DELAWARE RIVER CLUB SELECTIVITY CLINIC-FEW SPOTS LEFT!

                    I have three spots left for you to join us for an in-depth Selectivity tailwater trout weekend . It is next weekend , Labor Day weekend in the lovely Catskills, which should be cool by then ( NOTE: Due to the request of many that have plans the first Labor Day weekend, we most likely be adding another weekend clinic the following weekend- Sept. 10/11th ) . Should see fall hatches like Isonychia/Heptagenia hebe ( the larger modeled wing sulpher etc.) 
If you are a beginner, or advanced tailwater/freestone lover who is trying to figure out the extreme selective behavior these wild browns and rainbows love to exhibit, here is a great learning and sharing opportunity that 'will up your game' and allow you to crack the code that always baffles even the most expert of all fly anglers.  Here is the link to Delaware River Club for more information- call them and reserve your attendance for what promises to be a great event!

http://thedelawareriverclub.com/events/

My goal for the intimate setting are many, but mainly to make you come away with an extreme in-depth understanding of how a seasoned tailwater trout guide, which I have been for over 20 years on my current lodge home waters of the Muskegon, thinks and commands the approach on these finicky/fussy complex waters and why guides are so effective in getting you on large rising/nymphing/streamer trout when the average Joe/Jane angler struggle on their outings to figure out their secrets. Tailwaters are brutally complex and so are its trout behavior, hatches and daily fluctuations. 

 Having fished the Delaware system from the early 80's since I grew up in NY, and I  fish the Delaware/Beaverkill/ Neversink often since we have a summer home in the Catskills.

JUST A FEW AGENDA ITEMS

* IN DEPTH LOOK AT SELECTIVITY AND ITS APPLICATION TO THE COMPLEX TAILWATER/FREESTONERS OF THE CATSKILLS WITH PARTICULAR EMPHASIS ON THE DELAWARE SYSTEM

* READING WATER/APPROACH/PRESENTING LONG FINE 18 FOOT LEADERS

* TROUT (PFP) PREDATOR FORAGING PROFILES OF TAILWATER TROUT

* MASKING AND SUPER MAYFLY, CADDIS,MIDGES AND STONE FLY HATCHES - MY NEW 'TENKARA STYLE' ( BUT USING 9/10/11 FOOT 2-5 WEIGHT RODS WITH REELS) HIGH STICK STATUE OF LIBERTY LIVING CADDIS TECHNIQUE WHICH IS DEADLY ANYWHERE YOU FIND SUPER CADDIS HATCHES- IT WILL INCREASE YOUR EFFECTIVENESS BY 80%

* ON-STREAM 'BOOTS-IN WATER' INSTRUCTION OF SPECIALTY CASTS- SINGLE SPEY CASTING, NYMPHING TAILWATERS, STREAMER SUCCESS

* TYING SUPER SELECTIVITY FLY PATTERNS (BRING YOUR TYING KITS
* VIDEO WORK OF TROUT FEEDING BEHAVIOR

HOPE TO SEE YOU THERE!!!!

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Posted in: Big Delaware , Catskill fly fishing , Delaware river club , matt supinski , selective trout , Selectivity book , WEST BRANCH DELAWARE

DELAWARE SELECTIVITY CLINIC

It is gonna be a great event!..hope to see all  my east coast friends ..I love the Catskills- LOVE NY...my home waters from the Great Lakes, Southern Tier to the Catskill trout mecca..cheers!..contact the guys at Delaware River Club by clicking on the link
http://thedelawareriverclub.com/events/

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Posted in: Delaware river club , New York wild trout , WEST BRANCH DELAWARE , wild brown trout

DELAWARE TAILWATER SELECTIVITY CATSKILL CLINIC

Look forward to seeing all my east coast friends for my September Selectivity tailwater clinic- contact Delaware River Club for more info...cheers!

Here is the link:
http://thedelawareriverclub.com/events/

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Posted in: Al Caucci , Big Delaware , Delaware river club , hatches , masking hatch , Selectivity book , selectivity dvd , tail waters , WEST BRANCH DELAWARE

got rain?...FINALLY!...SPRING CREEK SUMMER STEELHEAD....NEW YORK'S WILD TROUT MECCA

( Tom Terrry from Chicago with his fisrt summer run fun which jumped into a tree on its first leap from an Indiana spring creek on a pink scud last weekend)

( Client Dave Richardson from Virginia and his first summer Skamania steelhead- also...great to see water flowing again!)

