Angler 119's Delaware River Fishing Report

After four days of beautiful, cool, dry weather the rivers are returning to more normal levels. Both the Willowemoc and Beaverkill can be comfortably waded. The water temps there have been fine for fishing but we are in the hottest week (on average) of the year. If the water levels continue to drop and we get sunshine the temps could quickly rise above the 70 degree cut off point. Look for isos to...

With the EB and WB still unwadeable, I decided to try a little exploring on the Willowemoc. Drove over the bridge at "The Secret Spot " (only four cars in the lot), turned left and drove upstream just past the Creekside Cabins where I encountered a brand spanking new "Fishermen Park Here" sign together with Special Regulations advising me that I couldn't keep any fish in a 3.5 mile stretch of the...

Spent the morning raising and lowering ladders. Got most all the dead limbs cut off the apple tree and thinned the peaches on freestone limbs that were too high to reach three weeks ago. Made a dump run about one and on the way back, decided to head east on 17 to have a look around. Maybe stop in the shops in Roscoe and possibly head up to the museum. As luck would have it the parking slots in...

 You say it best, when you say nothing at all. 

As I sit down to write this, there is a severe thunderstorm warning for Delaware County. It calls for 60 mph winds and quarter size hail. Fortunately it appears that the worst of the storm will pass to the north of Lordville. Where is it supposed to hit? Why Walton of course. If Walton and the surrounding area get the heavy rain predicted the WB (now 99.3% full) will spill. This coupled with the...

Wade fishermen, just stay home.  There is no place for you to fish safely at current water levels. 

Even if you have a boat you should stay off the rivers until flow rates subside. An accident at current water levels can turn into a tragedy. I have a friend who had his driftboat run up on a submerged log. The stern became submerged in heavy water and in an instant he found himself underneath a...

Spent the morning waiting for the grass to dry so I could mow it. Takes longer to mow right now because I have to remove 15 support poles that are keeping the peach tree limbs mostly out of reach of the deer. When I'm done mowing I have to prop everything back up again.  The deer are up in the woods watching in hopes that I forget and leave everything down where they can reach it. 

Forgot to...

The fishing - Went just to keep the fish on their toes. Cannonsville is spilling and most of the river is now unwadable. Didn't go until 7:00 and was back in the car at 8:00. In about 1,600 CFS of water there were but a few sulfurs hatching. Caught three fish about seven inches each that were sipping something along the bank. Saw one good fish, made one cast too long, one too short and the third...

Someone please tell me why NYC did not, (and still has not) maximized the releases from both reservoirs a week ago. The water flowing into the reservoirs currently far exceeds the amount by which they can be drawn down even with maximum releases. It's my understanding that after June the city is required to maintain a void in both reservoirs for flood protection. No effort has been made to...

Today was neither as bad as it could have been or as good as you might have liked it. If you live long enough there are a lot of days like that. Faced with no home cooked dinners or my wife's company for the next three nights, there was little doubt about where I would be headed. Lafayette had partly cloudy skies and a drying breeze this morning . We opened all the windows just to get a little...

 My wife has announced that she will be spending the next three nights "monitoring" our two youngest (teenage) grandchildren. Some might consider this a plea for help.  With Jean, it was a signal for me to go fishing so she doesn't have to worry about feeding me dinner.

Being realistic and perhaps a bit negative, the furtherance of the current onslaught of "severe" weather is not good for fishing...

If you are looking for a fishing report here, forgetaboutit. I'm in Lafayette trying to mop up the water in Jean's girl cave. We had a real downpour last night, our little Rainbow Creek was a raging torrent this am, the two little rivulets that I have diverted around the trout and bass ponds to avoid siltation both broke through their banks and poured water, gravel and debris into the ponds. The...

Dennis - Sorry missed your question about trips out west. Haven't taken one the past three years, Covid-19, too many boats on the rivers, a fish population crash and old age being the primary reasons. For over twenty years it was a no brainer, go to the Missouri at Craig Mt. Dozens of Delaware fishermen still go there. At one time we counted over 30 Delaware River fishermen eating dinner at...

