http://www.theflyfishingforum.com/forums/blogs/fysh/ This fly fishing forum consists of fly fishing techniques, advice, tips, news, gear reviews and fly fishing discussions among fellow anglers. en Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:19:33 GMT vBulletin 30 http://www.theflyfishingforum.com/forums/images/misc/flyfishing_red/rss.jpg http://www.theflyfishingforum.com/forums/blogs/fysh/ http://www.theflyfishingforum.com/forums/blogs/fysh/122-fyshtales-south-fork.html Mon, 15 Aug 2011 03:42:56 GMT This weekend Pam and I headed to The South Fork to celebrate our Anniversary. The water has been very high all Summer and has only come down to fishable and safe floating levels over the last couple weeks, needless to say it's been a tough season with no "water therapy" on our favorite river.

This being our Anniversary I bought Pam a new rod(ok it was a very lightly used, well taken care of rod that I picked up from Paul aka "IMXER"), a Loomis GL4 9' 6wt that will work great as a dedicated streamer rod. I wanted to surprise her with it before we floated, but I had no way of concealing the rod tube wrapped in brightly colored paper so I decided to give her the rod on Thursday night instead. She was surprised and excited to use it the next day. Thanks Paul.

We checked in with a few local Guides who we've become friendly with over the years, they each told us the river is tough right now with the fish being tight lipped and the hatches very light and irregular. You know it's probably going to be tough fishing when the Guides who make their living on the river are scratching their heads while trying to solve the rivers riddles. We decided to fish The Canyon section from Conant to Wolf, if fishing was slow atleast we would enjoy the scenery and wildlife.

While prepping the boat for launch, stowing gear, and putting rods together the rest of my Anniversary plan was ready to unfold. I had told Pam that she could use a Lamson L2 reel from another rod on the GL4 and we would pick up a reel later on, so at this point I had to put on my game face while digging through the gear bag and tell her that I couldn't find the reel she planned on using, the look of concern was priceless, I kept digging for a moment and produced another brightly colored package for her to unwrap that contained a new Ross CLA 3 with a RIO Clouser line. I love it when a plan comes together.

Pam started the day throwing a yellow Zoo Cougar, it has become our "go to fly" when throwing streamers on this river. The day was warm and sunny, the scenery was beautiful, and the fish were more than willing to take a look at the offering, but few were willing to commit. We changed over to a white Zoo Cougar and had the same results. We enjoyed the day and boated a few smaller fish.

The evening was spent having dinner and beers with some of our Guide friends listening to their salt water adventures from the past Winter. It was nice to catch up and listen to a few lies.

Day 2 we decided to float The Canyon again, hoping that the fish would cooperate a little more. We would not be disappointed today.

Pam threw the white ZC from the day before, adding an additional split shot(2) to get it down just a little faster, this additional weight seemed to be just the ticket.

A nice 18" Brown.



19" Brown.



And the best fish of the day, a 23" Brown.


She landed another 5 fish, all between 15-17". Overall the day ended up being one of the best days ever on this river, not because of high numbers of fish caught(spend a few hours in a good riffle and you'll catch many more fish), but rather the consistent size of them.
With the heavy flows all season these fish have eaten well and are very healthy.

Days like this make me glad to be her Guide, what a great anniversary.:) ]]> fysh http://www.theflyfishingforum.com/forums/blogs/fysh/122-fyshtales-south-fork.html