Time: 2:00PM – 5:00PM

Location: Waterton Canyon

South Platte River 10/08/2005 Photo Album

Jane and I loaded our bikes on the RAV on October 8 and headed to the Waterton Canyon parking lot. It was a beautiful day with high temperatures expected to be 70 degrees, although nasty weather was forecast for Sunday. We biked the four or five miles up the dirt road in the canyon to the picnic table just beyond the first bridge above the lake.

More Bend

A guy was standing in the large pool that I fished with moderate success the previous Sunday. I tied four size 22 CDC BWO’s Saturday morning in case a BWO hatch once again materialized. I put on my waders and began working the next upstream pool above the large bend pool. Almost immediately I noticed some sporadic rises, so I tied on a gray Madam X and then added a yellow beadhead caddis pupa below it. When I spotted some emerging BWO’s, I tied another length of tippet below the yellow caddis pupa and then added a WD40. I encouraged a flash to the Madam X, but the flies were not producing, so I cut everything off and tied on one of the CDC BWO’s, that I produced earlier in the day. I made two with a BWO poly body and two with a lighter olive poly body. The darker body was not generating interest, so I switched to the lighter color.

Successful Fly

Almost immediately my fortunes improved, and I landed eight trout over the next several hours. Six of the netted fish were rainbows or cutbows, and two were small browns. One of the cutbows looked more like a cutthroat than a rainbow, as It displayed lots of speckles and a slash under its mouth. The success required numerous casts, and the sporadic nature of the rises caused me to spray casts to many food lanes. After I landed five or so, the gentleman in the prime pool below me approached to learn what I was using. He had a box full of olives of varying sizes, and said he was using them with fish rising all over the place, but he did not indicate any success. I gave him a CDC olive in exchange for a trico. I do not think he gained any luck, so I concluded that presentation skills were the key.

Last Bow of the Day

Toward the end, I decided to work upstream more and landed two more rainbows where the river came back close to the road. By 5PM Jane grew impatient, so after releasing the last trout, I clambered up the bank, shed my waders, packed everything in the backpack, and biked back down the canyon. The foliage on the cottonwoods was brilliant, as we drove back to Stapleton.

Fish Landed: 8

Nice Foliage