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Date: January 29, 2002 at 11:42:47
From: rockfisherman, [dialup-209.244.141.238.dial1.providence1.level3.net]
Subject: A few flatwings, floating line and fish
First let me say that this my first year of winter fishing. Like most fishermen, I've hung up the rod around Thanksgiving and didn't pick it up again until April. As I said in the "Goals" thread, this year I decided to try and catch a striper every month of the year...
December was easy. In early December I caught fish along the coast, and in the salt ponds until Christmas fishing in my usual way...intermediate sinking line 90 percent of the time. I put the rod away on Dec 23 to spend some time with the family over Christmas, and didn't pick it up again until New Year's. In the week since I put the rod aside, something changed. I expected to catch a January fish easily...but it didn't happen.
Conventional wisdom dictates that the fish are dormant, lying deep, and you have to hit them on the nose with a fly for them to take it. Late afternoons when the sun warms the water will supposedly make the fish move. So that's how I fished. I traded my intermediate line for a deep sink, and fished clousers and silverside imitations deep and slow in the late afternoons. I gave this theory a real workout. Unfortunately, it didn't catch any fish.
I posted on this in the "Still Bass in the Pond" thread on this board. In that thread, Ken said:
"They move up into the flows and feed at night all winter long. Not every night but many nights. Hmmm! Tuesday nights through the winter now that's an idea that breaks the rules, I kind of like it. Has to be above freezing so that the line will move through the
guides."
Encouraged by the warm weather and moon tides last Saturday, I headed down to Narrow River about 4:00. I fished it hard with the deep sink "depth charge" line on the incoming tide pushed by a south wind. Nice conditions. Rising near full moon. I fished the Gibbs Striper Fly because silversides are the primary bait in the estuary this time of year. Of course, everybody knows that. Then I put on a heavy clouser and scraped the bottom for a while.
At sunset, I headed upriver to the upper pond. It was still twilight, and when I got down to the water, I saw a ring in the middle of the river. I must have spooked a diving duck, I thought. Then another splash further upstream. And another across...and another! There were feeding fish on the surface, all over the river!
I switched over to a floating line and a Gibbs Striper Fly, tied with a blue flatwing feather. On my first cast cross current, with a wet fly swing, I hooked a DECENT fish. But I forced him a bit, and the hook pulled loose...he wanted to run and I snubbed him... Goodbye, January fly rod fish. Not to worry. In a couple more casts, I hooked another. I was more careful this time, and landed a 22 incher. My first January striper.
Still using the wet fly swing, I hooked something heavy. Nothing sluggish about this fish! I landed a 30-inch striper. I cast again, and caught an 18-inch bass...then another, only about 12 inches. The fish were chasing bait in the shallows, in as little as two feet of water, less than 10 feet from shore. When I went over to the shallows, I found out what they were chasing from the leftover carnage. 2 to 3 inch juvenile herring!
From 5:30 to 6:30, I landed 12 stripers on the fly rod and the Gibbs Striper Fly. From 12 to 30 inches. I also lost 3 or 4 more that I hooked. The last one I landed at 6:30 was 24 inches. No more fish popping at that point, and the action had slowed, so I quit while I was ahead...I had caught a fish on my last cast.
None of those fish were sluggish. They fought like the dickens. All on an incoming tide, after dark...on a dead drift, or wet fly swing...a flat wing Gibbs fly and a subtle take.
Sunday evening I went back, but was better prepared. This time I had a leader with 2 dropper flies and a terminal fly. "Give the fish a choice" as Ken says. I put a Gibbs flatwing on the terminal fly, a white flatwing on the middle, and a black flatwing on top. Just after dark, the fish came up in the water column and started breaking, chasing bait. Just like Saturday. After a couple casts, I hooked up. As I played the fish, he gained strength, and took line. He got stronger still, and the rod bowed under the weight of a heavy fish. This was stronger than the 30-incher of the previous night, and in the dark, my imagination of the size of this fish went wild. As I finally brought the fish to bay, I found that I had not one fish, but THREE fish. I was not disappointed. My first triple...I don't usually fish 3 flies, ...only one or two...except during the worm swarm. I may have to make this a habit. The fish were 22", 18" and 16" roughly. Next cast I picked up a single fish on the white flat wing. The next cast resulted in a double, one on the black flatwing, one on the Gibbs. I hooked a couple more doubles...now easily detected because the first fish on would suddenly double in strength when the second fish grabbed the other fly. I lost one or two of the doubles and "only" brought one fish in...then I landed another double of 20"+ fish. It was too tiring fighting all those doubles, and I clipped off the top dropper, the black flatwing. I continued to alternate catching fish between the Gibbs flatwing and the white flatwing...the fish liked them equally. The action ended after 45 minutes or so, and I had landed 12 fish...6 on 3 casts in a row at the beginning of the blitz. An interesting thing...once I clipped the third fly off, I didn't land any more doubles, even though I was fishing with 2 flies. Hmmm.
I had to see if it was going to happen again last night. I went back after work, in the dark, and all was quiet. Of course the tide is now a good hour and a half later, and the water wasn't moving very well. I still managed one fish, but I called it quits after that, with no breaking fish.
Summary: Dead drift or wet fly drift. Flat wings, floating line, 3 flies. Fish.
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