Chasing Vermiculatedbacks in Shenandoah National Park

[Trent Jones]

I know summertime generally has people out chasing bronzebacks, but I have been unable to cast a fly at a trout in a couple months and had a really bad jones for some Vermiculatedbacks. Given that it has been a cool summer I headed out to Shenandoah National Park for some brook trouting, figuring the water may be low but should be cool. Thermo read 63f at 2:00pm. I missed the first few strikes until I got my timing back. Ants, Beetles, and Hoppers all worked. The best fun of the day was when I put on a size 6 or 8 cartoon hopper... it was big and obnoxious, but the big fish took savage strikes at it. The water was low and the fish were spookier than normal, but the fishing was still good. LOTS of rain on the drive back, I would bet the large influx of cool water will have the northern park streams fishing well the next few days. Walk slow to pick off the big fish at the tail of the pool. 
 
-Trent

[Ryan DiAndrea]

Glad to hear its still good fishing. I was think about heading to the Thornton North Fork next weekend.

On Aug 20, 2014 9:15 PM, "Trent Jones" <tjon...@hotmail.com> wrote:

I know summertime generally has people out chasing bronzebacks, but I have been unable to cast a fly at a trout in a couple months and had a really bad jones for some Vermiculatedbacks. Given that it has been a cool summer I headed out to Shenandoah National Park for some brook trouting, figuring the water may be low but should be cool. Thermo read 63f at 2:00pm. I missed the first few strikes until I got my timing back. Ants, Beetles, and Hoppers all worked. The best fun of the day was when I put on a size 6 or 8 cartoon hopper... it was big and obnoxious, but the big fish took savage strikes at it. The water was low and the fish were spookier than normal, but the fishing was still good. LOTS of rain on the drive back, I would bet the large influx of cool water will have the northern park streams fishing well the next few days. Walk slow to pick off the big fish at the tail of the pool. 
 
-Trent

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[TurbineBlade]

Beth and I found the same thing to be true recently as well (spookier than normal fish with low water in SNP, but still some decent action).  I've never tried anything as large as you describe, but recently I've added parachute ants into the mix and they seem to catch just as well as the usual EHC I tend to always tie on.  I should experiment more -- Maybe we'll be able to sneak out between the rain this weekend...

Fishing the tails of pools is hard, but I did take a big one out of a tail a few trips ago (cut me with its teeth).  Usually the tail is spilling over with enough flow to make an upstream cast difficult without instant drag, and sometimes there isn't enough cover to sneak in there for an across or across/down cast.  Though I've spooked enough of them to know they hang there ;).  

Holy cow, fishing some of the tribs to the Savage taught us how clumsy and careless we were!  Those were the most spooky brook trout I've ever seen -- 

Gene

[Trent Jones]

I had never really tossed much big stuff either, but figured it would be fun to try. If I had a mouse pattern I would have put that on at the end. Teeth? I must have gone through a half dozen ant/beetles because they kept chewing the indicator off!

 I usually fish the tail by angling a cast from the right or left so I can drape most or all of the fly line over  rocks and just have leader on the water. Its best when you have a nice big flat rock in the 5-hole (Terry & Hockey fans). I almost always get the alpha fish to eat in that type of pool configuration.

 In an effort to confuse the boundaries between Bronzeback and Vermiculatedback fishing, I want to take a Brookie on a blue popper in the future. If you pull it off this weekend and have a photo, I will have a dollar bill with your name on it at the next Beer tie Gene....or Beth. contestvalidtogeneandbethonlyonedollarbillpayablepercouplenotliableforinjuireswhileinpursuitofbrookies

onpoppersoffervoidwhereprohibited.

 

-Trent 

[TurbineBlade]

I guess that would work -- I've occasionally laid the line over 1 or more rocks on upstream or across-upstream casts and it provides a great drift. 

I'll try the popper thing next time just for the heck of it -- why not?  

Trent (all):  Any of you tinker with furled leaders for dry fly fishing?  I have several of them (made from uni thread) treated with red mucilin, but I can't decide if I like it any better than the 30 > 20 > 10 > 8 > 4 > 5-6X ones I seem to be using lately out there.  I get the "they turn over" better portion, but in the end - you end up with a fairly visible 6' leader with 3-6' tippet vs. the traditional, mostly invisible tapered leader. 

Plus, dry fly leaders with 3-4' tippet to pile up....it doesn't seem that turn-over is necessarily a benefit, at least within the last several feet on the fly-end.   I dunno -- haven't decided yet.  

Gene

[Misha Gill]

On the South Holston a (white) furled leader is my secret weapon... I put on the 6' furled leader and a full 9' tapered 4x leader and then extend it to 12' and 6x, for a total leader length of 18'. It lands SO SOFTLY. 

[John Bilotta]

Agree on leaders but I know folks who like them. 

John

Sent from my iPhone

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[TurbineBlade]

Trent!  We took the challenge Saturday, but I was not able to land one on a small blue popper.  I did try in several deeper spots where I suspected large fish might take a whack at it, but no luck.  If anyone else wants to try it, I recommend upping the tippet on your dry fly leader a bit to prevent twist on those dudes (probably obvious to most, but just in case you usually only bring 5-7X to SNP or whatever).  I don't generally fish dries larger than a #14, so the #8 or 10 popper was like fishing out West for me.  

Despite that, Beth absolutely crushed the place and managed 26 on the same beetle!  I managed less than 1/2 that many and lost interest when I found an ambystomatid salamander!  (No Red Efts though). I believe it to be a Jefferson Salamander, but I'll post the picture later and maybe someone knows for sure.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_salamander.  I gotta upload that one still.  

Anyway -- fish were still biting in the rain, and brother it rained all day!  I've been fishing a lot of CDC/ELK and CDC comparaduns, etc. lately and haven't given my terrestrials a fair chance...but they worked like crazy Saturday.  I was watching Beth fish a stretch at one point and she snagged a tree behind her on a missed hook set, which resulted in her pulling her own beetle down along with someone else's length of tippet attached to a #16 parachute adams ;).  No rust, so I assume the person was there right before us and likely did the exact same thing on that pocket.  

The beetle is essentially tied in the same style as Rob's Japanese beetle, but with black rubber legs in the "X" shape.  I like the doubled-over foam for floatation and visibility.  

Sorry -- no dollar for me!  We'll try to make the next tie regardless, if you're there we can tell lies up at the bar.  

Gene

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[Trent Jones]

Argh! A swing and a miss Gene, oh well you tried.

I have not really played with the furled leaders to much for the same reason you pointed out. However, I have started adding heavy tippet to the butt end of my leaders which does seem to turn over the fly better than adding tippet to the thin terminal end. Also seems like a much less visible option that a furled leader. 

-Trent