fishing report

[timsfly]

Jeremy the egg worked great for me on taney tuesday, I managed to hook and land 42 fish, mostly browns. One was just a bit over 12 lbs and the other nice fish was a nice 5 lb brown, it was a good day, caught most of the fish on a apricot/red dot, and on the oregon cheese/red dot. Both tied on #16 2488 TMC hooks, no weight just let them sink real slow in the edge of the current, just below outlet #2. It was a great day yesterday.

[Jeremy Hunt]

11-10-06

Thursday while we were fishing that evening, I was telling my dad about Roaring River and that my friend went by there on his way home to Broken Arrow, Oklahoma Wednesday. Ron said he saw a ton of big bruts that were stocked for opening day catch-n-release starting on Friday. My day was supposed to head out this morning to go to Iowa, but once I told him that he was up for trying that out. We got there around ten in the morning and headed to Tim’s fly shop. I had to get the scoop on what it was going to take to catch those big trout. He showed me three patterns that he was having a lot of luck on. One was a good ole egg pattern and the other two were wooly buggers in ginger and small midge patterns in black. I was eager to get down there and see what was in store. We drove around first to find some big fish holding in some of the pools. I was also surprise to see that there were not a lot of people fishing opening day. You could walk anywhere and find a place to wet a line.

It was clear skies when we started, but I knew a cold front was coming in around 2pm. I started out fishing while my father said he just wanted to watch. I was fishing my new Sage XP in a three weight. I tied on a black v-rib midge in a size 18 with a 5/64 silver tungsten bead. I immediately started catching fish. This was my second time ever fishing this river so I didn’t really know this water. All I knew was what I thought these trout would eat and from what Tim told me at the fly shop. I ended up catching a dozen fish or so in about fifteen minutes. It didn’t take my dad long to get in the game. We just fished midge patterns for most of the day walking pool to pool. I saw a lot of big fish in every pool and try to catch them on midge patterns, but they weren’t in to that. We caught a lot of smaller fish, but seeing all those big fish was definitely getting my attention. I would say three hours went by and we started feeling the cold front moving in. We really didn’t dress for the occasion. So while we were fishing, we would go up to the truck and re-tie while the heater was going. We would warm up and go do it all over again. We did this for about an hour before we would call it a day. I did end up changing flies right at the very end. What I’m about to tell you is….. this is where the whole trip switch gears for me and what I thought about fishing egg patterns.

I really never fished egg patterns, not because I was too good to fish them. I was not into fishing eggs so I really never did. I felt like it was cheating in a way. Well…. I have changed my theory on fishing eggs. The reason why I say this is… about the last thirty minutes I tried an egg pattern that I bought from Tim. I had three of them so I gave my dad one and we both tied them on to see if they would work for one of those bigger fish that were sitting under the water where it drops off from each pool. I figured that it I would throw it up in the front pool and let it fall like it was just coming down the chain, they would think it was real and it would look more natural. It worked and caught some bigger fish. Not anything that was over eighteen inches, bit the big fish were coming over and looking at it. So I thought to myself that if I would throw it and let it fall like they see the pellets fall they would think it was food. I was right; those fish went nuts on this presentation. I thought how a trout would relate to the feeding behaviors of a trout park. You could throw this anywhere you saw trout and they would take it. All you had to do was watch the egg disappear and set the hook. We had ended up losing these in the trees from setting the hook and had to call it a day. I was eager to try this again and told my dad I was going back for more. He wanted to as well so that was the plan. Tie eggs and see if we could spend all day trying this out.

11-11-06

So that night I called one of my clients and told him about how we had this cool bite figured out and asked if he wanted to go as well. He didn’t hesitate at all, his reply was what time do you want me to pick you up. I told him we wanted to get there early so we could get a good spot. I was thinking it would be crowded for opening weekend at the park. When we got there it was less crowded than the day before so we were really happy about that. It seem like we had the whole park to our self. We did drive around again to spot the bigger fish like we did the day before and find out what holes they were holding in. I know our goal that day was to only concentrate on catching those bigger bruts.

So to make a long story short…. We caught fish right off the bat so I knew we were onto something. We weren’t catching anything of any size when we first got there, but by the day was over we caught three big fish. We stuck with the egg pattern all day because I knew one of us were going to catch something big if we covered alot of new water were these big fish were at. That was our discussion while we were in the way there. Who was going to be the one to get that big one. The first one was caught by Bill Badley. The next one was about an hour after that by me and the biggest one was caught about thirty minutes before the park closed down. And the funny thing is…they were all caught on the big egg pattern. My dad didn’t catch any big ones, but I’m sure he was just as excited to see one of us catch ‘em. The first big fish we caught was around 7 pounds. The second one was 5 pounds and the last fish we caught was the biggest weighing around 13 pounds. They were all rainbows. I was a little disappointed that we didn’t catch any browns. I did see some, but they were all small, maybe one big one out of the whole bunch. I would tell anyone to go over and catch one of these big rainbows if you live close by. It is well worth the drive over I guarantee you that. They’re real easy to catch and felt real nice on my 3 weight!!

How is the egg tied you ask?

This was tied with three different colors all divided in the same diameter when tying the in.. Pink, yellow, and orange, and orange was always the color tied on the top. It was tied on a 1/100 jig head hook with no shoulder on the shank. If you don’t what that is it is the way they pour the mold. The ones that have just a round ball on the head are not the shoulder ones. That seems to be the key with this fly. It had to fall slow. If you used the heavier heads they didn’t want anything to do with it. I think the slower the better. I fished Taney the last couple of days doing this same technique and was surprised to see how many fish actually like this presentation. I was fishing in the rebar hole doing this same thing I did at Roaring River and had about ten fish hit it in about an hour.

[Jeremy Hunt]

Thanx for the heads up Tim. I will give a try and let you know how I do. I'll be back your way on Friday. Any suggestions?

Were you fishing the slack water right on the seem line? (Edge)

jh

[timsfly]

Yes right along the seam, or in the dead still water, a lot of times I'll just let the egg fall and let it sit on the bottom and just lift my rod tip enough to let the egg rise and drift just a few inches to a few feet at a time, those trout in that still water just can't take that sometimes. It requires good polarized glasses and time. Sometimes I'll let an egg lay right on the bottom for a minute or more, if I can get that egg to roll along the bottom I can get a strike almost everytime. On windy days when I can't see very well I'll use a small indicator or a 1/2 a palsa pinch on float. I like the smaller eggs for this type of fishing. But I've had days when the bigger #8 eggs worked as well as the smaller #16-#24 eggs.

I fished the park on monday and caught most of my fish on a yellow softhackle and a black ant. I was fishing my 5' 3wt and it dosen't throw eggs very well, at least the lead head glo-balls.

On sunday I caught all of my fish on a small tan bead head woolybugger.