Time: 10:30AM – 12:00PM
Location: Eagle Ranch
Fish Landed: 1
Brush Creek 07/09/2010 Photo Album
As I drove from the Arkansas River through Leadville and on to Eagle on Thursday evening, the weather grew clearer. I could see that the Eagle River was clear and a bit high as I followed it down the valley to Eagle, CO. I stayed overnight with my friends the Gaboury’s, and Dave suggested we fish Brush Creek in Eagle Ranch in the morning then hit the Eagle River near Edwards in the afternoon. Friday turned out to be a gorgeous day from a weather standpoint with relatively clear skies and temperatures in the upper seventies or low eighties.
Dave G. and I were ready to fish by around 10:30, so we hiked down the path behind their house and entered the water downstream. Brush Creek is kind of small for two fishermen, so we decided to alternate attractive pools. Dave was catching small browns on a beadhead pheasant tail, but I wasn’t having any luck whatsoever. I was using a yellow Letort hopper trailing a beadhead hares ear, beadhead green caddis, copper john, and beadhead pheasant tail. We reached a point where the creek divided into two channels with roughly equal volume, so Dave G. took the north side and I explored the south. There was some caddis buzzing about, so I made yet another fly change and tied on a size 14 beadhead prince nymph. Halfway through the south channel just below a bend and in a seam, my hopper disappeared, and I hooked a nice brown that probably measured around 15 inches. I photographed the fish while holding in my hand as there was tall vegetation all around and no good spot to place the fish.
- Nice Brush Creek Brown
I continued fishing the south channel and met up with Dave. We moved rather quickly now as Dave G. wanted to try a stretch .3 miles upstream where he’d caught some very nice browns on previous outings. There was one spot that Dave had already fished with a refusal to his stimulator where I hooked three fish, but only landed a very small brown that didn’t meet my minimum length for counting. After this I thought perhaps the prince was the magical fly to turn things around, but alas, it didn’t produce again. We called it quits around noon and returned to the house for lunch.