Pecos National Historical Park - Santa Fe

[nawagner]

I will be fishing the Pecos through the Pecos National Historical Park in a couple weeks and need to know what flies I should be tying to get ready.

Any help is appreciated.

Thanks,
Nick

 

[red feather troutbum]

Hi Nick, cant help directly, my experience is limited to Cimarron Canyon below Angelfire, the SJ below Navajo, both of which were pretty great fisheries. These folks should be able to help you with the specifics/local info on the Nat Park info; Fly Fish Northern New Mexico

 

[dwtalso]

I'm on the park this Friday and looking forward to it very much. The park was closed to fishing all last year because of flooding due to the Tres Lagunas Fire and I missed fishing that water.

Right now the Pecos is in full runoff and I'm hoping that it tips over this week but it's probably a couple of weeks before it really starts to trend down. If you are going to be fishing the park that far out it should be an excellent time.

I would be prepared to fish both high murky water and low clear water. I say this because late in runoff the Pecos will rarely be really muddy but it will still be off color although there will be enough visibility that the edges and shallows will be clear to the bottom. The fish tend to hang in the deep slack water to avoid the rush but when the sun is out they will move into the rocky shallows along the edges.

This weekend I fished a section about 25 miles upstream of the PNHP and I did well with a black Wooly Bugger (#10) trailing something smallish (red annelid, pheasant tail) in the deeper faster spots and I sight fished along the edges with an Elk Hair Caddis and a parachute BWO. I will probably lean toward heavier flies this Friday because there will more water that far down hill but I plan to fish on top as well.

The water temperature will in the mid 40's (F) and you can expect a mayfly hatch in the afternoon. While I'm on the park I try to plan to be around a nice run with a smoothish surface in the early afternoon. It's usually pretty fun . Unfortunately the park doesn't let us stay until sundown, I think that would be the best time to rigged up and ready to fish those waters .

I'll also make sure to swing a streamer through the tails of deeper pools. I've caught a couple of 20" rainbows in those spots and I've been stalking a much larger trout for a couple of years now. I've hooked and played it twice but haven't landed it.

The files I like on the PNHP are:

Pheasant Tails (BH, FB)
Copper Johns (black, red, copper)
Hairs Ears (BH)
SJ Worm (red, brown, orange)
Small annelids (red, black, sparkle)

Wooly Bugger
Sculpzilla
Slump Buster

BWOs
Adams
Stimulators (yellow, black)
Elk Hair Caddis (olive, tan, peacock)
Royal Wulff
Small midges

Black ants and beetles

 

[waycool]

Interesting.. had no idea they had made that small section of river into a National Park....

That is a section that is just north of what used to be the Forked Lightening Ranch once owned (back in my youth) by Greer Garson. I was lucky enough to have been invited on the ranch many times back then.. Great place..

 

[dwtalso]

Interesting.. had no idea they had made that small section of river into a National Park....

That is a section that is just north of what used to be the Forked Lightening Ranch once owned (back in my youth) by Greer Garson. I was lucky enough to have been invited on the ranch many times back then.. Great place..

Actually, the PNHP includes the Forked Lightning Ranch and it's the Pecos on that ranch that is made available. One of the reason I like fishing it is that the entire area reeks of history .

 

[waycool]

Interesting... it's the ENTIRE Forked Lightning? That doesn't sound right.. as I know a group from Japan purchased the majority at one time.. perhaps the portion at the homestead ? I do see they have Buddy Fogelson's (person that invited my father and I, most don't recognize him, but do know who Greer Garson was ) main ranch house.. would be interesting to go see it again.. Been a long time 30 year's just flew by... wow..

There were some great stretches of river on that place.. many a monster brown... on a fenwick 4 wt..

 

[dwtalso]

Interesting... it's the ENTIRE Forked Lightning? That doesn't sound right.. as I know a group from Japan purchased the majority at one time.. perhaps the portion at the homestead ? I do see they have Buddy Fogelson's (person that invited my father and I, most don't recognize him, but do know who Greer Garson was ) main ranch house.. would be interesting to go see it again.. Been a long time 30 year's just flew by... wow..

