Another Silver Creek Report

Fishing Silver Creek is beginning to look like a habit, and it isn't even winter yet!

I drove up to Pinetop-Lakeside to meet my friend Mike Caparoso at his house Wednesday night, 12/7/17. His friend, and now mine, Bill Bendt had joined him and they had dinner waiting for me. It is a very rare thing when someone else plans the food on a trip, but this was one of those rare times - and it was very much appreciated by me. Thanks Bill and Mike!

We were on the creek by about 10:00am yesterday and I was immediately into a fish that took a black and blue Simi Seal Leech with silver bead head. The hits were steady, if spread out, during the day and I landed maybe a half a dozen fish, lost about the same number in LDR's (long distance release), and simply missed the strike on so many fish I lost count. Finally, I checked the fly. It was missing the hook point! I quickly replaced it and started getting more fish on, though landed very few.

Mike and Bill fished Friday, the 8th, but I opted to come home. This is not like me, but I'll say this - it was really cold up there! So cold that I simply didn't want to get chilled again.

Both Bill and Mike have expressed an interest in a custom rod. Bill's requirements are very unique. He wants a 3wt. rod that is either 10' or 11' feet long, with a moderate or even slow casting action, to be used as a nymph rod. Both Orvis and Sage make blanks that fulfill those requirements, but they are very expensive blanks. Mike has somewhat more average rod needs. He wants a 9' 5wt. with moderate to fast action. Well, this rod type is the most popular rod of all, so it should be relatively easy to find a blank in his price range.

With a repair to do on Bill Elk's rod, plus these 2 rods, January should be a pretty busy month for building rods! If you are reading this and are interested in a custom rod, please just give me a call!

Silver Creek Report

The morning of November 30 saw me up very early - 4:30 to be exact. I was out of the house by 5:00 and on the creek shortly after 7:30. Lee Lynch was already there and fishing. What we noticed right away was that the lower part of the creek has more fish than in previous years. Lee was able to fish the previous afternoon and had told me that he got some on a foam ant imitation. So, I tied on a foam ant and was immediately into fish. I fished a foam ant all day and probably caught at least a dozen.

Shortly after I arrived on the creek, Rick Allen also showed up. He got one on his first cast! I don't know what he was using but it was probably a subsurface fly of some sort. Lee also caught fish that day switching flies every once in awhile. I stuck with the ant - after all, it was working!

Both Rick and Lee had to leave for home late in the day, but I stayed in Show Low for the night and met Jeff Martin the next day on the creek. Again, the foam ant was working, but not as effectively as it had the day before. Jeff noticed my success and tied on a foam ant as well.

I went home, but Jeff stayed on and fished Saturday. He managed to hook one of the very big fish in the upper section but did not land it. I don't know what he had tied on at the time.

Well, I'm headed up again on December 6 to fish the creek on the 7th and 8th. This time, I am meeting Mike Caparoso and Bill Bendt - guys I know in Tucson. Mike has a house in the Pinetop area, so we'll be staying there. Come join us on the creek!

I've tied up a bunch of Simi-Seal Leeches, foam ants, and red and black Zebra Midges for this outing. Stay tuned for that report in a few days.

Silver Creek Again!

I realized that as we were approaching Thanksgiving I had no fishing plans. So I made some. I will be at Silver Creek in Arizona on November 30 where I will meet Rick Allen. The next day, I will meet Jeff Martin. That's two straight days of fishing the creek. If you are reading this and want to join me, give me a call or drop an email.

San Juan River - Fall 2017

Well, I finally got out fishing again. The summer was brutally hot here in Superior and my wife and I "got out of dodge" as much as we could. Northern California was our first stop, and while there, we met Marc Merrill and his wife Paula in St. Helena for a very pleasant evening of conversation and dining. Oh, I think there might have been a glass of wine or two involved. I met Marc a couple of years ago while fishing in the middle of Nevada. Marc has fished just about everywhere and knows the ins and outs of them all. As we parted, Paula gave us her latest CD (she's in a jazz singing trio), and Marc gave me a hat from New Zealand and a bottle of his homemade lemoncello. Good friends!