Was surprised when I realized that two weeks had gone by since my last Q & A session. Last week I substituted the Beaverkill piece as I thought it raised interesting questions.  

Will comment one last time on it before moving on to the latest questions. Not sure if everyone is aware of how good a predator man is. When I began fishing and the DEC stocked only yearling trout and everyone kept their...

The new weather pattern continues to bring thunderstorms almost every afternoon/evening and today was no exception. If Jim N. had given the GPS coordinates for his 10 to 2 sulfur bonanza I might have had my fill of catching fish and missed todays rain. With no one giving me any useful tips I left the fishing camp (bet you wonder what I did from 6:00 am until 2:00) at about two, stopped at the...

After a night of heavy thunderstorms that blew out everything but the upper reaches of the two branches, there wasn't much question as to where both the wade fishermen and the drifters would go. What driftboats there were, put in at barking dog and drifted downstream throwing streamers. The waders headed up above Oquaga where the water level and clarity were fine for wade fishing. Hopefully,...

Slept until 8:00 this morning, had breakfast and went out to do some yard work. In less than an hour I was as wet as I was after my muskrat encounter. It was an easy decision to forego what has been a somewhat futile search for the afternoon sulfurs. Up graded the flies in the olive box, tied a couple emergers, a spinner and three stenos. Fell asleep doing the crossword puzzle. Awoke in time to...

July fishing continues to be like a yoyo, up and down. The summer sulfurs need to grow up, settle down and hatch when they are supposed to. Seems I've experienced this problem before and will take a look back in my logs to see if they shed any light on the problem. I know the midday sulfur hatches are temperature sensitive and we have had some unusual circumstances to deal with. Clouds often keep...

Spent the past two days relaxing with Jean. We took in the annual Lordville 4th of July parade, enjoyed a dinner at the new Pheasant Tail Tavern in Deposit, watched fireworks from our back porch, took one of our many drives around the area and actually found a couple of roads we had never been on before. Jean departed this am and I tackled some yard work that had been postponed by the rain and go...

My wife Jean is down in Lordville to take in the fireworks and the Lordville parade.  We drove around a bit this afternoon and were surprised at how few fishermen were on the river. Looks like with Covid 19 in remission, families are going to be spending the weekend together (not a bad thing). 

Ed & Ken you started a discussion that I thought would elicit more responses from Beaverkill fishermen. I...

With the yard still wet from last nights rain I was unable to cross the yardwork items off my to-do list. Copied some flies that appeared on my screens last night and at about 1:30, loaded up the trash and headed for the transfer station. Figured as long as I was on the road I might as well see if anything was going on. It was.

First bridge I walked out on had sulfurs flying all around it with fish...

Took the obligatory once a week drive to the UEB.  At 2:00 this afternoon there was but one fisherman between East Branch and the Corbett Bridge. Never saw a bug on the water or a fish rise. 

Strange as it may sound after dealing with 90+ degree heat all week, I felt, with the heavy overcast, that the water up in Deposit would be too cold to get the sulfurs hatching, so I looked downstream for...

In order for the fishing to be good three things have to happen. The fisherman has to be in the right place at the right time. I wasn't. The bugs have to show up via either a hatch or a spinner fall. They didn't. The fish have to rise. They didn't.

Perhaps I was too far downstream for the evening sulfurs (the gamelands) but there were swallows eating spinners way up high before the last rain. 

Based...

 Got the Lordville Estate down to 71 degrees at 6:00 yesterday morning then closed things up and watched the thermometer out on the porch climb into the mid nineties. At noon Mom had a coming out party for her fawn. It's the first one I've seen in Lordville so far this year. Have yet to see a doe with twin fawns. Both the bears and coyotes are grim reapers and have been busy thinning the heard.

Abo...

The best part of fishing today was just standing in the sub fifty degree water and no, I didn't feel a bit sorry for the guys frying in their the drift boats. Stopped in Deposit at about 11:30 on the way down to see if the midday sulfurs had gotten going (they hadn't). Drove to Lordville, unloaded the car, tied some sulfurs, had lunch and drove back up the river to Deposit. There was very little...

