3.1 in height and 250 cfps the water had a brown tint but was clear enough to see the bottom in most places.
We thought we would try beatles and found only rising fish would take them along the banks. There were not a lot of risers but Will caught one nice 16″ brown this way. Most of the fish were taken with either nymphs or streamers. Other than Will’s none of them had any size. We only fished from 11am to 3pm. I think if we had more time we would have dialed into some larger fish. Regardless it was a very nice way to spend an afternoon on July 4th.
