Time: 10:30AM – 3:00PM

Location: The stream above the inlet to Gross Reservoir

Fish Landed: 10

South Boulder Creek 10/16/2015 Photo Album

With increasing frequency I find myself envisioning this scenario while I’m fishing. I wake up and do my exercises and then enjoy an invigorating run followed by a relaxing hot shower. I then see myself sitting at the kitchen counter sipping a hot cup of chai and reading the Wall Street Journal. Each day I can feel the warmth draining from the earth in Colorado, and although 2015 has been an unseasonably warm October, the pace with which the season shifts to autumn and winter seems to be accelerating. As this takes place it seems my ability to catch fish fades, and my physical body also seems to be wearing down. It seems that each morning I feel new twinges in my shoulder, neck, back and legs.

I was frustrated by my lack of action on Thursday on the Colorado River, so I convinced myself to ignore all the nonsense described in the first paragraph and made plans to undertake yet another fishing adventure to new water. Earlier in the summer Jane and I completed a hike to the South Boulder Creek inlet to Gross Reservoir, and I was intrigued by the idea of exploring the stream farther into the western mountains. I suspected that this was more work than most fishermen were willing to commit to, and thus the fish were not heavily pressured.

In addition I guessed that South Boulder Creek above the reservoir was populated predominantly by rainbow trout as is the case in the tailwater, and this fact was relevant since I attributed some of my lack of success on the Arkansas and Colorado to the brown trout population entering spawning mode. Their focus shifted from eating to procreating, and this was bad news for fishermen offering imitations of tasty snacks.

Pretty Little Fish

I got off to a reasonably early start and arrived at the parking area by Gross Reservoir that accesses the Inlet Trail. There was one other car ahead of me, but it did not strike me as a fishing vehicle, so I was fairly certain I had the area to myself. A brisk thirty-five minute hike over several ridges delivered me to the inlet. The level of the lake was much lower than when Jane and I visited earlier, and this caused the stream bed to be visible for an additional one hundred yards. I wondered if the lake contained brown trout, and if so had they begun their spawning migration up South Boulder Creek? I discounted this thought and continued with my original plan to fish up the stream.

The air temperature was fifty degrees when I began hiking, and I could now see that the shadows from the ridge to the southeast were nearly covering the stream. The flow was quite nice as it allowed me to cross at numerous places, yet it was not so low that the fish were ultra skittish. I tied a Jake’s gulp beetle to my line at the car, and I began plopping it in likely pools and pockets, but I was not seeing any response, and it was very difficult to follow in the shade and glare. I was frustrated by the lighting, so I removed the beetle and converted to a dry/dropper configuration. The three flies on my line included a tan pool toy, beadhead ultra zug bug, and a salvation nymph.

Very Nice Pool

These flies remained on my line until noon when I paused for lunch, and I managed to land three or four small trout that nabbed the ultra zug bug. Most of the takes occurred as I lifted the flies to recast. The first fish was a very small brown trout that barely passed my six inch cut off for counting, and the others were gorgeous but small rainbow trout. These fish were between six and eight inches and possessed delicate markings on their sides. All the fish that I landed over the course of the day were small, and I experienced far more frustrating refusals than takes despite my efforts to downsize and try different dry flies. Unfortunately the poor lighting forced me to resort to large visible surface flies, and these were rejected by the small residents of South Boulder Creek.

In addition to shadows and poor lighting, I discovered an additional hindrance to my enjoyment of this new water. Wading was a significant challenge. The stream was in a high gradient area, and this created numerous rapids and cascades around huge boulders. All the rocks were covered in green moss, and I needed to be cautious with each footstep. In many cases I needed to climb over huge boulders and dead tree limbs, and the difficulty of these maneuvers was compounded by the presence of slippery rocks that served as a base for my footing.

Partial Sunshine on the Creek

Shimmering Colors

While eating my lunch I could see a segment of the stream that appeared to be covered by sunlight as the mountain ridge to the south tapered down. I returned to the gulp beetle for a short while, but even my fall of 2015 super fly was inadequate, and the small resident trout inspected and turned away from my foam fraud. I gave up on the beetle tactic and returned to the pool toy, but during the early afternoon I attached only the ultra zug bug in order to avoid tangles. I slowly slipped my way up the tumbling stream, and with persistence I was able to increase my fish count to seven by landing one fish on the ultra zug bug for every five refusals to the pool toy. Between the difficult wading, challenging light, and tiny fish refusals; I was unable to establish any sort of rhythm.

Parachute Hopper Worked

Finally I reached the area of sunlight, and the number of refusals to the pool toy became overwhelming. I gave the situation further consideration and decided to test a more realistic grasshopper pattern. I pulled a parachute hares ear hopper from my cylindrical container and knotted it to my line. This fly generated a hefty quantity of rejections, but it also enabled me to connect with three fish. One of these takes was a perfect dry fly scene, where the seven inch rainbow appeared from the depths of a deep slow moving pool and calmly slurped the parahopper. Despite its small size, these are moments that I wish I could capture on video to view over and over.

By three o’clock the stream was nearly entirely covered in shadows, and I was feeling quite weary and chilled. I was now wearing my fleece plus raincoat for a windbreaker, and yet I was on the edge of being chilled. My thoughts turned to scenes of comfort such as described in the first paragraph, so I decided to call it quits. I found a decent path along the north side of the stream, and used this to hike back to the inlet where I found a wide shallow section to cross. If I return to this portion of South Boulder Creek, I plan to remember this trail and use it to push farther into the backcountry to water that is even less pressured than what I experienced on Friday.

Gorgeous Colors on This Rainbow

Friday was an interesting day. I explored new water, and I discovered a beautiful natural setting not very distant from Denver. As with some of my other favorite haunts, it requires a bit of effort to reach, and this probably minimizes the number of fishermen willing to endure. The fish are quite small, wading is tough, and the tight canyon walls make lighting a challenge. The ten fish landed on Friday took my cumulative fish counter for 2015 to 837, and this represents the second highest tally of my fly fishing life. The season is waning, and I suspect that I will be enjoying the scenario described in the first paragraph much more frequently in the near future.