Speaking of which - With the wind that blew seemingly every day, I did put a few more knots than usual in my leader this week.

Dennis - My sulfur box has well over two hundred flies in it representing various stages of the flies transformation from nymph to dun. The sizes, shapes and colors also vary. Nor sure if it makes any difference to the fish but it makes me feel that changing my fly...

Spent the morning working on the yard. In Lordville if you are outside working and a neighbor is driving by, its time for a chat. With the outside painting last year it was easy to keep up with Lordville news. This year I haven't spent as much time outside and was happy to see both Steve, a fellow fisherman, and Kat both of whom live in the suburbs up river from town. Learned of several break-ins...

After two days in the Sulfur Zone trying to catch fish that are feeding on spring sulfurs with, of all things, a spring sulfur dry, I admit defeat. Fished from 2:30 until six and never even had a fish look at a sulfur dun. Did raise 8 to 10 really nice fish on an assortment of flies but not one of them ate my offering. Wide open mouths came at the fly only to turn away at the last second. Was...

Today is the reason I recommend retirement to everyone. The weekend and Monday were too hot and yesterday was just plain brutal, cold and windy with no bugs until late. Today was everything (almost) you could ask for as a fly fisherman. The missing spring sulfurs showed up when and where they were supposed to and the fish ate them with relish. Unfortunately they ate them subsurface. From 3:00 'til...

 The day started out still mild with a steady light rain.  As the low moved out, the wind started to blow and the temp dropped.  It was a three shirter with a raincoat kinda day.  Sorta like it was April 22 except there were pseudos and sulfurs instead of paraleps and Hendricksons.

Left camp at 1:30 and took a drive over to the UEB. From the Sunoco station in East Branch to the Corbett Bridge there...

The pendulum has reached the apex of its swing towards the sun, tomorrow it starts it's journey towards the nadir of darkness that is December 21st. There were 15 hours and 14 minutes of sunlight today in Hancock (7 more minutes if you were in Syracuse). Tomorrow will be a full two seconds shorter in both places. As a lover of the daylight hours, today represents the first step in the long journey...

 Jim N. -  Page 240 of the paperback version of   "A Season on the Delaware" was the bio page which contained everything you ever wanted to know about Angler 119.  It seems that page 239 which contained high resolution color photos of Angler 119's favorite flies is also missing from the published addition. A bipartisan panel has been commissioned to look into the matter.

Jack M. - You asked how I...

Just yesterday I went to great lengths to tell you where to go to meet bugs and rising fish. Got up this morning and went in the opposite direction. Why? It was all a plan to keep you away from the good fishing. No, it was just a spur of the moment decision to say good by to the BR (at least the middle section) until fall. The last two cold nights brought the BR water temp down into fishable...

 In my blog entry  "It's only just begun.", I said it would be a challenge until the summer sulfurs kicked in and that you needed to get into a rhythm with the bugs and the river. Well to be honest A119 floundered a bit.  Took three trips a day, drank lots of Gatorade to avoid late night leg cramps and had trouble putting things together. 

The evenings have been very good but in the hot weather it...

With the temp down in the 40's this AM and a forecasted high in the 60's, I was assured of being able to fish the freestones this evening. That made it easy to cancel the morning fishing, finish mowing the yard and work on the peach trees. Thank God for the late frost last year that killed 99.87% of the peaches. If I had to spend as much time on the peaches last year the camp painting job would...

It was just "That kind of a day". It rained where I was about ten times, It was cloudy and overcast most of the day. The freestone temps stayed in the "OK to fish" zone, all three peaking at about 67 degrees. With lawn mowing (as soon as the grass dried out) and peach thinning on the work agenda, I decided to give the Lordvilleriff a try while the lawn was drying. There were no bugs to be seen,...

For those of you who haven't been on the river for the last week or so, know this, the rules have changed and judging by my results today, the fish are just delighted.

Arrived at the fishing camp in time to put the food in the fridge and still be on the water by 9:15. Tried three pools in two different rivers, saw no bugs, alive or dead and was reeling it in to head home when a hatchery trout...

