In a follow up to my earlier post,
Alfredo writes:

Thanks for coming out yesterday on the Gunpowder. As promised (I always keep my word) the weather was perfect, fish were rising, and the company was great.

Time spent with Theaux is always valuable and enjoyable. Thanks for joining us for breakfast at the Wagon Wheel (popular place!), and streamside before we waded off. The packet of flies went above and beyond. Thanks a million.

The water was running at about 35 cfs, and the fish were very spooky in this low flow. Still, everyone caught fish, and had a few more rises and hookups. No monsters were reported. All fish seem to have been standard issue Gunpowder browns — 6-10 inches, beautiful and leapers.

I saw only sporadic insects. I did not catch any, and relied on attractor patterns in the appropriate tiny sizes, but most of the bugs looked like pale tiny caddis or stoneflies. Fish took a variety of flies — Streamers, nymphs and dries. All of mine, 4 total, with a few other rises, were on dries — #18 adams parachute, #22 midges midge. One hit my indicator (yellow #10) and several hit a #14 yellow humpy.

Mark took a fall into rosa bushes sometime before noon. He met Ed and myself at Whale Rock with a bleeding hand, punctured waders, and broken rod. Thankfully, only the rod was broken. This was the first day Mark had used that particular rod, but at least he managed to land a brown on it before his fall.

Mark and I shared my rod after that, landing a couple of browns and getting some heart stopping hits and refusals. One of us would fish, the other would take pictures, spot fish, and watch the fish’s reaction to the drift. This is a great way to learn a stream, by the way, and pick up new techniques from watching the other fisher.

Mark and I started off the stream shortly before 4 p.m., when the air started to cool down, and ran into Ed throwing some beautiful loops in a big pool downstream. If I recall, he had landed a couple of browns. I hope he finished with a nice fish before heading back.

Eric had left a bit earlier, according to a note on Mark’s windshield. He did well downstream of the bridge, hiking clear past Masemore, where we did not run into him. 2 browns, one long distance release (LDR, for the jargon- prone), and a couple of other hits.

James headed upstream of the bridge early on, and Mark and I never caught up with him. James reports that he got back to the car at 4:45, having had some good hits, lost a few, and landed a couple. He did not get to the dam, but almost.

By the way, Backwater Angler, Theaux’s shop has a new look to its website . Looks good, Theaux.

Thanks again for participating, thanks especially to Theaux. I hope to see you all soon.

Alfredo .