We also spent a week with my aunt Edna Olmstead on the shores of Lake Tahoe, where I tried stand up paddle boarding for the first time. I have some distant cousins that live on the Nevada side of Stateline up the Kingsbury Grade, and their son Jay Shelley was visiting, so it was great to catch up with him, and meet his significant other, Peggy. I must digress here to tell you a bit of their story.

Jay is a helicopter pilot, and his work has taken him all over the world. He worked in Alaska for a while, where he met Peggy, but now he is working in Africa on a 6 weeks on/6weeks off rotation. He travels a lot! Peggy is a teacher in Anchorage, so their time together is very precious. When he is off, he comes back to the US to his motorhome or Anchorage and visits family or just goes out to play. Being from Lake Tahoe, he has skied quite a bit and still does. Mountain bikes and paddle boards choke his motorhome. I'm hoping to get Jay and Peggy on a river trip with me sometime.

I did a river trip on the Yampa/Green River (Colorado/Utah) in July and was gone for about 10 or 11 days. Spectacular trip! Then Loril (that's my wife) and I went to Hawaii for about a week in early September. We went for a family wedding so it was not the big adventure it might have been. But we did swim in the ocean, helped throw a party, and witnessed the union of two great people.

Okay, on to the San Juan. Jeff Martin and I arrived the evening of September 25 and set up camp. We fished all day the 26th and were met be Kimball Pomeroy late in the day. I had to leave to pick up Bill Elk at about 8:00pm at the Durango-La Plata County Airport, about an hour away. Yes, they have commercial air service and car rentals on site. Late in the week, Rick Allen joined us. After the San Juan, Rick went on to the Gunnison River. I have not heard how he did.

It rained quite a bit while we were there, so Bill and Kim stayed at Abe's, while Jeff and I, and later Rick, roughed it at Cottonwood Campground. I cooked breakfast and dinner for us all at camp.

The fishing is never as good as you would like, but we all caught fish on rods that I built. I'm proud of that, to say the least. Most of the fishing success was using subsurface flies with indicators (the standard San Juan rig), but we did manage to hunt down some good risers and pick them off using tiny adult midge patterns. What we all noticed this trip was the large number of small fish in the river. It seemed like for every 5 fish we caught, 3 or 4 of them were small. I asked the guy behind the counter at Abe's about it and he told me that the river had recently been stocked. I hope they grow!

Next trip should be soon, up to the rim country lakes or even Silver Creek, or possibly a White Mountain lake. Stay tuned, or better yet, come along!

Ruby Report

The Ruby Lake trip was a resounding success. Rick Allen drove up separately from Jeff Martin and myself and once there, we set up camp. Mark Merrill was there when we arrived, having gotten there just 5 minutes earlier. We occupied 2 adjacent camps and the campground host arrived on the scene within 15 minutes. He was very helpful, providing the necessary paperwork and payment envelopes to us. Because this place is so very far away from any kind of store, the host now has firewood and ice for sale at relatively reasonable prices. I mean, you could drive the 2 hours to Elko for these things and 2 hours back, but of course that would take up most of the day and ultimately cost you more.

Once camp was set up, the fishing commenced. I have said before that the fishing is tough here. This trip proved the rule. It is tough, very tough in fact. But over the course of 3 and half days of fishing, we all caught some. I was immediately into a large fish, but my hook straightened and I lost the fish. Most strikes came on a red larva with copper ribbing, copper bead head, and a little flash for a tail. Another similar fly (black with silver ribbing, black bead head, and tail flash) also received attention from the fish.

The trophy of the trip was caught out of one of the ponds South of the campground. Here it is:

I did not measure or weigh this fish, but I estimated it at about 24” to 25” long and somewhere in the neighborhood of 8 pounds. He took a Chernobyl-style Mormon Cricket tied with foam. It was really windy that day and we were having trouble actually seeing the fish, so I tied on this big fly as an indicator. This fish slashed at it on the first cast but missed it.  A few casts later he was on. Jeff was fishing nearby, pulled out his phone and took nearly a minute and a half of video of me fighting and landing it, plus a couple of photos.

As I have said many times, you will not catch many fish here, but the ones you catch will likely be the largest trout of your life. As a point of interest, Rick caught a couple of Tiger Trout on this trip. Other than that, we all caught Rainbows.