So sorry!...for the long delay in posting. As you are well aware we have been in the grip of the worst drought and heat wave in a century.The whole country is dealing with it but I'm glad to say we are over the hump with the big storms we had the last two days and cooler weather coming.Laurie, Peter and I  spent the first two weeks of July at our family's summer home in the magnificant Catskill mountains of  of New York- a wild trout mecca! The ice cold tailwaters of the Delaware and Neversink, with their deep mountain ice cold reservoirs with several hundred feet deep bottom draws made these rivers ice cold. Air temps were hitting the 100 F  range and both the West and East Branch and the Neversink upper tailwaters were 42 degrees.

( view from our families place in the Catskills)

( The amazing Neversink River of New York- a fusion river: mountain freestoner, spring creek and ice cold tailwater all in one....PLUS!.... the birthplace of American Fly fishing....Theodore Gordon/Hewitt and La Branche...this is Americas 'ground zero' of fly fishing...above a wild Neversink brown, the spring creek like waters and the steep falls at Fallsburg)

I spent each day chest deep and chilly, watching wild brown trout sipping sulphers, olives and stenos in the middle of the afternoon as the waters warmed to the prefered low 50F range. Their fisheries are managed for wild brown, rainbow and brook trout which are splendidly colored and fight like mad....also ultra super selective .

( Angler chest deep on the West Branch....44F water...air temp 95F...tailwater fog)

( West Branch sulpher sipper..."drive by style".... only my guide/friend/sansai/trout coon dog, and Catskill trout master...Johnny"Miller Time" Miller can figure out...he has finally figured out how to crack these big selective/reflective sippers feed...incredible habituation behaviour is taking place here on these extremelly "hammered to death" fish...since this river was the only fishable place on the east coast!...except for spring creeks.)

 On the way back, I got to stop by my childhood wild trout classroom...the Wiscoy Creek in the

 southern tier Allegheny mountains. I fished here last 31 years ago when I lived in Niagara Falls and it is here I learned of the selective cunning nature of its exclusive wild brown trout.

( Wiscoy terrestrials..."da box")

( I love bohvines...if you talk to them like puppys they follow you all day...my pals!)

( New York does an amazing job of public access and wild trout management)

 It is a cow pasture spring creek/freestoner that runs through Wyoming County- "little Switzerland' of western New York. The water levels in all the New York streams were very low due to the drought but things gave changed with the rains.

( Pota mayfly shuck)

( Peter walking the Wiscoy Crekk Falls...we stayed at the Wiscoy Creek Lodge...a spectacular log cabin...go to their web site...big thumbs up!!!!!!... a true forest setting an hour and half south of Buffalo)

AND NOW!....after many prayers answered the rains have come and my pursuit of summer steelhead  with my clients from all over the nation could not have come at a better time. The "Skamania Alley' of Michigan/Indiana got anywhere between 2-4 inches of rain with the storms depending on location....the mother load of summer runs are yet to come!.

The St. Joseph remains too warm for fish yet but will change. I'm concentrating on smaller spring creeks and some private new water I've obtained. Those creeks are icy and have good flows now.
Muskegon Report. It got really brutal in early July- so did all the blue ribbon wild trout waters of Michigan's PM/Au Sable where water temps hit 70's...that's all changing.
The Muskegon bubbler only had so much cooler water and the cooler nights and lower daytime temps will gradually get things back to normal...if normal exists anymore! The trout are concentrated in the deeper pools andfast shallow riffles due to the river hitting a brutal low and hot 797 cfs...now 1,090 after it hit 1800 cfs after the storms. They are sipping #26 olive rusty spinners in the mornings and evenings and the tiny green caddis is starting up. The rocks are covered with cinnamon and green caddis larvae/pupae and the rest of the summer thru October should see massive caddis hatches. Their has been no trout die offs noticed and the trout that are caught are still fat and healthy despite the heat from the caddis pupae...please exercise extreme caution when fishing till temperatures cool further!!!
 Heard reports of summer king salmon coming in Litle and Big Man and PM Lake.
 I think we are over the heat hump and more storms and showers are predicted even though temps will climb again... the rain buffer is the key!....Cheers!

( high water Skamie box...some of Greg Senyo's masta egg eating minnows...and more master Senyo creations...a monument will be built to this Great Lakes steelhead flyt tyer....all of us are humbled next to him!...no blowing smoke!)

STILL HAVE SOME OPEN DATES FOR SUMMER SKAMANIA STEELHEAD AND THE "SUMMER TROUT EVENING SIPPER SPECIALS" THAT WILL LAST TILL OCTOBER!....SEE YOU ON THE RIVER!

