Arkansas River Below Pueblo 11/23/11 - 11/24/11

Spending 2 days down in Pueblo with the in-laws does have it's upside...

Flows are down at about the norm for the Arkansas this time of year. 55 CFS.

Temps for both days of fishing were warm, with a cold front that blew in shutting down fishing for a couple hours on the second day, but the fishing over all was excellent!

I ended up with 2 new species, the 1st was a surprise...the second, not so much.



A little walleye that took a red copper john.



A sucker that took a pink san juan worm. I'm kind of surprised that I had not caught more suckers since I've heard they are pretty common. It was actually a pretty fun fish to land, it fought hard and took some long runs.

Besides the two surprises, the rest of the fish were bows. Mostly stocker sized with an occasional brute at 18 in. No browns, and I didn't see any spawning beds, but this is probably just because of location. I'm sure if I had fished up torwards the dam and the nature center, I would have seen a redd or two.

Below is a little video of how the action was, the clip is only about 5 mins long, but I was picking up fish about every cast. Again, nothing of size, but still fun. I wish my battery on my go pro hadn't died, since there a few other spots that I wanted to get video of as well. Oh well...



Flies that worked for trip was almost everything and anything.

The standard copper johns worked well in a size 16 and 18, copper and red worked very well.



A new fly that I had been working on were some czech nymphs. I was really surprised to actually catch quite a few fish on them since I only tied them up to help get my rig down.





This green with a hot spot was a very favorite until it started falling apart...

A standard green czech nymph also worked!



Also rainbow warriors in a size 18 worked great...



And of course egg patterns were still very popular...



Orange...red...pink...they all worked well.

This is a great stretch of water that generally isn't too busy. There's lots of fish habitat since it is the Pueblo Whitewater Park, and you will see all kinds of people fishing this area from fly fisherman to bait casters...it's a very productive area, but with smaller fish and I would assume this is the case because it is not a catch and relase stretch of water.



On my next trip down, I'll do a little more fishing closer to the dam and around the nature center to see if I can find some bigger fish. I've even heard of people catching some nice fish down by the riverwalk in downtown...

Blue River in Silverthorne 11/23/11

1st trip up to fish the Blue in Silverthorne this season.

10/23/11
1:00 PM - 4:00 PM
Partly cloudy, warm temps. Not cold enough to ice up guides on the rod yet.

Flows are low at 88 but the water is clear. There is still lots of algae so you are spending a lot of time cleaning up your flies.

Even though it's still early, a move to smaller tippet is key. Fluro is a must and use a 6x leader with 7x for your droppers.

Fishing today was fair to good, lots of fisherman are on the water, and being a holiday week and weekend, it was too be expected. I did not see any other fisherman catch a fish. I think most people are still in a "summer" mindset and with the warmer temps, they might not be thinking winter fishing yet.

Flies that caught fish:
Size 16 Mysis
Size 18 Rainbow Warrior
Size 20 Thread Midge Red/Black



Fish were pooled up under the bridge, a few large ones, but they were extremely spooky and with people walking over the bridge non-stop, they were lock jawed all afternoon. I ended up pulling only 2 fish out of the bridge hole, nothing of size, but it's still fun having people cheer you on when they see your rod bending.



After fishing the bridge hole, I moved upstream to the bench hole and caught more fish here. Again, nothing of size but it was nice beating a skunk with so many people not catching around me.



Ended the day with 8 fish mostly bows with an occasional cutbow. I'm looking foward to when the weather gets a bit colder and there are less people on the water. This makes it much easier to catch some of the bigger guys as they are less spooky.

Next trip I'm planning on fishing upstream closer to the dam. Lots of good riffles and some deep holes along the way that hold some big fish...

Clear Creek at Georgetown 11/07/11

No solid lid of ice yet, and there is still open water at the inlet with good fishing available...

Fishing is still good with nymphs and egg patterns. Size of the fish has dropped, I suspect that people have been taking the larger fish.

I know fishing to spawning fish is quite controversial, so please practice catch and release and there is no need to play the fish to exhaustion. I fish with a 5x leader and 6x tippet and I've had no problem bringing fish in quickly and releasing them.

When I arrived today at noon, there was nobody there, but people started filling up the parking area by 2:00. EVERYBODY was fishing close to the bridge and quite a few people were snagging. One guy even had the nerve to show me what he was using to catch fish...2 bare lead head jig hook. He asked me how the fishing was upstream and I replied good...I should have said terrible because he made his way up there to snag some more fish and run them back to his car. He only caught two and moved back to the bridge saying it was easier to fish off the bridge.

Anyways...it's going to happen at most fisheries with close access to Denver and decent fishing... do what you can to educate others and if someone is knowingly breaking the law, call the DOW's operation game theft line.

No pictures, since I just got a go pro and was playing with that, enjoy the little video! I know the resolution is terrible...I gotta figure out a way to make the editing software to save in high res.



I'm not sure if I'll be able to make it back to Georgetown before it all ices up, but I'll be fishing the Arkansas below Pueblo around Thanksgiving as well as the Blue River in Silverthorne. Keep your eyes peeled for those fishing reports.