Both Mark Merrill and I had fished the Ruby before and we both agreed that there weren’t as many fish this time. This certainly contributed to the tough fishing. The Ruby isn’t for everybody but if you go, make sure you have ALL the provisions you will need, including cash for the campground fee ($15/night). I believe this fishery is very sensitive, so please catch a few fish, release them after being fully revived, and stay only a few days and move on. You probably won’t see many other anglers so you’ll have the place nearly to yourself. The setting is truly amazing.

Chevelon Canyon Lake Report

Almost at the last minute, my friend Rick Allen and I decided to take a day (May 4, 2017) and head up to Chevelon. I've fished this beautiful reservoir, nestled in a canyon amid huge Ponderosa Pine trees, many times before, extending all the way back to when I was in college at Northern Arizona University. I've never done all that well at Chevelon - its a love/disappointing relationship at best.

We met at the Starbucks inside Safeway in Payson at 7:00am and I transferred my gear into Rick's truck for the hour plus drive into Chevelon. Once we got there, we aired up our tubes, loaded the rest of the stuff we would need for the day, and hiked the half mile into the canyon to the edge of the reservoir. We launched and immediately I got a few strikes. So did Rick. Throughout the day, the fishing was steady but not what I'd call hot. We both caught somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 fish each. None of these fish were the large holdover Brown's we were seeking, but the normal 12" stocker Rainbows. It was probably the best fishing I've ever had at Chevelon, though, as I said, it wasn't spectacular. But to be fair, I've been skunked at Chevelon lots!

I was catching fish on either an Arizona Peacock lady or the Nosepicker Nymph fished below the larger fly with a full sinking 4wt. line. Rick was using a sink tip 5wt. and catching most of his fish on a black and blue Simi-seal Leech. I did see some surface feeding fish, but it wasn't consistent enough to warrant changing over to a floating line. I did see a few mayfly imagos though.

We saw maybe 3 other people all day! This is an out of the way Arizona gem where you can catch a number of fish. Hit it just right, which I never have, and I'm told you can catch 20"+ Browns here!

We finished up and hiked up the hill and were moving by 7:00pm. Back in Payson a bit after 8:00pm and we separated for our respective drives home. I was home by 10:30pm - a long but productive day.

Next up, I am headed to Nevada soon to catch some truly nuclear Rainbows and Tiger Trout. Come back here often.

San Diego Fishing Report

The fishing along the San Diego coast was a bit disappointing. Lee Lynch and I fished at Mission Beach and Torrey Pines Beach on Tuesday, April 11, and at the beach at the end of 11th Street in Del Mar and the Del Mar Dog Beach on Wednesday, April 12. We neither saw a fish nor hooked a fish. Usually, you can at last see fish silhouetted in the waves but we didn’t even see that!

Discouraged, the next day, Thursday, April 13, we headed out to Coronado and at the foot of the bridge there is a park named Coronado Tidelands Park where you can park for free and gain easy access to the bay. We pumped up our float tubes and kicked out into the relatively calm waters of San Diego Bay. We caught many Spotted Bay Bass in the span of about 3 hours. You know you’ve had a pretty good session when you can’t remember how many fish you caught. None of these fish were all that big, but at that point we didn’t care. As we began to kick our way in, I hooked into something that seemed to pull really hard, but with no movement. I thought I might be snagged on something, but I was gaining line back if I pulled really hard. It took me at least a half an hour to haul in a large kite someone had lost. I pulled it out of the water at the beach and started walking back to the truck when I saw a San Diego City maintenance worker. I showed him the kite, told him the story, and offered him the kite. He was really excited because we said he was going to give it to his grandson the next weekend.

You just never know what’s going to happen when you go fishing!

San Diego and Ruby Lake NWR Plans

Okay, the dates for the next couple of trips are set.

First off, I am headed to San Diego on April 10. My buddy Lee Lynch and I will be fishing Torrey Pines State Beach on the 11th, the 12th, and the 13th, in the morning on an incoming tide. I have never done this before, but Lee has and says it can be really fun. We’ll be in full regalia including waders and stripping baskets.

