As autumn leaves color our landscape, we are still waiting for significant rainfall. We need days of soaking rain to push more water into smaller and mid-sized tributaries.  Recent rain over the past week barely elevated water levels.  The ground is so parched, that most rainfall was quickly absorbed.  Over the weekend, I scouted three smaller tributaries and didn’t see any fish.  In past years with higher water, there were already plenty of fish in these same creeks by mid to late October.

An extended period of a soaking rain will flush out fallen leaves and bring a fresh push of tributary fish.  Nature has her own ways of adapting.  Small creek to mid sized tributary salmon and browns will postpone their upstream swim and spawn, waiting for sufficient water.  On certain years, it’s not uncommon to find Lake Ontario browns spawning in December, or even into January.  Or, fish like salmon that are more time pressured,  will remain in the lower estuary zone and attempt to spawn.  A few years back, I recall a push of salmon that entered a creek in early December.  Regardless, we still have weeks of spawn time for salmon and browns.  Whether the current storm system has enough moisture to induce the spawn, is another story.

The best bet for anglers wishing to chase salmonids is to spend time on large rivers.  The Salmon River, Oswego, Genesee, Oak Orchard, Eighteen Mile, Cattaraugus Creek and other similar large tributaries have been experiencing fish for weeks.  Numerous salmon carcasses already litter the banks of some large rivers.  I recently enjoyed a trip to a well loved tributary that I typically avoid until after Thanksgiving.  Too many anglers, crowded conditions, pay for parking, etc are a few reasons for my avoidance.  However, due to low water conditions and the Genesee still being discolored, it was the surest bet to find fish.  A friend and I hiked below the majority of the crowds and focused our effort on a narrow portion of river.  The point we fished acts as a natural funnel and salmon, browns, and steelhead.  These fish converge and in this zone.  It was a beautiful Fall Day and we managed to find several nice fish.  As you head out to the river, here are a few tributary specific tips that might improve your odds:

• Give them plenty of different profile flies and egg colors to look at.  Tributary fish can be moody and if you know that your fly is repeatedly being seen and rejected, try a new pattern.  Sometimes an off-color streamer, less bright streamer, more realistic egg pattern, natural nymph/stonefly, random San Juan Worm, chartreuse caddis larvae or whatever, is the right trigger pattern.
• If you’re not fishing for fresh salmon, then there’s no need to beef up your tippet strength.  You will get a more natural drift with six or eight pound test.
• While on the subject of ensuring a natural drift, make sure that your split shot is sufficiently distanced away from your fly (NYS DEC Regulations-must not exceed 4‘).  It’s plausible that the ticking of split shot alert already spooked fish.  Or, build non-toxic  weight into your fly and skip the split shot.  Personally, I like to employ custom built sections of T-14 that I loop to loop connect to my weight forward floating line.  These custom length T-14 sections allow me to effectively fish various depths, especially when dead drifting or swinging streamers.
• If you can see the fish, odds are that they can see you.  Consider backing off, getting above them and maximizing your presentation location.  Also, consider employing a more natural colored indicator.  White or Black are great colors and will be less likely to spook educated tributary fish.  Adjust your indicator depth to slightly more than 1x to 1.5x the depth of the water your fishing.
• As long as you don’t infringe on another angler’s water, cover water.  Use your polarized glasses and scout out the most likely holding zones for these fish.  Sometimes a quick upstream or downstream jaunt will yield less spooked fish.
• Finally, mend and mend more.  While there are times that actively swung flies work, dead drifting a natural presentation (such as an egg pattern) requires constant mending and line manipulations.  For those anglers interested in dead drifting as well as swinging patterns, that JP Ross Switch Rod works well for both.  Over the past two seasons, I’ve found switch rods the perfect compromise between the limitations of a conventional 9′ rod, versus the fatigue and heft of a two-handed rod.  Consider making the conversion to a switch rod and you just might be pleasantly surprised!