So, here's what I know now after some digging . When Mr. Fogelson died the ranch was divided into two sections. The north section went to Mrs. Fogelson (Greer Garson) and the south section went to his son. When Mrs. Fogelson died the north ranch ("Old Forked Lightning Ranch") was donated to the PNHP.

The south section (2300 acres) is now owned by Jane Fonda (Jane Fonda's Forked Lightning Ranch). And it's for sale for just under $20 million .

There were some great stretches of river on that place.. many a monster brown... on a fenwick 4 wt..

There's still very nice fish in the Pecos but unfortunately it's been the most pressured river in the state for long enough that the entire watershed has been depleted of the browns and it's not like it used to be. But then, no river in this state is like it used to be 30 years ago.

 

[waycool]

Thanks for that dwtalso !

I grew up fishing the Pecos river from the township to the headwaters.. I can appreciate its' not what it once was..

I just had a funny memory of the forked lightning.. Mr Fogelson had those damn Santa Gertrudes cattle.. the mean suckers would stampede at the drop of a hat.. I remember there was an old cable bridge (walk way) across the river.. I had to run onto it more than once to get away from those dang cattle !!!!!! LOL ! Yep.. those were the days

Thanks for sharing !!!

 

[nawagner]

Thanks for the detailed info and great history lesson! Hope fishing goes well on Friday. Looking forward to the fishing.

 

[dwtalso]

I'll drop a note here and let you know how it goes.. Right now the flows are just below 160 cfs. The park closes fishing at 200 cfs (half flood stage) so it looks like I'll sneak in under the wire . On the other hand, the fishing is going to be tough . But I'll work through it some how .

 

[txshane]

Another great place to fish in that area is the Valles Caldera National Preserve. Valles Caldera National Preserve

I don't know if it will be open for fishing just yet for you or not. Fishing may not start until the month of May. It's limited entry. You have to reserve a spot and pay a small fee.

I got to fish there 20 years ago when it was still privately-owned. A family from here in Abilene used to own the ranch. It's as beautiful as it gets, and the fishing was fantastic. We caught 150-200 fish each per day, all on dry flies (mostly #16-18 elk hair caddis - in July). It was rare to not hook a fish on a cast. We fished San Antonio creek. The Jemez also starts and runs through the place.

There are hundreds of elk on the place as well. It's one of those places that you need to visit for sure. Absolutely gorgeous, and very special.

 

[dwtalso]

The VCNP hasn't opened it's fishing program yet this year. The East Fork of the Jemez probably won't open up until late May because they are planning a prescribed burn across the Valle Grande (big valley on the south side of the caldera) in late April/early May. I'm hoping they open up the San Antonio sooner because the burn is pretty far from that river but I don't know if they have something else going on back there.

 

[txshane]

Hopefully the grass will green up soon after the burn, before all the ash washes into the river. It would stink to kill a bunch of fish. The burn will be great for the grass - and elk, for sure.

 

[waycool]

The burn should have no affect on the fishing.. they have studied the impact of prescribed burns on the creeks there when only burning the grassland. NMSU students gave a nice presentation on the study a few weeks ago at a local club meeting.

On the other hand the last wildfire did gravely impact the watershed...

 

[dwtalso]

I fished the park Friday and had a very nice, if tough, day. I didn't catch many fish but the river looks good after the flooding, there's lots of clear gravel and cobble and I saw a couple of redds from last fall, and the banks held up nicely.

The water was flowing at 150 cfs and that's high and fast for this stretch of river. The water was still pretty murky with visibility at a couple of feet. In the end it took a heavy golden stone nymph and a some additional split shot to find fish along the bottom. I also caught fish on a Prince Nymph. There were a few mayflies in the air, a couple of small tan caddis, and some hoppers but no big hatches. Under the rocks I saw mostly olive cased caddis. However, I never say any fish rising at any time in the day. The water temperature started out at around 40 and got up to 46 by the middle of they day.

I've got to see if I can make one more trip out the before the season ends .