How to catch these fish?

[ET custom flyrods]

Recently I found a catch and release stream with 20 to 30" and larger fish. Mostly rainbows with a few browns mixed in.
I fished this stream for 5hrs for the first time and got really frustrated.
I had one look and one take (on a pheasent tail wet) with that fish (a monster)shaking the hook immediately.
I used every fly in my box from size 22 to size 8. pheasent tails to wooley buggers and any number of drys in various sizes. Tippets down to 6X ..........Nadda.

Now a little background on this stream. It's a limestoner. The stream does not lend itself well to flyfishing both sides are lined with trees and brush. It is basically open to the public , but is taken care of privately. The fish are being feed twice a day with pellets by its care taker. while there I observed no hatches, with maybe 3 rises in 5hrs for someting unseeable.

Any suggestions on how to catch a fish in this place, short of making a fly that looks like a pellet ( which really dosent set well with me) ?? This has got to be the most frustrating 5 hrs I have ever spent with huge fish in great numbers swimming all around and their not even looking at offerings. Any suggestions short of stop torturing yourself........LOL

[Gnu Bee Flyer]

Tie up a fish pellet fly. See if you can get a look at what size and color the caretaker is using to feed them and imitate it.

Sometimes you can excite just planted hatchery fish just by tossing a small handfull of pebbles into the water. They think it is the fish pellets. If they investigate a single pebble tossed into the water they will take a pellet shaped fly.

I would also suggest that you send a first class plane ticket to GnuBeeFlyer@inmydreams.com so I can come and help you pull some of these monsters out of there. It would be sort of a public service on your part.

[Panfisha]

Well, not a pellet fly but an EGG fly.

[ET custom flyrods]

Eggs didnt work....tried that.


I know the size and color of the pellet. Any suggestions on how to (against my better judgement) tie a pellet fly ? Good suggetion about the pebbles. The fly must be weighted I know. As far as the plane ticket goes that's on you, but I'll take you there (guide service).........lol

[dudley]

Not that I'm sayin' you should do this but...

I use to spend my weekends working at some pay-to-fish ponds
When kids were having trouble, I'd chum for them with some pellets, then have them throw a dry fly (any dry fly) into the feeding frenzy
Worked every time.

Then again you could always resort to one of these

[jjtroutbum]

So the pellets don't float? Not even at first? Either way use deer hair color or colored to match. Spun and stacked tight trim to size and shape Sinks or Ginks to help get em down or up. Use floro tippets sinks below the surface and vanishes which allows you to use larger ones.

Take your camera and take pictures to post.

Hope any those techniques may help.

[FisherTim]

Try the Coffee Bean Beetle.
Sort through some coffee beans for the right size and a good shape. Wrap some thread on the hook and then super glue the bean onto it. A coat of Hardasnails makes a perfect beetle. A spot of bright paint can be added to the top before you coat it for visibility.
This works as well on wild trout as hatchery fish. Always have few with me.

Regular or decafe...........doesn't seem to matter!!

[JohnScott]

Smernsky -

If you are willing to fish a streamer, I'd put odds on this one. Take a size 8 Dai-Riki 280 2X long hopper hook ( or similar length streamer hook ). Starting behind the eye with 6/0 olive dun uni-thread, lay down three layers of thread base between the eye and the bend. At the end of the third thread layer, the tying thread will be at the bend.

Take a 5-6" piece of Wapsi pine squirrel zonker strip in sculpin olive and hang about 3/4" of hide off the bend of the hook, hair facing back. Tie the zonker securely to the hook at the bend. Wrap the tying thread forward to the mid-point of the shank. Pull the zonker strip forward along the top of the shank. Tie it in very securely at the mid-point of the shank. Wrap the tying thread forward to just behind the eye.

Wrap the zonker forward as a collar to just behind the eye. It should take around 8 to 10 wraps. Before each wrap, sweep the hair fibers toward the rear to ensure that they are not trapped by the hide as it is wrapped. Tie off the zonker and trim it. Build a head and further secure the zonker by winding back maybe an 1/8 inch behind the eye and wrapping a pretty full head. Use a couple 4-5 turn whip finishes to secure the tying thread. Apply a liberal coat of head cement to the entire head area.

When you are ready to tie the zonker to the shank at the bend and at mid-shank, it helps to dampen the hair to separate it and get the thread down on the hide without tying down any of the fur. And it is important to secure it very well at mid-shank so when you start wrapping it as a collar it doesn't pull the strip around the shank behind the tie in point.

I fish this streamer as a sculpin / baitfish. Fish this off a full sinking line or sink tip ( may work well off a floating line, depending on water depth ). Cast down and across and strip the streamer back toward you with short, steady strips ( although your particular fish may like some other rythym of retrieve ).

NightAngler1 fishes the same ( or a very similar ) streamer as a leech. Not sure under what conditions he is fishing it that way, and I have the impression he uses it for stillwater whereas I am almost always fishing moving water.

We both swear by this streamer, however fished. Like I said, I'd put my money on this streamer for any trout in any water. You got to see it held steady in the current to believe it - to believe that it is not a real fish swimming to hold in the current. It's taken all the kinds of trout we have here in Idaho in almost every kind of moving water ( and some very slow water that I've used it on ), and last fall it took a gorgeous 21" brown making a spawning run up the Madison within the Yellowstone N.P.

If you don't have the materials and / or don't want to try tying it, send me your address via PM and I'll get a couple off to you in the next few days.



John

[JohnScott]

Smernsky -

This is a P.S. to the above.

Fish this streamer with no less than 2X tippet, maybe heavier, for the size fish you are targeting, or they will very likely break you off when they hit the fly.

John

[iso]

I've had success with hatchery fish (pellet fed) using muddlers.