Daffodils are blooming in front of the house and birdsong welcomes each day.  It must be springtime!  The soaking rain we enjoyed last night gave a nice boost of water to our tributaries.  Before the rainfall, small tributaries were especially  low and clear.  We’re now into mid-April and by now, many of our small creeks  experienced an active spawn of steelhead over the past six weeks.  Steelhead spawn sooner in small creeks.  Water temperature warms quicker and they tend to do their business before their brethren in  large tributaries.  While larger systems such as the Cat, Oak Orchard, Sandy, Genny, Oswego and Salmon River all fish well through the month and into May, small creeks can be more fickle.   Low water, quickly warming temperatures and bright sun, convince steelhead to linger less in small creeks.  While there are always stragglers and exceptions, fellow anglers shouldn’t be surprised if the see fewer fish from now until the end of the month.

At the same time, April steelheading offers some of the finest action of the year.  I’m particularly attracted to sight fishing and swinging large streamers for these chromers.  Catch numbers may be down, but the ferocity of strikes, aggressive nature of drop back fish and improved fight make April steelheading a wonderful option.  Here are a few  strategies that you might consider adding to your bag of angling tricks:

• Look for the shadow, not the fish.  Darker fish blend in well and a shadow can give away a non-moving steelehead.  Bright, overhead sun can be your friend.  Use it to your advantage to look for shadows and strive to keep your shadow off the water.  The picture shows a 28″ female that is easily detected by her shadow.
• Look for that crimson slash around the gill plate, the white of a mouth, a quivering tail, or the gentle sway of a holding fish.  Unless they are actively on gravel, most larger tributary fish will prefer deeper holes during bright sun, or gravitate towards logs/boulders/undercut banks.
• Find spawning suckers and you will likely find a few opportunistic post spawn browns or steelhead.  Look for the darker shapes, larger figures or nervousness of suckers as telltale signs that larger tributary salmonids are present.  It’s tough to beat a sucker spawn fly w/ a dash of chartreuse to entice that greedy steelhead!
• Spooky steelhead require different, lighter tactics.  Drop down your tippet size (4lb to 6lb), lengthen your leader (10′ to 12′), minimize the flash and color on your fly, and deliver your cast with as much stealth as possible.  I prefer to use a white yarn or black yarn indicator that barely makes any splash.  These are less likely to cause alarm with a wary, shallow water steelhead.
• My best streamer success with low, clear water steelhead comes with sparse, realistic minnow imitations.  I sometimes fish lightly dressed, translucent saltwater bait fish patterns.  These are more realistic in profile than a typical rabbit zonker and offer a more subtle approach.
• Target the most aggressive steelhead in the bunch.  Also, there is no need to make dozens and dozens of casts to a fish that sees your fly, yet doesn’t respond.  Switch flies, vary your patterns and make each cast count.  When a fish actively moves away from your fly, then your presence is likely detected.  If I don’t dupe a fish within my first ten casts and I know that my fly has been in the zone, I switch patterns or techniques.  Or, I continue to scout other areas of the creek that might present more cooperative fish.
• Lastly, leave those wonderful reproducing females alone!  It’s a magnificent sight to witness steelhead spawning.  If a female is on gravel and in shallow water, let her be.  It’s a treat of nature to enjoy this spectacle.  She merits protection.  We have several waterways that actually have a degree to natural reproduction, well worth preserving.  Besides, she’ll be a fine target as a drop back fish in another few days.

The bluebird sky and temperature in the upper thirties convinced me to leave work early today for Oak Orchard River.  A friend of mine (Norm) was already fishing the river and he invited me to join him prospecting a popular run.  He was chucking a large chartreuse pattern to dredge up steelhead.  I opted to put on a sink tip and fish streamers, slowly on  the bottom.  I fished an 8′ section of T-14 and knotted a white zonker w/ a chartreuse bead head as a pattern.  I took the lower half of the pool and felt a familiar tug within ten minutes.  Soon, I victoriously hoisted a foot long horny head sucker out of the water.  Not exactly what I expected as both the sucker and I looked surprised.  Still, any fish in the winter beats a sharp stick in your eyes!

