Last trip of June!

With dirty weather on the way and the inevitable crowds of a long weekend we decided to head fishing on Wednesday evening instead of Thursday or Friday as we normally do. Dad, Joe and I hit the road shortly after supper and we were to meet Brad at the camp. Bill was to head up on Thursday evening. 

We saw a pair of black bears on the 123 at the powerline. There must have been some good eats there as the smaller bear that was closest to the road would hardly lift his head as I whistled/yelled to him. He had a very nice and prominent white V on his chest but I was unable to get a picture of it.

NOM, NOM, NOM...

We arrived at the camp got settled in, and started discussing our strategy for the morning ... we reviewed the river gauges over and over and finally settled on a trib, one that had a big raise but appeared to be close to cresting... well at least until the rains began the next morning *rolls eyes*. I like to swing big flies so big water  is where I prefer to be! 

The alarm went off at 6:00 and we were on the road by 7:00 and on the river by 8:00. Before driving into our fishing destination we stopped off at Debbie's http://www.upperoxbow.com/ to get some intel. "Spring high", she said and more rain was in the forecast.. she also mentioned that we might run into Brett. We chatted for a few minutes before deciding it was great weather to be a fish! It was nice seeing you, Deb - i'll see you folks again soon. 

Into the wilderness we headed... about a half hour later we arrived and decided to split up with Dad & Joe fishing the lower, upper pool and Brad and I to the upper, upper pool - does that make sense? Oh and did I mention that the water was high? Somewhere during our first pass Brett arrived with several sports who he put on the middle pool. I walked down and chatted with him for a few minutes before heading back up to finish my pass.... Thursday was perfect for the old 'dark day, dark fly' thing so I had my trusty long-hackled shady lady on with the magic white tail.... in fact, it stayed on all day until Brad and I fished the MSW later that afternoon. As I was nearing the tail out of the pool I tightened up on a very pissed off, raging 16-18lbs of silver - this fish instantly took off jumping and thrashing it's way out of the pool and into the rapids... It took me to my backing with the the hardy screaming all the while before another big jump and a thrash right in the rapids and then my line went slack.... What a rush! Brett yelled up "I'm going to tell Paul you lost that fish!" and I'm sure he did :)

Brett and his group left and we figured it was time for lunch. We had a quick break and I decided I was going to fish all the way down the lower pools as quickly as I could. The other lads decided to stick with the upper pools and I can't say as I blame them. I got all the way down around the corner and was hooking trout and parr pretty much on every cast... At least with the parr all I had to do was give them a bit of slack and they would remove themselves. 

So on down I fished towards the lower end of the last pool where even in the high water it was quite well defined: (and people say there isn't enough water for spey rods here, the fools! heh, heh!)

Right about here I felt what I thought was a trout for a split second, and then a bit more weight - a grilse! And then airborne silver! Woohoo! I was by myself and determined to at least get a picture so I found a great little spot with a soft grassy bottom and landed it. 

 

This is where I have to get a little preachy... this fish along with all other salmon/grilse I'm fortunate to hook and land was released unharmed... the day and age of killing and tagging fish by recreational anglers is over... people need to wake up and get a clue that these fish are far too valuable to be killing and their very existence could depend on the releasing of yes, EVEN GRILSE! I'm seeing pictures of young people with tagged fish online and think to myself who is bringing these kids up? Young catch and release anglers are the future of Atlantic Salmon fishing in North America and if you're teaching your kids to kill a fish it's time for YOU to wake up!

Here's a recent press release by the NBSC asking for anglers to voluntarily release their grilse this year after the horrible 2012 returns and the recent actions by Greenland who may up their catch to 75 metric tonnes in 2013... our salmon are in trouble folks.. 

http://www.nbsalmoncouncil.com/pressjune242013.pdf

There, now that that's off my chest I can get on with the rest of the report....

I released the grilse, which took off like he was shot from a gun and headed back up river where I found Brad swinging a muddler over the middle pool. I arrived just in time to get a pic of this nice little brookie he landed and released. We do on occasion keep a few trout for the pan but today wasn't the day:

Shortly after this we were all pretty much ready to hit the road for the camp to get dried off and warmed up. Brad and I were going to hit the MSW at his uncle's pool later that day. 

To be continued.... 

My LAST weekend fishing report for 2012.....(part 1)

I'll be honest, getting up to the camp this past weekend was a bit of a bag drive.... I wasn't terribly enthusiastic about it and the thoughts of fishing in the cold, wind and rain wasn't terribly exciting. In fact, I was more interested in birds so I made sure I picked up a hunting license and dusted off the trusty old Remington 870 Express - is there a more reliable utility grade pump gun? The plan was to duck out a wee bit early on Thursday and drive to the camp via the back roads from the 123 a.k.a. the Grandlake Road so that I could do some 'hollywood' hunting before it got too dark. About 2 kilometres on the Chipman side from the Cains river bridge there is a logging road called the Acadia Road. This road meets the South Cains road some 40-ish kilometres is the woods - great chance to drive along and scope for some birds. When I made the turn off the pavement and started seeing some of the fall colours a change began... my less than chipper mood about this endeavour began to be pushed aside as I remembered how much I love the fall and everything to do with it... This season has been so terrible fishing-wise that I became obsessed with the weather details and river levels to the point that I forgot to stop and smell the roses... I've been so worried about something I can't control ... I suspect I'm not the only NB'er or salmon fishermen to have had suffered the same affliction this 2012 season!

