FINALLY My First Fishing Trip for 2014

I have been waiting for that so called perfect day to kick off my 2014 fishing season. Well Sunday was close to perfect on the Sipsey Tailrace. The temperature couldn’t have been better at a warm 70 degrees with a slight breeze out of the northeast. The approaching cold front on Monday was an added bonus as well. We were expecting temperatures in the mid twenties Monday night. That is usually the case for early spring in the deep south this time of the year, warm one day and frigid cold the next day.

I had plenty of company from the pump station all the way up to the dam. Nine vehicles were in the parking lot which meant I would encounter a bunch of fly fishermen when I got to the water.

High dingy water was flowing from the dam with no trout rising at all which kind of dampened my spirits. All the usual hot spots were taken, so I settled for an area I had not fished in a couple of years.

 

My first trout of the 2014 season, which took a super nymph on an extremely slow, retrieve. I encounter numbers of short takes before I finally got a solid take from this trout. I was using my new Grey’s Hardy 9 ft. 3 wt. with my Gloomis free spool reel. I have found that the best weight fly rod for this tailrace is as 3 weight, anything above that would be over kill.

The Seal Leech was the prey for this nice bow that nailed the fly less than 7 ft. from me. I had fisherman to the right and to the left of me the couple hours I fished. There was no escaping the crowd today. I was really surprised I was landing trout with the amount of fishing pressure here today.

The renegade was the only dry that produced today.  The dry action was not explosive; but hey I will take this size trout all day on the 3 weight.

I ended the trip with this colorful rainbow which went airborne a couple of times. I feel good about today’s trip because it forced me to forego some of my usual hot spots for a couple of areas I seldom fish. So I guess I could say I have discovered some new water.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Share this post