All quiet on the Charles

[NatickDave]

I gave my local water one more try this Friday, on the warm side of that nor'easter. The water was high, dark, and pretty wintry. It looked a lot more like a trout river than a sunfish/bass river, as it is in high summer.

I did not get a single hit on the surface (not too surprising) or on weighted nymphs. I suppose that I could have taken a canoe up or down stream and fished the deep water and probably taken a fish or two, but the wadeable section did not produce. I guess it will have to wait until next year.

[Ralph Tomaccio]

Dave,

Do you do any winter fishing at all and, if so, do you enjoy it?

Do you find any difference in fishing results better above or below the Natick dam? Or, are they pretty similar?

Ralph

[NatickDave]

Have I done winter fishing? Hmmm... Kind of hard to answer definitively. I have fished when there was lots of snow on the ground, but I would call the conditions more like spring. I was fortunate to be between melts (low country over, high country about to begin) in Colorado a couple of seasons ago, and did pretty well on the Snake and Upper and Lower Blue. I have fished the Swift right after Thanksgiving, and seen more fish feeding than in my wildest dreams, but, of course, they were taking size 24+ midges and BWO, so I was sort of out of my league. I have busted through the ice to fish the Charles in waders, and got nothing.

I have fished the Squannacook in cold weather as well, and from that emerge some pointers. FishinBill and I had a session up there in early spring a while back and found that some of the textbook lessons are true. We had luck with heavy wooly buggers (mind you, I almost always fish with at wolly bugger as one of my two flies) stripped slowly through deep pools. In cold water, fish tend not to pursue food that is far away...sometimes you have to bonk them on the head. Cast, count to ten to let it sink, strip through the zone, do again. I have had this work on early spring warm-water ponds as well.

Another lesson I have learned from my dad (a fine fly fisherman, to be sure) is that you should wait for the warm days, and fish the middle of day in cold weather. Crack of dawn is neither necessary or productive. I am sure to try another outing to one of our tailwaters this fall. I will give you a yell when I do.

As for above or below the dam...I usually fish below, for two reasons. My house is in the neighborhood below the dam, and it is wadeable. I always prefer to wade fish when possible. If I want to paddle, I can drag my boat in at my neighbor's house and fish downstream, past the wadeable stretch, where the bass habitat improves. So, I have a bias, but it is based on practicalities, not fishing success. I have fished above the dam a couple of times, however, and it is very nice. Your best bet is to put a boat in at the dam and head upstream. Overall, the water is finer, colder, cleaner and with better structure up there. This is where the trout do well in spring, and where cold inlets hold brookies. And it is just awfully pretty to be on.

NatickDave

[Ralph Tomaccio]

" I will give you a yell when I do."

Please do! I always enjoy sharing common interests with new friends.