I was excited to get back on the water this week and revisit rivers I hadn’t fished since summer. They’re in a little better shape now, with slightly improved flows and good water temperatures. Add in the fall colors, and it’s hard to beat October on a Pennsylvania river.
I haven’t yet seen the bigger trout return to the places I’m used to finding them. They may need a little more time before settling back into their normal haunts. In the meantime, plenty of smaller fish are willing to take a fly, and I was happy to spend a few days enjoying what was in front of me.
I hope you’re finding some time to get out there, too.
Thanks for reading,
Jeff
This Week's Tip
Tie Your Confidence Patterns Lighter
In low water, don't abandon the patterns you trust. Tie them without the heavy beads. Same flies, same hook sizes, built light enough to drift through the column instead of dropping straight through it. Fish them on light tippet for natural movement, and keep a few unweighted ones for the quietest water.
Before we ever stepped into the water, my brother and I had already imagined this trip. Three days on a favorite river. Stronger fall flows. Larger trout back in their familiar lies. Mornings tightlining and evenings casting October Caddis to rising fish.
By ten o’clock on the first morning, it was clear that the river hadn’t followed our plans.
We were catching fish. Plenty of them. But the water still had a summer feel, and most of the trout were smaller than the ones we had pictured while tying flies and counting down the days.
It would have been easy to spend the trip waiting for the fishing we had imagined to begin. After all, we had been looking forward to it for months.
But standing in that river, with three days ahead of us, we had to choose how we'd spend our time.
I write a lot about tightline nymphing, but that doesn’t mean I’ve stopped using indicators. Lately, when I’ve been able to find larger trout, they’ve usually been in slower, deeper runs. When I need to suspend a nymph in those conditions, I really like OROS indicators. The two foam halves screw together around your leader, making them easy to attach and adjust without kinking the line. I carry a variety of sizes so I can match the indicator to the weight of the rig I’m fishing. They’re a simple, useful option to have along when the water calls for a different approach.
As a Firehole Outdoors Ambassador, I trust their products for the flies I sell and the flies I fish. The hooks are laser-sharp, and their tungsten beads are top quality. I have recently started tying some of my own flies with the Firehole Stick 551. I like the wide gape, which leaves plenty of room between the point and the fly’s body. The heavy wire and longer shank make it a useful hook for anchor nymphs, with room to build the profile I want around a larger bead.
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