Bear Creek April 8 2012

Easter Sunday morning I had a few hours to myself and took the opportunity to head back up to Bear Creek. I considered going to the South Platte up in Deckers but the area was on fire, literally (a small wild fire North of Deckers near Ox Yoke that I believe was extinguished fairly quickly).

Fishing was at first slower than usual, I wasn't quite sure why since the conditions haven't changed much since my last few visits. I started out with a Killer Bug and got some follows and bumps including a very aggressive strike of a rainbow trout but none of them were hooked enough to be landed. I switched to some sakasa kebaris with no interest, so I finally switched to my confidence flies, the CDC & Elk and RS2 dropper but fishing remained still fairly slow.

The first fish to hand was a little brown trout that fell of course for the RS2. Getting hungry, I started wrapping-up things just before 1pm and headed downstream towards the parking lot. Of course I got tempted to make a few casts in some of my favorite spots and was promptly rewarded with 5 more trout of which I landed 4, all within less than half an hour! 4 of them took the RS2 and one eager brown took the CDC & Elk.

 Who says the "one more cast" can't produce?

All said, it was nice to get out and spend some quality time on the river.

River Statistics:
Weather: nice & sunny, little wind
Air Temp: 46 @9am, 64F @1.30pm
Water Temp: n/a
Flow: 20cfs, clear water
Day on the water in 2012: 7
Fish: 13 hooked, landed 5
Equipment: TenkaraUSA Iwana 11ft, Tenkarabum 11ft hand-tied hi-vis fc line of

Still Winter here but soon...

Today I headed out to the river for the first time this year. Not that I didn't want to go earlier, but family scheduling did unfortunately not allow for any river time until today. If I remember correctly, it was mid-December when I last headed out with my friend Will for some fishing in Waterton Canyon. 

The weather did only partially cooperate today; I wanted to head to the South Platte but the forecast called for gusts up to 50mph. Combine that kind of wind with your ultra light Tenkara rod and you might just as well go for a hike. I decided instead to head to Bear Creek that should have been somewhat sheltered in the canyon compared to the South Platte (gusts to 20mph instead of 50mph). 

I arrived around 9am and it was already in the 40ies. I hoped for a nice day of fishing... I decided to fish today with my new Caddis 330 and Tenkarabum's No. 3 level fc line (wind, remember?) and wanted to put my new Tamo that I received for Christmas to good use. 

Well....... it seems that I still have no clue how to fish in the Winter. I worked all the spots where I would hang out were I a trout and then some. Midges, nymphs and even dries (hey, you never know).  I guess it didn't help that some of the river was still frozen and snowed over and the water was really really really cold. I will have to either fish more in the Winter and collect experience and pay my dues or I should just go ski. I hear the skiing in Colorado should be really good. I wouldn't know since I haven't skied in Colorado since moving here in 2008. That is a story for another time though.

Anyway, I enjoyed the day out in the sun, trying to cast and catch some fish in some of the water that wasn't solid. The review on the Fountainhead Caddis 330 and the Tamo will have to wait for another day. Hopefully soon. 

Here are some pictures of today:

River Notes:

Bear Creek

Flow: 15cfs

Water Temp: cold (partly solid) 

Air Temp: 44F @ 9am, 52F @ 2.30pm

Weather: Sunny, very windy/breezy

Bear Creek Fall Notes

An unexpected and very welcome change in family schedule & plans allowed me to head out to Bear Creek  for bit more than a half day. I fished with my Iwana 12ft from about 10am to 3pm and it was a gorgeous Fall day on the Front Range. It was sunny and pretty mild if you stayed in the sun. I was not the only one who liked the sun, the trout were much more cooperative in sections of the river exposed to the sun. I forgot to bring my thermometer for the water, but to me it felt freezing, lol.

The action was pretty steady, I caught mostly browns with a few bows mixed in, the largest fish was just under 14", the smallest was a dink of maybe 3", pretty fish nevertheless.

Another day I barely changed flies unless I had to due to the tree fish breaking me off. I started out with a black size 16 Charlie Boy and a mercury RS2 as a dropper. Both fell victim to the tree fish, so I tied on a new CDC & Snowshoe (like CDC & Elk but Elk hair was replaced by Snowshoe Hare) that I was experimenting with. Most fish fell for the mercury RS2 but some still came quiet willingly to the surface and took the dry. I really didn't expect any risers though, I only tied the dry on in lieu of a strike indicator (I still need some visual help to detect underwater strikes).

Interesting that today, even with much if not all of the foliage gone, the tree fish were seriously teasing me all day long. For the first time I thought that a shorter rod would be handy. . A 10 or 10.5 footer might have been ideal today. Let's see of Daniel (of TenkaraUSA) will offer one soon.

River Notes:
flow: 18cfs
temp. air: 53-70 during my time on river, sunny, windy gusts
temp. water: really cold, my guess mid 40ies.