After some time I hiked upstream and crossed well above of the pool.  I wanted to fish the other side of this popular run and really plumb the trough of the pool.  After another thirty minutes, I felt a solid tug and enjoyed the fight of a hefty steelhead.  This fish was foul hooked and I barely admired the beauty, before a prompt release.  I continued to fish a variety of streamers (purple/white/olive) for another hour with no success.  I really enjoy fishing streamers, especially for active fish.  As nobody around us appeared to be hooking up, I couldn’t say that these fish were active in any way.  In fact, reports indicate that things were slow on Oak Orchard today.  Sometimes, bottom bouncing is your best bet, especially with lethargic fish.  Finally, I re-rigged and switched to a dark stonefly w/ a petite chartreuse head.  On my second cast, I hooked a nice 24″, well proportioned brown.  After the brown, I fished another hour and couldn’t buy a fish.  As much as I enjoy fishing streamers, I think that tiny, natural stonefly patterns might have been the most productive ticket today.  Overall, a beautiful day, nice to fish with a friend, swans keeping us company and a great way to start the weekend.

Saturday, March 6th, I’m presenting  (Kayak Fly Fishing and 1,000 Bass and Pike) and tying flies at the Fly Tying Symposium http://www.jprossflyrods.com/staff/ffaa/index.php in Utica.  This is a great event for kids, stop by if you are in the area!

The gentle warming trend of upper thirties convinced me to leave the fly tying bench and head out to Oak Orchard River.  It was a pleasant, mostly sunny afternoon and no gloves were needed during fishing.  It’s always a winter treat to fish without gloves, as well as not worry about iced guides.  There were only two other cars in the parking lot and I had several hundred yards of river to myself.  I broke out my two-handed 8wt and opted to slowly drift and swing streamers.  The water was crystal clear and flowing around 300 cfs.  Nobody liked my white zonker, nor a brown bugger.  Covering plenty of water, I changed to a # 6 dark olive bugger and within a few casts, hooked a 3-4 lb brown.  I carelessly lost the brown as it got closer.   Nonetheless, I enjoyed a good look at it and was glad to hook a fish on this January day.  After that, with determination I bounced my fly on the bottom, covered plenty of water.  My effort  didn’t produce another strike.  Overall, a nice day winter day to get outside.  The highlight of this trip was watching a beautiful pair of trumpeter swans feed and patrol a close stretch of water.

I’m not sure how many fish were in the section I fished, but Jay Peck and Carl Coleman later confirmed that “the Oak” had been stingy recently.  With all the smaller creeks iced up, your best bet these days is on this river, the Genny, lower Irondequoit, Salmon River or any of the other decent sized tribs with moving water.  The slightly warmer temperatures the next few days might likely help in your quest for a winter steelhead or holdover brown.  Remember to layer up and keep that fly close to the bottom and moving slowly!

A friend of mine called me up a couple of weeks ago and said that his brothers-in-law were coming to town and wanted to go steelhead fishing.  Of course I said I would join him and suggested that we go to Oak Orchard in Carlton, NY.  My friend had never been before but heard quite a bit about the legendary fight of these Lake Ontario steelhead.  We went out last Saturday.  It was a beautiful but cold day.  The sun was shining, but the water was still around 47 degrees.  The fish seemed happy rolling like tarpon as they moved upstream, but nothing.  We threw egg patterns, streamers, and even a tube fly at thess fish but nothing.  Since we drove separately I decided I would leave at noon but my friend Cody and his brothers-in-law decided to stay.  They fished from approximately from 9am til 4:30 pm and finally caught the steelhead pictured below.  I believe they caught this one on a streamer, but had the advantage of site fishing.  I wish I was there for the catch, but I understand it was a thrill for my friend Cody to catch this fish.  Looks like yet another who is addicted to our wonderful New York steelhead.  Tight Lines Cody!

We are truly fortunate and thankful to live in Western NY where we have great trout streams and rivers.  In addition to this we also have world class steelhead and lake run brown trout fisheries.  Yesterday I got out with a few of my friends to try our luck for some Lake Ontario steelheads and browns.  The conditions were a bit tenuous with quite a bit of snow and rain with very cold temperatures.  The first Lake Ontario trib we tried was running too high and cold.  The fish were just not responding to our flies.  After a few hours we decided to try a tailwater to Lake Ontario which would have some better water conditions.  It did and as a group we were able to land 6 large lake run browns.  Although the browns do not fight like steelheads, they are beautiful and do put up a good fight.  It was a nice way to start my Thanksgiving holiday.