A Little Break in the Weather!
Wow! It has been pretty warm here for the past couple weeks. Got a little cool off yesterday afternoon and it is overcast, with a 40% chance of rain here today. Nice for a change! Generation schedule is still being pretty well followed. Just as was the pattern last week, they ran one generator for about one hour this morning at 6:00. It is scheduled to stay off today until around 1:00 p.m. when two will come one and they will ramp it up to four generators by 2:00 and eventually off by 8:00 or 9:00 p.m.
The early morning fishing has been pretty good, especially if you are there before they turn on the one generator as you get the advantage of fishing the rise. The downside of this is that as the water starts to fall after they shut down the one, fishing slows down considerably. But hang around long enough and try different patterns and places, and fishing will start picking up again as the water stabilizes. Still would say fishing is fair to good, and the fish are good quality.
Tony and Amber, from Oklahoma spent the morning with Jim. Tony is the fly fisher and Amber wanted to go along to watch and enjoy our river. They had a good morning on the black thorax midge, size 16 and 18 gray scuds and the blood worm dropper. Tony pulled out a nice 17 inch rainbow. Gina had Brenda and Jim, from Oklahoma, out for half a day. Brenda decided to get herself a birthday present…a guided fly fishing trip. She had a wonderful birthday as they caught lots of fish on the floozieplume, ruby and rusty midges, gray scud and the blood worm dropper.
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Brenda – 7-24-10 |
Jim – 7-24-10 |
Sunday morning, Carolyn had the opportunity to help James, from Arkansas, get his second granddaughter, Casey, introduced to fly fishing. This ten year old little gal picked up pretty quickly. She even outfished her grandfather. Several times she roll cast her own line, set the hook and brought in a nice rainbow all on her own. A few other times I would cast for her, but she did everything else. Grandfather took lots of pictures and when I get a copy of one, she will show up on the site. Her best pattern was the floozieplume. She said one of the things she really enjoyed about fly fishing was letting the fish go. Stan and Dana had a group, Bruce, Adam, Sarah and Jan out for half a day. Believe they are all from the Lee’s Summit area. They frequently fish here on their own, but knew there was a high probablility the water would come on so they decided to book a trip with us. Stan had Bruce and Adam throwing the Primrose & Pearl midge when there was no generation. Then the water came on, the big ruby with a cerise San Juan dropper was the ticket. Dana had the ladies, Jan and Sarah on the size 16 tan flashback scud and a dark gray sowbug. A good time was had by all! Can’t leave Jim behind when everyone else is on the water. He had Faron, from Louisiana out. Faron is new to fly fishing, so guess what they did for a while. Jim worked with him on casting, line work and everything else. He did let him catch some fish so he could practice playing and bringing in fish. Their best patterns were a brown midge, the black thorax midge and a blood worm dropper.
Yesterday, Stan had Gene, from Kansas, out for the morning. Gene agreed it has been too long since he last fly fished….about two years. He used to get out at least once a year, but we get busy. Anyway he had a good morning on the primrose & pearl midge, blood worm and pink San Juan worm. Darrell and David, from Illinois, were out at the same time. Pretty good day on the red and purple midges. David brought in a nice 17 inch rainbow. Now Trish and Mike don’t like to do anything ordinary, so they coerced Carolyn into an late afternoon trip. When they hit the water, all four generators were running. They pulled a few fish drifting down to the Lookout Island on the cerise San Juan and pink egg pattern dropped below the ruby midge. At the island, Trish and her "twitch, twitch, slow strip technique pulled several fish on a size 8 bug-eyed bugger. Nice, comfortable evening, despite the threat of rain. The finale was the beautiful sunset we saw from the overlook area on the way back to the shop.