Home for the weekend watching the sunfish in the bass pond guarding their spawning beds and counting the trout the heron has yet to catch in the trout pond. Most of the trout have scars across their back from narrow escapes. The trout have changes the way they eat the pellets I throw them. When a heron has been visiting the pond they come up from under each pellet and quickly go back down. Before...

Earlier this week I said guides would be leaving for gigs out west and that many fishermen would be hanging up their rods for the season.  With everyone who was floating or wading limited by high water temps to the WB and the BR down to Stockport you would think the drakes had just begun. It was nothing I wanted to be a part of and for the most part I wasn't.

This morning I drove over to the EB...

Today would have been a great day to have my wanderings around the river system on film just to show those of you who still go to your "spot" every time you visit the Delaware just what you are missing.

The AM trip was to the BE. Water temp was 66 when I got there at 9:00 and 67.8 when I left two hours later. The entire time I was there there were fish feeding like crazy sub surface with hard...

For several years my wife has had to remind me that "It's only six weeks, it'll be over soon". What's only six weeks? The "Big Bug Season", and I couldn't wait for it to end. Why? With the high water we had the past few years there were boats on every river. There was no where to fish without looking over you shoulder for the next boat. Thankfully, with lower water levels this year, the B.B.S was,...

With thunderstorms and rain predicted for this afternoon and evening I decided to try to get some fishing in this morning. Was thwarted by a tractor trailer that was trying to turn half of a sectional house around right in front of the Lordville bridge (and across the railroad tracks). Did a U-turn, drove back to the camp and walked down to the river.

The water was covered with the same little...

Left home about 6:00 this morning so that I could get in a couple of hours of fishing before things heated up. Was on the EB (water temp 65) by 8:15 and had rising trout shortly thereafter. Problem was they weren't rising to my fly. They were eating pseudo spinners. My smallest spinners are at least 2x's as big as the pseudos and the trout let me know they did not pass muster. By 10:30 it was over...

 The New York State hatchery system has come a long way in improving the trout they stock. Fifty years ago when the limit statewide was ten fish a day and everybody's goal was to keep ten, the state stocked hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of battleship gray yearling trout between 6 and 8 inches long. They were the prey and everything and everybody caught and ate them.

Two major improvements...

Learned a lesson today - When you've only been on the river two of the last five days you shouldn't be making statements about the status of the drake hatch. It's true that there are both green and brown drakes hatching on the UEB.  It's also true that they are hatching in the lower portion of the WB. Where I went wrong was saying that the drakes were done on the freestones.

Have seen Drakes...

Drove back to camp early this morning after a nice day spent with two daughters and three youngest grand kids. Went out about 11:30 with no clue where I was going to fish. Drove up the PA side and saw no risers on the river and almost no trailers (three) at Buckingham (it was way early so you can discount the number). Turned right in Hancock and took a leisurely drive up old rte. 17. Stopped to...

Am back in Lafayette and have found enough time to answer your questions. 

Just an aside before the answers. Was walking along the BK yesterday, "kinda" following a vague trail in the leg high grass along the shore, eyes on the river looking for risers, when I stepped over a hummock right on to the rear end of a beaver that was happily eating his dinner. Thankfully we both went in different...

It's June 1st, the peak of the deer fawning season and yearling carcasses are showing up along the side of the road in increasing numbers. Mom is busy with her new kids and the yearlings are on their own. They are apt to be up and around at all times of the day and haven't a clue how to cross the road safely. Be alert. Yesterday a doe was trying to get her wobbly legged fawn across 97 on a curve...

Anybody who was on the river system this weekend knows, that every species of bug known to mankind was hatching on the Delaware River system. Not all in profusion mind you, but rain, bright sun, cold and wind made no difference, they hatched. The fish? They ate. Coming out of the "Doldrums" not ten days ago, many of the fish were long and lean. Today all the fish (except those closest to the...

Returned to the "Lordville Estate" this AM after watching granddaughter #3 (ranked by age) play a JV lacrosse game. The rules for girls lacrosse are from the stone age and don't begin to take into account the athleticism and physicality that the girls bring to the game today. Change the rules give 'em helmets and pads and let them play. As the recipient of a yellow card (never be the one to throw...