Like Old Times

"Sometimes it's about the company, sometimes it's the fishing, but every now and then the two elements line up for an incredibly memorable day." Those were the wise words from a friend that I shared the river with on Friday. While we don't fish together as often as we used to, we try to make it count when we do. This was a damn good outing, one that reminded us of old times. Times when our biggest responsibility was being in good position for the start of a hatch. Life has changed a bit in the decade-plus since we began fishing together, but between the laughs, cold Guinness, fresh fiddleheads, and rising trout, it brought us right back. It was like old times.

Here We Go

May is one of my favorite months for fishing in Connecticut.  What's not to love?  Overrated or not, the hendrickson hatch gets the attention of some of the best trout in our rivers, migratory striped bass from the Hudson and Chesapeake return to Long Island Sound, and post-spawn carp put on the feedbag.

May 2011 started on a high note for me.  AaronS and I spent the better part of Sunday on the West Branch Farmington River.  The flow was 550 CFS and dropping slowly. We were nymphing by 8:15 AM and I broke off a heavy trout on my third drift.  Aaron jumped in, pricked something and came back with a scale during his first couple drifts. Then it slowed down...big time.  Knowing the caliber of trout in this run, we worked it hard for a while without another tap while nypmhing under yarn. The switch to Euro nymphing was made and I hooked a nice fish on midge larvae pattern as the dropper fly. The 20-inch brown was the highlight of a surprisingly tough day on the water considering the calendar. It was a left-yellow Survivor that is celebrating its third year in the Farmington this week.  Closer to hatch-thirty, we moved downstream to water where we (I) thought we had a better chance of seeing rising fish.  Aaron knew it wasn't going to "happen" where we were going.  The nymphing was tough pre and post hatch and there were few fish looking up despite the copious amount of bugs pouring off the water.  Like always, it's tough to have a bad time while fishing, especially on that river.  Anyday now, all hell is going to break loose and I hope I'm there to witness it. 



Photo credit: Aaron Swanson



This healthy 20-inch brown was passing a semi-digested fishfly larvae during the photo shoot.

Photo credit: Aaron Swanson



Trout crack a.k.a. hendrickson dun

Survivors

Maybe you're aware of the unique trout breeding program run by CT DEEP's Inland Fisheries Division. If you're not, then you should be because it is responsible for some of the better trout swimming in Connecticut waters. These high quality brown trout, known as survivors, are progeny of captured wild and holdover fish from the Farmington River. During the annual sampling of the river, a number of cherry-picked browns are taken back to a state hatchery, they do their thing and are released back to the river. Eventually their offspring are stocked into the Farmington, either as yearlings or two-year-old adults. The spring 2010 batch was stocked last week. The adults can be identified by little orange tags called elastomers inserted in the tissue behind their left eye. The yearlings have yellow tags behind their right eye. You can see an example of one of these colored identification marks below.

A 2009 Survivor yearling captured one year later.

Like all trout in the Farmington River, the Survivor strain are forced to wise up fast in its heavily pressured waters. The ones that make it through their first winter in the river should be considered a respectable catch. Some will hold-over multiple years and become real trophies, like the one below caught and released by my good friend Derrick of CT Fish Guides.

A 2005 Survivor yearling landed in 2010  (Photo credit: Ty Croce)