Posted on September 14 2021
It was an interesting day. There is one lone hummingbird still using the feeder. She sits in the apple tree and tanks up on the sugar water all day long. Every morning I look out expecting her to be gone and she's still there. There are so many apples this year that the deer can't keep up with the drops. The ground is covered with them. Usually the deer lay out in the back yard and come over to the tree every time an apple drops. Saw eagles, osprey, turkeys, geese and mergansers on my journey today. The geese have altered their behavior ever since the season opened (haven't heard a shot), they don't get anywhere near me and are flying up and down the river out of range of steel shot.
Left camp about 1:30, I wanted to see if the fly shop in Shehawken had a DT-4 fly line (they didn't have a single DT). Someone please tell me what is so G.D. good about weight forward lines? I will fish double tapers until I either die or they stop making them. Why? I asked Leon Chandler, a V.P. of Cortland Line Company what was so good about weight forward lines? He smiled and said they are the greatest thing since buttered micro wave popcorn - - - for the line manufactures. Weight forward lines now come in colors to tell you how much line to false cast and how much line to shoot. Why? Because if you are a good caster or are not color blind you will false cast just the weighed portion of the line and let it pull the running line out of your hand. This results in a very small area of the line being whip sawed back and forth in the tip guide of your rod. A good caster can go through weight forward lines like a knife goes through hot butter. A double taper on the other hand lets you pick up whatever amount of line you have on the water (no retrieval of running line is necessary) and as the guide says "Cast again". There is no wear point and when the line finally begins to break up - turn it around and fish with the unused other half.
The fishing - When I saw that they raised the release in both branches yet again I was off to the BK and the Willow. Fished a run in the Willow and two pools in the BK. There were few if any bugs where I fished and blind casting a size 20 olive emerger is not for the faint of heart. The fish were looking up and willing to eat (I even saw a decent percentage of the rises). The big problem was landing hooked fish. Ended up netting half of the fish hooked with a seventeen inch hatchery fish from the BK being fish of the day.
Like yourself, I use DT lines for 90% of my fishing. If you can find a copy, read John Waite’s “Serious Fly Fishing”. He has a whole chapter with his opinions of why DT lines are better than WF lines. I don’t agree with everything in the book but I think he hit the nail on the head with the DT lines. Also, my casting technique imparts twisting to the line and I especially like the fact the thicker DT belly doesn’t twist and snarl as easy as the long, thin running line of WFs.
Met you on the West a few weeks back at Deposit bridge (August 9th to be exact, landed 6 that day including a 17" bow, I was fishing from a camo painted canoe, (its my duck boat) I asked you about the possibility of an Angler119 BBQ.
Any way, I Fished the Willow and the beaverkill on Tuesday as well, hooked 14, landed 12 and missed on 2, the fish of the day was a fat 15 inch hen, also had a thick, beautifully colored 14" male with a bit of a kype.
The bugs – 2 on Iso’s, 5 on black flying ants #16, 3 on a brown parachute ant also #16, they didnt like the black on the willow, and 2 on droppers.
When I need to use a 20 or 22 BWO I use an ISO or caddis dry as my indicator. I learned that the optimum length of tippet between the two flies depends upon the speed of the current so that the one fly does not drag the other.
I had a couple of friends who taught at the Orvis school many many years ago. They were told that the use of weight forward lines made the students feel like they were better casters than the really were.
I fished the BK yesterday also. I landed 2 fish. One was 10 in the other 18 in Brown. I saw a lot of Iso coming off the water but not many rises at all. All the fish caught and refusals were on a Iso. I stayed till dark and still didn’t see a lot of olives.
Do you cast a fly that small in a riff or was it still water?
Thanks for the info