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Posted in: gray drake , Greg Senyo , Indiana Skamania , muskegon river , Neversink , New York wild trout , skamania steelhead , summer steelhead , terrestrial insects , trout and eagle , WEST BRANCH DELAWARE , Wiscoy Creek

NOW THAT'S WHAT I'M TALKIN ABOUT!

( PERFECTION!)

( WHAAAT?.......A GREEN DRAKE IN JULY!)

( De Milo Harmon)

AIR TEMP: 99 F- HEAT INDEX 108

WATER TEMP: COLD 48F

HATCH: TONS OF SUPLHERS, A FEW ISOS, MARCH BROWNS, POTAMANTHUS- AND YES EVEN A GREEN DRAKE

PREY: WILD BROWNS-GORGEOUS!- AND BIG SURFACE FEEDING PIGS.

ARSENAL: ORVIS ZG HELIOS-10 FT-5 WGHT.-ABEL 6N BROWN TROUT,ORVIS GREEN POWER WF WONDERLINE,VARIVAS DEEP GREEN LEADER-#18 CDC SULPHER DUN

PRICELESS!

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Posted in: Abel , brown trout , gray drake lodge , matt supinski , Orvis Helios , sulphers , trout eagle lodge and outfitters , VARIVAS , WEST BRANCH DELAWARE

WHERE ARE ALL THE GRAY DRAKES????...........CONFUSED?..........DON'T WORRY -THEY ARE COMING!

( We are ready when you are, sir or miss! After last year's record gray drake hatch, it has got to happen eventually!-BUG DOCTOR JOHN MILLER IMAGE)

The last few nights since Sunday when the heat wave started-(low 90 F temps) REALLY SHUT DOWN THE HATCHES-BIG TIME! A few caddis and sulphers-some cahills were around in small numbers, but that is typical when very quick changes in weather occur-also quick water level fluctuations. With last weekend's rain, we went from 2,000 cfs down to 1400 today.The Quote"MAGIC 58f) I talked about was for sulphers, olives-their preferred hatching temps on the Michigan Rivers.

BUT.......WHERE ARE THE DRAKES????

After being out again last night in the stifling heat and waiting till dark-nothing!

So in a panic I did a little research and also conducted a conference call with the bug doctor-Johnny Miller on the West Branch of the world famous wild trout Delaware system. He is pulling his thick hair out also since they've had no rain like us, the main stretch of the Big D hit 85 F- lower West Branch near Hancock hit 74 F-THESE RIVERS RUN IN THE UPPER 40'S-LOW 50'S F ALL SUMMER! His green drakes are running late-hatches have shut down etc. just like we had the last few days.Their flows are 350 cfs-low-low-cause the New York City reservoir system is holding water back even that the dams are at 100% capacity and they are letting wild trout die because of their absolute foolishness! We have a summer home up there and I spend a good amount of time fishing the Catskill Tail Waters, so I'm concerned in a big way!

BUT-back to the Muskegon. John and I have found 62 degrees F water temp to be the magic number for gray drakes to start emergence. Since the nymphs migrate to the shorelines to emerge, they are not too fond of hot air temps- their best emergence is in those cooler wetter environments-they don't like to crawl up 90 degree banks and grass.

ALSO......if you look at water temps on Croton USGS, night time lows have still been significantly cold.WHY such cold water? Remember the first two weeks of May- frost every night for weeks and 20 and 30 degree air temps?- I remember the heat running and scrapping frost off the boat every morning still chasing steelhead up till the 20th!

SO LOOK AT THE GRAPH

Sunday-May 23rd-14 C-57 F

Mon.-15 C-59F

Tue.15 C-59 F

Wed 15.5 C-60F

SO DESPITE THE HEAT, THE COLDER NIGH TIME FLOWS HAVE NEGATED HEATING DURING THE DAY!

Still 80's through the weekend and thunder storms on Monday- next week in the 70's and 50's at night.

ALSO..if you looked at NOAA and their long term summer forecast released lat Friday, you are probably shocked!

For Midwest including all of Michigan to South Dakota-down to northern Texas and east to Indiana, a colder and wetter then normal weather pattern is predicted for JUNE,JULY AND AUGUST- WOULDN'T THAT BE NICE AFTER THIS PUTRID HEAT !

All in all, I'm keeping my fingers crossed and burning candles.

On paper it makes sense- any night now will be the key-WE JUST NEED SOME SEMBLANCE OF NORMAL WEATHER IF THAT IS POSSIBLE ANY MORE!!!

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Posted in: gray drake lodge , guide sevice , may fly hatches , muskegon river , muskegon trout steelhead , selective trout , trout eagle lodge and outfitters , WEST BRANCH DELAWARE , WILD TROUT GRAY DRAKES