Inspiring Fall colours (yes, the 'U' belongs)

I made my way through the Acadia road and finally got to the South Cains road - no birds sighted. I decided to stop at Salmon Brook to check the river and boy was she high and dirty! There were a couple fellas pounding her anyways -- the lads were troopers! Please note the only patch of red in the trees on the right --- you'll be seeing that a little later in this report ;-)

So I finally made it to the camp, it took me almost 4 hours to get there - it's normally a 2.5 hour drive. I really enjoyed my tour and it certainly put me back into the right frame of mind. I lit a fire and had a couple 'sodas' while waiting for Paul to give me a ring. When he called we discussed our plans for the next day -- the plan was to do some pool hopping on the Northwest in the AM and the Renous in the PM. I was to meet him at Debbie & Dale Norton's place "Upper Oxbow Outdoor Adventures"
If you ever need a place to hunt or fish from I highly recommend the Oxbow. They can accommodate any type of fishing or hunting adventure available in New Brunswick!

6 AM came early and I was surprised when the alarm went off. The morning was cold and there was rain in the forecast... what would today bring?

Breakfast by flashlight:

I arrived at Debbie's place shortly after 7 in time for coffee. I chatted with some of the regulars and Paul Sr. was there as well. It's always nice to get up there and see everyone - it feels just like home!
We loaded our gear into the 'little tank' and headed north, pool hopping here we come! We saw a nice buck and doe whitetail on the drive.

We hit 3 pools by noon and pool 4 was to be a coin toss and we decided to hit one that I haven't fished in a while. As usual before we started through the pool Paul and I discussed what fly each of us would use... when we fish together we try to not fish the same pattern so that we can cover a wider spectrum of flies and presentations to increase our odds of finding what the fish will key in on during that particular day and for those conditions. Being fall, marabous were high on the rotation - it was just a matter of colour. I started each pool with my favorite fall marabou - the canary. I think it was midway through the first pass that Paul mentioned the fish are likely sick of looking at yellow and red because of all the leaves in the high water... I took his theory and decided to change up midway.. I normally like to complete a pass before changing flies but this just seemed to make so much sence that I busted out the 'showgirl'. If there are fall leaves in the river that look like a showgirl I'll eat my hat! I continued down through to the slower, bottom part of the pool and that's when the trout parade began:

I was starting to think to myself, alright - this is getting annoying! But surely these pesky critters are holding in similar places that salmon would, aren't they? Somewhere in between trout Paul stepped out to warm up and he tied on another uniquely coloured marabou pattern and stepped back in above me. He made 1 or 2 casts and came tight on a salmon! It wasn't meant to be and the hookup wasn't solid and as I was turning my head up stream to yell and beg him for a fly of the same colour I felt a BIG PULL!! No way!! Fish on!! It wasn't 30 seconds after what just happened to Paul so we almost had a double header!! Paul yells back, "take your time and enjoy!". It had been a while for me so I really did have a great time with this fish. She jumped a bunch of times and didn't just roll over and play dead. She wasn't my biggest fish ever but she was certainly my best of the season (spring fish don't count). She also bent the hell out of my hook - a number 4 mustad 3665a.

The battle:

Getting ready for some tail ;-)

Tailed!

With Instagram filtre:

The release:

A few more pics  *we finished here for the day*

Paul throwing some line:

Dave checking things out:

This is exactly how I wanted to finish my season, fishing with the Nut. I had zero expectations of fish and she was certainly a bonus. Thanks again for the great day on the river bud, I can't wait for our next trip. Good luck silver bass fishing if you manage to get out!

This pretty much wraps up Friday. I'll get Saturday's update done soon. I managed to get out with my cousin Doug on Saturday -- He's the guy who got me into all this foolishness in the first place! ;-)

A few flies and supper....

Here's a look at my greased line muddler that Walter (4FISHN) was asking about over on nsflyguy.ca/smf. This picture was taken by my good friend Damian for his book 'Atlantic Salmon Flies of Nova Scotia'. It's hard to believe that the swap is over and so much time has passed by so quickly! It was an awesome privilege so once again thanks Damian, and all the fantastic Maritime tyers who were part of this amazing project. Special thanks to Robbie Hiltz for an awesome job hosting this massive swap.

"Unnamed greased line muddler (this fly is all about speeding up as it goes downstream/across to create a wake on the surface)

The recipe:

Hook: Gamakatsu P10-2H2L Long Shank Dry Fly Hook (a.k.a. Carter bug hooks)
Tag: Lagartun copper tinsel (med)
Tail: from bottom to top - Fl. Green Marabou, 2 pieces each fl green and UV KF, wood duck flank fibers
Body: Uni Mylar - Peacock
Rib: Lagartun copper tinsel (med)
Wing: White under Olive marabou
Head: 3 bunches of natural deer hair packed tight and trimmed large

Cast straight across or slightly up stream far enough above the suspected lie so that the fly is nearing or at full speed as it passes over your target and hold the 'F' on! "

 

 

The next item of business are these tube bombers everyone and their dog seem to be getting into.... I'm jumping on the bandwagon and I've already decided that anytime a bomber gets tied onto the end of my line this summer it will be on a tube. The advantage of it's supreme floatability makes it a no brainer:

 

 The final item on the agenda was this evenings supper, provided by the Hammond river and my buds Paul & Steph Elson. Thanks for the outing last night, I hope you're having another great evening on the water! Supper was delicious and I believe I have just about satiated my appetite for trout for 2012. Time to get into release mode now. Thanks again guys!

 

 

 

 

We even managed a couple of these today...

Gotta love brookies!