Time: 11:00AM – 2:15PM

Location: Near Copper Mountain

Curtain Ponds 08/05/2024 Photo Album

Ben and I tossed our gear in the back of the Telluride and kept our waders on and our rods in ready mode and made the short drive west on Interstate 70 to the Curtain Ponds. Unfortunately I was now defaulting to what I felt was my backup plan.

We hiked to one of the ponds, and I allowed Ben to wade along the shoreline, while I fired some long casts from the bank east of his position. My chubby Chernobyl and prince nymph remained on my line, but it quickly became apparent that the dry/dropper was not the correct approach for the pond. I took the necessary time to remove the two flies that I deemed inappropriate, and I replace them with a peacock hippie stomper trailing a size 16 light gray deer hair caddis.

Initially Ben and I moved along the bank and fired long casts either toward the interior of the pond or parallel to the shoreline. The sun was high in the sky, the air temperature soared, and rises were nonexistent. We spotted schools of decent fish, but they seemed to be sulking in deep holes next to thick aquatic vegetation, where they streaked when my flies landed above them. I was not optimistic that the fallback would be any better than the exploratory first hour.

We slowly moved over to a sharp bend in the shoreline, and I cast to a corner nook, and finally a small six inch brook trout smashed the hippie stomper. Ben abandoned the pond closer to the highway and joined me, and we slowly shuffled our way along the bank, but the fish continued to flee at the first sight of our lines overhead. It was at this time, that I foolishly placed my backcast in the tip of a young evergreen tree. I attempted to bend the young conifer, but it was was too strong, and I snapped off both flies. I was quite peeved by my reckless casting ability.

Early Success Story

While I took the requisite time to redo my line with the same flies, Ben moved on, and he began to observe some very sporadic rises toward the center of the pond, and he reported several refusals to the hippie stomper. After I connected with and landed another countable brook trout on the deer hair caddis, I decided to offer him one as well. He eagerly accepted, and while using the stomper and caddis, he landed his first brook trout of the day.

Ben on the Board

I was moving along closer to the shallow shoreline with no success, so I decided to check out the next pond, which featured deeper water. I hypothesized that brookies in the deeper water would feel safer; and, therefore, more prone to visit the surface to pick off tidbits of food. My theory did not pan out, as I managed to land one two inch brook trout, before I returned to the main pond that now featured Ben along the bank opposite the highway. While I was chasing windmills, Ben landed enough brook trout to boost his fish count to five.

Focused

I joined him along the same shoreline, and we fanned casts toward the center of the pond in all directions. I finally managed to nail a couple brook trout to bring my total up to four, and at this point I found a seat on some thick railroad ties that formed a sort of dock, and I downed my lunch. Some dark clouds were building in the southwestern sky, and we welcomed the advancement of cloudiness.

After lunch, our wish was fulfilled, and the clouds blocked the sun for long periods. During these low light times, the amount of surface feeding increased, and this corresponded with an improvement in our fish catch rate. Ben and I matched each other with catches until his total stood at seven, and I boosted mine to six. I had written the day off as an exercise in futility, but we were now achieving a moderate amount of success and having fun.

The Fish Dove into the Aquatic Goop

Ben moved east toward the next corner of the pond, and I waded out on an underwater point that featured light colored rocks for a solid bottom. For some reason my success rate stalled, so I contemplated another fly change. Before embarking on the trip, I replaced a parachute hopper that I lost on the previous trip with another one, although it was a size 12 instead of a 10. These parachute hoppers were flies that I tied ten years ago, before I migrated to foam. For some reason I knotted it to my line behind the hippie stomper, and I began launching long casts toward the center of the pond. Initially I was frustrated by refusals and a couple very brief pricks, but I stuck with the hopper, and I landed three more brook trout to increase my fish count to nine. I also lost a couple fish that burrowed into the aquatic goop, before I learned that I needed to keep my rod tip very high in order to keep the fish near the surface. Catching fish on old flies that I resurrected from my fly storage boxes was very gratifying.

Fly Change Knot Tying

While this was transpiring, Ben, unfortunately was dealing with some tangles, but eventually he resumed his long distance casting and boosted his fish count to eight. The dark clouds rolled closer and the wind kicked up, and I could see waves of rain against the distant mountains. Some thunder rumbled down the valley, and this was the prompt that motivated us to call it quits. We hustled back to the car and threw our gear in the rear and sat in the driver and passenger seats and watched the rain flow down my new windshield (I replaced the old one that sported a long crack 80% of the way across). I could see a brighter sky to the southwest, so we decided to investigate another pond and an upper section of Ten Mile Creek.

Pretty One

We made the short drive to another parking lot, and we strolled down along the creek to near the first pond, but once again the sky darkened and in this instance we saw lightning and heard more thunder, so we adjourned our day of fishing, returned to the car and traveled back to Golden. We persevered and salvaged a decent day in early August.

Fish Landed: 9