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St. Vrain Angler Tips - Fishing in November Late Fall fishing is fun and offers challenges that are different than other times of the year. One of the challenges has to do with where to go. The others are similar - what to use, what techniques are needed and so on. Where to go has to do with where there is water that is open and has hungry fish. In the West, we are often limited to tail water fisheries for this time of year. Many streams will freeze at some point in late October through November and into early December. A few of our local stream - the St. Vrain, Boulder Creek, the Big Thompson and the Poudre are cases in point. Tail water fisheries, such as the Miracle Mile, Grey's Reef, South Platte below Spinney, Eleven Mile and Cheesman, reservoirs, the Frying Pan, Blue and so on fish well during winter months, offering open water and hungry fish. To understand how to fish this time of year, it is important to understand a little bit about how trout feed this time of year. As you can see from the chart below, how much chow trout eat varies according to water temperature. The colder the water - which is what we'll see during Fall and Winter fishing - the less they have to eat to stay full.
It is important to understand this about trout: they want to eat all they can and get as big and as fat as they can. They stuff themselves. It is not unusual to catch a trout on a small fly and find that the fish has a very large natural insect in its mouth when you unhook it. They are greedy. They’ll eat as much as they can hold, plus five more bites. When it’s cold, though, and the bugs are small, the fish are not going to move very far to get a bite to eat. This makes presentation of the fly very important. Come to think of it, the fly pattern is pretty important, too.
In addition to small bugs, large trout will often chase streamers this time of the year. It is a good idea to give them a shot. Try tying some large, buggy-looking flies on a size 6 streamer hook. Use a dark, marabou tail with some flash in it; dark or light variegated chenille for the body and soft, webby hackle that is reinforced with heavy copper wire. Try putting a wrap or two of orange or yellow dyed guinea on the front of the fly. Tie a few with beads, cone heads and/or lead eyes to get them down. Fish streamers along the edges of deep runs, in pockets and so on. Cast upstream of the spot you think the fish is lying in and let the fly drift along, giving it an occasional strip to give it more motion. Hold on: when a trout takes the fly, you're going to know it! For even more information, give us a call or stop in one of the shops. |
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or call 303-651-6061 © St. Vrain Angler Stores, Inc. We wish you good fishing, fly tying and great fun throughout the year! |
Midges
are usually abundant. And, since the bugs float along with the current, and are
pretty small, trout will not have to move very far to intercept a morsel to eat.
This aligns nicely with the fact that midges are most active during cold months,
when the fish’s metabolism is very slow. Fish only have to eat a belly full of
food about every two days or so. With any sort of motion a trout uses energy,
which has to be replaced by what it eats. Since the amount of energy they’ll
receive from small bugs is small, they won’t move very far to intercept one. See
the chart below for more info. As you can see, the water temperature
significantly effects the feeding activity of trout, which are cold blooded and
who’s metabolism is dependent on water temperature. Ambient sunlight also warms
the bodies of fish and the bugs upon which they feed. For more info on tying
and fishing midges, try our 