LAKE GEORGE — In any winter, cabin-weary fly-fishermen must find their joy in life’s little pleasures.
First, through a typical winter weather pattern of arctic blasts, followed by a series of deceptively warm days, then another cold spell, the number of days for fishing in reasonable comfort is limited.
Next, the window of opportunity for fishing within a given day, no matter how pleasant, is comparatively small. Nights and mornings are cold, and coldblooded fish know it. They’re sluggish; they don’t require as much food as at other times of the year, and they don’t move a lot. The temperature might warm up during the day and fish might become more active, but when the sun begins its descent, things cool off in a hurry.
Finally, finding open water in January usually means a tailwater — the section of a stream directly below a dam — and fishing tailwaters in winter generally means using tiny flies, sometimes little larger than the specks of black pepper sprinkled onto a winter-morning breakfast of biscuits and gravy.
“Nothing larger than a (size) 24,” said Steve Gossage, store manager of the Angler’s Covey in Colorado Springs, reporting on a recent, moderately successful day in Elevenmile Canyon, a classic case study of fishing mountain tailwaters in winter.
Typically, water released from Elevenmile Dam is about 40 degrees and the South Platte River below remains ice-free for some distance downstream through the coldest of winters.
Like many tailwaters, the South Platte is exceptionally fertile, supporting copious numbers of aquatic insects. Though the canyon stretch of river has various mayflies, caddis, craneflies and scuds, midges are the mainstay of winter fishing.
Midges might emerge — and trout might rise for a time — on even the coldest days. Dry flies or emergers fished in the surface film can be productive then, but nymphs or emergers dead-drifted near the bottom tend to be more consistent. Almost invariably, the most productive patterns are small, Nos. 20-24 or even No. 26, fished on an appropriately fine leader tippet.
A rig favored by some canyon anglers has a bright scud or egg pattern as an attractor, with a No. 22-24 Black Beauty, UV Midge, Mercury Midge or similar pattern fished as a dropper some 18 inches below. A split shot can be used to sink the flies to the proper depth, but a bright, wire-bodied Copper John nymph can serve the same purpose and also might produce a fish.
Takes are likely to be subtle. Some are almost imperceptible, even with a strike indicator.
“People get excited when we get a couple of nice days, but you can’t rush the season,” said Gary Almeida, proprietor of Ghillies Fly Shop in Colorado Springs. “It’s still winter. Things are still moving pretty slowly on the river.”
To improve the odds, he suggests fishing after two or three consecutive warm days and paying attention to the sunlight, an especially important consideration in the canyon.
Sunlight penetrates canyon walls unevenly, but much of the river is in the shade well into the morning. A degree or two of water temperature can be critical to winter fishing success. Aquatic insects and fish are more likely to be stirring in the slightly warmer sunlit portions of the river. Peak fishing times, therefore, tend to be from late morning to midafternoon, the time when some chilled, early-morning anglers already might be leaving.
Sunshine or shadow, winter fishing often is slow in pace, but it also might produce some surprisingly good flurries of activity. Either way, fishing the tailwaters offers an opportunity for anglers to stir from a fitful winter sleep, maintain their form and experience the river and its environs in their winter phase.
Best of all, perhaps, winter fishing can be a reminder that little by little, the better days of spring and summer surely are on their way.