Secondly, I’m headed to Ruby Lake NWR in Nevada starting May 21. We might get there in time to fish the afternoon of the 22nd, and the plan is to fish the 23rd, 24th, and 25th, beginning the return trip on the 26th. So far, the participants include Jeff Martin (Gilbert, AZ), Rick Allen (Scottsdale, AZ), Mark Merrill (Sacramento, CA), and possibly Chuck Hill (on his way from Scottsdale to Idaho for the summer). Another distantly possible participant is Bob Copelli, who lives in Colorado Springs.

Other possible fishing includes the Sierra’s over the summer and back East somewhere in August. As usual, let me know if you’re interested in any of these trips, or if you’re considering the purchase of a custom designed and built fly rod.

Silver Creek Update #2

I set the alarm. I even got up, but I made the mistake of checking the weather. ...WIND... I decided to go back to bed and get up at a reasonable hour. Besides, I was in the middle of a project that has to be completed by next weekend.

But, I do have a report. My friend Lee Lynch fished Silver Creek with moderate success. The standard patterns worked (chamois leeches, bead head black woolly buggers, etc...) and he even said that there was a BWO hatch late in the day.

Apparently, the parasite issue is resolving. Good news!

Silver Creek Update #1

Through underhanded shenanigans, the Silver Creek day has been moved up to tomorrow, March 4. There may be another few days before the season ends, but please check back frequently for updates and reports.

San Juan River Fishing Report

The fishing on the San Juan, in a word, sucked this time around, at least for me. My buddies Rick and Jeff didn’t do much better, but they did manage to catch a few. I got skunked!

Now, that doesn’t happen very often, but it does happen, so I took it all philosophically. That’s not to say I didn’t care whether I caught any fish or not, its just that I’ve caught plenty on the San Juan, so a few more doesn’t make it or break it for me.

To be fair though, the water was pretty murky. I’d say visibility was right around 12 inches, maybe a bit better. The fish weren’t very interested in the normal small flies you’d use there. No, the fish they caught were more interested in chamois leeches in a sort of burnt orange color, fished on the bottom in faster moving water.

There has been quite a bit of rain in the area, and that certainly is contributing to the off color of the river, but if you go up to the top of the dam and look at the lake, you’ll see what the issue is. The lake is downright muddy, so it doesn’t look like the river will clear anytime soon. In fact, we heard that USBR is planning a 5000cfs flush again this year that will go 60 to 90 days, probably starting in mid-May. So, that means the fishing won’t really be good again until fall.

We hit a weather window just right however. On the drive up on 2/19, we were in rain off and on the entire trip. Monday dawned clear as did Tuesday. Wednesday had a bit of thin cloud cover. The high temperatures each day were right around 60°, so it was quite pleasant out on the water.

Next trips are a day on Silver Creek in Arizona near the end of March and then a few days fishing the surf near San Diego in mid-April. And in mid to late May is a trip to the Ruby Lake NWR in Nevada. Let me know if you are interested in any of these trips.

A Change In Plans

As is almost always the case on extended trips, our San Juan plans have changed. Due to weather concerns, we are postponing or trip to February 19 through February 23.

The warmest it is forecast to be on the river is hovering around freezing - and that's the warmest part of the day! Plus, snow is also forecast. Now, I don't mind a little snow as long as the wind doesn't blow too hard - in fact, the fish tend to lose all inhibitions and feed on midges ON THE SURFACE when the conditions are just right. The conditions could line up well here in late January, but the temperatures just seemed to extreme for us.

So, we've planned to go later in February. Keep an eye on this page, as things are sure to change again!

San Juan Plans

In the past few days, a plan has come together to make the trip up to the San Juan River in northwest New Mexico. Our travel day is 1/22/17 and we will fish for 3 days, departing on 1/26/17.

I will be accompanied by Jeff Martin and Rick Allen, and we will be staying at Abe’s Fly Shop and Motel. The latest report is that the fishing is a bit off due to water clarity issues. But, the fish are keyed into midges almost exclusively. This is good news to the dry fly purist. Subsurface flies in the right size and color should work too though. Come on out and play!

