One way to avoid crowds is to fish on Mother’s Day when there is a cold front with stiff wind on the horizon. With the Mrs. in Europe visiting one of our children, I had free license to roam and roam I did indeed.
As expected, few anglers were out. I finally ran into a Hendrickson hatch. Only wily browns were rising. I threw all of my Hendrickson experimental patterns at them and didn’t get a take until the last bit of the hatch, when my fly landed next to a real bug and 15″-ish brown inhaled both! What colors on that one!
I threw everything: Moles, floating nymphs, CDC-looped emergers, and parachute-style patterns. I would say one out of five bugs that I saw were eaten up top. There was no regular cadence to the rises for the most part. I guess there were a ton of bugs below.
The fish of the day was a 19″ stockie that slammed a streamer. Tightlining in the morning produced good numbers. I hope everyone had a great weekend.
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Hendricksons can be a frustrating hatch to fish for sure! Sounds like you did ok though. I would try a dry dropper (flymph or wet as dropper) next time.
Steve, thank you for always giving great advice!
Thanks, as always, for a pleasing read. I fish vicariously through the blogs various posts as my opportunities to get out on the water are limited with two kids under ten and a spouse that works excessive hours in the hospital. I’m curious if any writers or readers have fished the Rhode Island rivers. We’re moving to Barrington from the Boston area this summer with a job change and I would love some insights. Stripers and blues will certainly be regular targets but i do love fishing smaller water.
Thanks! I understand: I didn’t fly fish for about 15 years except for once a year when our children were younger. Personally, have not fished in RI.
The Wood River is a very underrated trout fishery, and just about the only one of note in the state. It’s on the other side of the state from Barrington, but Little Rhody is a small state. Intriguing water, named pools (Magic, Mud Hole, and Cut Tree were favorites when I fished it regularly) nice hatches, including some you won’t find on many other trout rivers in New England (Black Quills, Hexagenia, and more), loads of large trout float stocked throughout the season so they are spread out in all the pools, plus wild brookies. Well worth it! I had some memorable days hitting a good hatch on the Wood before or after hitting the salt for stripers.