Fly Fishing for salmon – October 7th 2018

Ethan with the first fish of the day

Fishing in the early part of the run can be a bit of a struggle. There are always a few fish around, but the majority of those are just blasting on through without stopping, leaving us fly anglers little opportunity to toss flies at resting fish. 

One of Jonathan's, caught on a black woolly bugger

Last weekend I had a great day with the boys and my father in-law trying to do just that…..swinging flies for salmon.

And as the day played out, we realized that there were plenty of fish holding and others blasting on through or to stop for a bit, which allowed us many great opportunities. More than I have seen in years fishing this early.

One of the major keys to our success was our willingness to walk to find fish, and to frequently change locations to find new fish. 

Jonathan with a big fish on!

We used more natural colored bead headed woolly buggers in brown, olive and black, in sizes #6 - #4, and swung them in front of holding salmon. We used a 9 foot tapered leader on a WFF line with an additional small bit of split shot on the leader above the fly to keep in the zone. Too much weight would keep the fly on the bottom and produce a greater chance of foul hooking fish, and too little weight would not allow the fly to stay in front of the fish. We could have tried using sink tips on a short leader with unweighted flies, but I didn’t bring the tips with me.

Each of us were able to bring at least one fish to the net, with a couple of us landing several.

Jonathan's big Chinook salmon

We did see several reds in each of the locations we went to, but only encountered one post spawn female salmon, and no active spawning was witnessed while we were there. Half of the other female salmon we caught had loose eggs, while the other half were still firm.

Ethan resting a salmon before it's release

Jonathan helped guide his Grandpa to his first salmon on the fly

Even I get to land one

Ethan with the last fish of the day

I suspect that by the end of the month, there should be a good number of salmon in all of the WNY tributaries with a good number of trout to follow.

Fall tributary season - edition 1

As of writing this blog post, the WNY fall salmon and trout run is now in full swing.

We are off to a great start this year. The boys and I have already taken several trips to our local WNY tributary and have all found a little success in landing a few fish.

September 30^th - Our first outing was intended to be more of a scouting mission. Our goal was to look at the condition of the creek at various locations and even spend some time walking in to find the many recent changes that always happen over the course of the summer.

Jonathan with a large female king

Our first stop was at a bridge that was less than a mile from Lake Ontario. It also marks the first good fly fishable water. Here we found a few cars in the parking lot, and one salmon swimming nervously under the bridge.

Ethan with his 1st king of the year.

Our next stop, which was the second bridge up from the first, revealed just how far along the run had progressed in that last week of September. A good half dozen cars lined either side of the street leading right up to the bridge. On our walk up to the bridge, we saw an anger fishing to four or five salmon that were holing in a run on the upstream side of the bridge. Once we got to the bridge and were able to look into the pool below, we counted a good 19-20 salmon. We watched for a good five or ten minutes before we headed to our third location.

At this point we knew that there were fish in the stream. So at the next bridge upstream we got ourselves geared up and headed down the trail.

A fresh hen from "round 2"

It took a little bit of walking before we found fish, but when there is nobody else around, we could take our time and swing some #6 olive and brown woolly buggers in front a few salmon.

We each landed one fish before we left for the day. A great start to the season for sure. 

October 6^th – “Round 2” was even better than our first session, as we all had a few hook ups and once again we were able to bring a few fish to hand. 

Jonathan's kyped out king from "round 2"

We ended up fishing a section of stream in the lower end and once again had the place to ourselves. We spotted a good twenty or so fish in and around the main pool area, with a few more that were moving up from down below. We once again used olive and brown buggers and Ethan spent some time fishing a large olive and white rabbit strip streamer.

This is a far better start than what we had last year. And the numbers of fish should steadily build from here on out, especially with a bunch of rain in the forecast.

Ethan gets ready to release his king from "round 2"

A little October color

My 2016 Fall Tributary season.

1st Chinook of the fall

The 2016 fall salmon run is done and gone and with it goes the last remnants of autumn. It seemed to arrive late and leave early this year, or maybe it just seemed that way to me because my focus has been on a busy family schedule. Either way, the leaves are down and as I am writing this, wet snow is falling.

Black bead head copper and brown buggers worked well this fall

The amount of time spent on the water these past few years has diminished from years past, so I really try to make the most out of each trip. And even though I didn’t get out as much as I would have liked (when do I ever?), I did manage to catch a few fish for myself and even help guide some others into a few of their own.

Guide Jessie Hollenbeck of Wide Sky Fly fishing coaching some clients

Water, or the lack there of, has once again been an issue for our local tributaries. This summer’s drought was severe enough to reduce the water table to a point where even the most robust rainfall couldn’t restore it in time for the fall. Even when we did get a bump in water flow, it didn’t last long. In fact, even with all the precipitation we have received this fall, I believe we are still running a deficit.

Even with less than ideal conditions, we found a few good windows of opportunity.

Ethan trying to turn a Chinook

During one of those post-robust rainfall events in mid-late October, I managed to be at the creek at the right time to find the water level up and stained. Many large Chinook salmon where moving upstream in good numbers. I worked the tail outs of pools and deeper runs, swinging natural colored buggers in front of resting kings, sometimes having three to five fish at a time to work my fly to, with at least one or two of them willing to intercept. 

Jonathan helps Ethan hoist his catch

As the fall run progressed, more and more big lake run trout began to enter our WNY tributaries to take advantage of all those loose eggs being deposited by the spawning salmon. And once again I found a couple of great windows of opportunity to take full advantage. It is at this time that using egg patterns will produce the most consistent action. 

Once the spawning is done, streamers and large nymphs and wetflies will begin to produce a good number of fish until a good slug of water dislodges eggs from all the spawning reds and once again putting fish back on the egg bite.

Jonathan with his spawned out Coho salmon

And so it goes, Summer to fall. Fall to winter. Winter to spring, and spring back to summer again.

Large 10+lb. lake run brown trout

Landlocked Atlantic salmon brought to you by Streamwalker Nets.

I can’t wait to get back out there, See you on the stream!