I just heard today that Fish Camp (sponsored by the White Mountain Apache Tribe) at Christmas Tree Lake has been canceled this year. The reason given is that the federal hatchery where the fish are grown has a parasite. They do not want to infect the lake, so no stocking will occur and the toughest decision of all was to cancel fish camp.

This is not all bad news from my viewpoint. The problem existed last year, so they stocked with younger and smaller fish that came from a separate part of the hatchery that was not infected. There was enough pushback on this that now they’ll need to figure out what is going on and then solve the problem.

Also, since my plan was to fish the Ruby Lake NWR in early May, it means I can delay that trip a couple of weeks, making the camping up there more enjoyable. A couple of years ago, I was up there right at the beginning of May, and had snow for 3 or 4 days and nights! The middle to late part of May should be better weather. I just hope the fishing is as good as it was in early May. Keep coming back for updates on this trip.

Apache Lake Report

Jeff and I weren't on the water until 1:30pm today. There is a learning curve - but read on to shorten it for yourselves. The main thing is that we got skunked! I guess 1 trip just isn't enough to figure out such a large body of water!

I tried full sinking lines with a silver bead-head black woolly bugger, and added a red midge larvae as a dropper. I fished this rig for about 3 hours with not even a bump. Jeff fished a brown woolly bugger without success. I switched to a floating line and a baitfish imitation but again, no dice.

I will say that the place is beyond gorgeous though. Kicking around on a huge lake in a deep canyon, cacti growing right down to the edge of the lake, on a crisp January sky, and about a half moon creeping up over the SE ridge made it about more than catching fish. We nearly had the place to ourselves too.

The learning curve involves not only the fishing. It turns out that you need a Tonto National Forest Pass to park where we fished, which was Three Mile Canyon Recreation Site, just 3 miles below Roosevelt Dam on Arizona Route 188. Jeff thought about it about a mile before we got there, so we went on down to the Apache Lake Marina to buy the pass. That's about a 20 mile diversion. Day passes and annual passes are available at various outlets, but if you're going just for the day, I suggest getting the pass on-line at:

www.myscenicdrives.com/store/item/forest-passes/tonto

The day pass costs $8 and the annual pass costs $60. You can do the math.

Apache Lake

As promised, the first Apache Lake foray is scheduled for 1/6/17. One of my main fishing partners, Jeff Martin, will be joining me. He most likely will be fishing his Orvis Helios2 9' 5wt. rod I built for him about a year ago. He also has a nice pontoon boat he will be using, but I'm still kicking around in my old float tube. We're thinking that the fish will be holding relatively deep, so we will be armed with sinking lines. We don't know what we will catch, if anything, but that's part of the allure - the unknown.

Let me know if you 'd like to join us. We won't be leaving too early, but will be fishing most of the daylight hours. Report to follow...

The Beginning

As I begin to make Coast to Coast Fly Rods (C2C) a reality, I am excited as to what the new year will bring. I am busy making improvements to our "new" house here in Superior, but plan on getting out to fish a bit over the winter. I say new house because it is new to us, but it was originally built back in 1927! Many projects are waiting for me to tackle them.

Speaking of tackle, I am close to a number of reservoirs on the Salt River - all of which have large populations of fish. My first fishing excursion/research trip will be to the upper end of Apache Lake where I have heard stories of large Rainbows. Dates for this are open. Let me know if you're interested.

Other than that, I'll probably make it up to the San Juan River in Northwest New Mexico a time or two before spring. Then in April, a friend and I are planning a trip to San Diego to fish the surf. We have done a bit of research and the general consensus is that the best fishing is on an incoming tide. Mid-April has some incoming tides early in the day, which is perfect for a few hours of fishing and then we'll be free to do other things with our wives.

Later in the spring, I intend to head into Nevada and the Ruby Lake National Wildlife Refuge. If you've ever been bonefishing, the fishing here is a lot like that. Huge Rainbows and Tiger Trout cruise in very clear, shallow water where you cast a sinking midge pattern ahead of them, wait for them to get close, and twitch the bug to give it a bit of action. When these behemoths see the bug, they will alter their course and slurp. My advice at this point is to hold on and maybe start running in the same direction the fish is going. Three fish a day is average, but they are likely the largest trout you will ever catch. I mean these fish rival Kamchatka! Stay tuned for specific dates.