NO PICTURE TODAY-TOO TIRED TO SNAP THE SHUTTER

Been on the water 8 of the last 10 days. Streams are clear and spooky, full for now and fishing well. The last few trips the ability exists to take fish on dries, nymphs and streamers. Gray caddis are still out during sunny days and BWO”s on cloudy. The hatches have been by no means thick but just abundant enough to get a few fish looking up. Spinner guys are doing well and so are those of you who are stripping streamers. Try all black, all white, or the ever popular wild turkey bugger. Streamers provide a very active technique for fly fishing and the visual aspect of the take or the miss, is so exciting.

Ask Andy

Hi Andy, I’ve been fishing some of the Pierce County spring creeks and seeing a lot of really inactive browns that just seem to hug bottom in slow moving water. Fishing for these fish has been a vexing experience as the depth at which they hold gives them a huge window to see me coming. I’ve been trying to get weighted nymphs down to them, but either spook fish when my shot hits the water, fail to get my fly deep enough, or when I do get it deep it seems to move far to rapidly through the pool to fool them. By deep I mean like 3-5ft deep. Any suggestions? Also I should add the water has been in the low 50s for what its worth.
-Eli
p.s. thanks for coming to the TC TU meeting last month, it was really great hearing all of your stories and advice on fishing the region.

 

Eli
Many times these fish are in holding lies. Meaning, The have probably eaten for a long period of time or are resting or digesting. The bottom line is they are not actively feeding. They are deep enough to be out of the reach of predators. They are for the most part, safe. There are two things about these fish that drive anglers crazy. One, they are making themselves evident. Two they are not actively feeding. They will actually move out of the way of a drifted offering and then move back again. They have seen you before and know your game. However, they are worth a shot if you have the time to play with them. Sometimes. maybe rarely, if the right offering is presented correctly and placed directly on there nose where they do not have to expend energy to move to eat your fly, they will. I have seen this on a number of occasions but it has only happened where one can sight the fly and put it directly on their nose or just by chance, all of the settings are right on, and the presentation is good enough to fool them into eating. Remember water depth and the bending of light makes the fish appear closer to the surface that they really are. Many time people get these settings wrong and are fishing right over the top or off to the side of the fish instead of presenting the fly on the bottom and square to their mouth. Without going into a discussion on light refraction in air to water and the reverse lets just say there is a trick to getting the placement of the fly in the right spot. Gary Borger does a good job of explaining this phenomenon in his books Presentation and Fishing the Film. It took me a while to understand how it works and then to amend my fishing to make the right presentation. Many times they want nothing to do with you. Sometimes you get it all just right.
Would you mind if I used your question on my blog.
Andy