Tangled Lines: Casting into depths at dawn

PRATTSVILLE, N.Y. — The Schoharie Creek, a fabled Catskill trout stream, has suffered mightily in recent decades.

Between pressure from human development around the busy and popular Hunter Mountain ski area, serious flooding, and the fact that the stream’s east-west configuration means it gets the maximum amount of sunlight, the cool water required for trout habitat is simply not as available as in the old days.

This is not a new phenomenon. It does seem to be getting worse, though.

Gary Dodson and I convened where the creek makes its final run into the Schoharie reservoir, part of the New York City water supply system, on a semi-broiling Thursday afternoon, July 11.

The goal was simple. Catch smallmouth bass, which abound in the lower section of the river.

This was hot stuff — as in an 80-degree water temperature.

The air temperature was actually slightly less at 77.

After negotiating the intensely slippery rocks, festooned with treacherous algae, the first major pool presented several difficulties, with a back eddy competing with a main flow and several large trees draped about the whole thing.

I hit on the simplest strategy, which was to flip a weighted attractor fly called a Tequilley into the start of the eddy so it would proceed slowly but steadily into the maelstrom, sinking all the while.

This worked. A proper adult smallmouth, with bronze coloring and vertical stripes, took the thing.

The point-and-shoot camera finally died, however, and I was not going to try to fumble my phone out for a nice but routine fish photo.

Why not?

Because I guarantee the fish would have made a sudden, last-moment bolt for freedom, causing me to drop the device into the drink.

Gary moved downstream while I continued trying to annoy the residents of the pool, succeeding a couple of times with different colored Wooly Buggers.

Then we all got bored and I moved off, where Gary was catching rock bass and cussing them out for not being something else.
I have to admit, they are not the most compelling critters. Something about the red eyes.

This latest trip was dominated by extremely tedious and distasteful Harry Homeowner activities, but on both Wednesday and Thursday mornings I prowled Woodland Valley Creek. By “morning” I mean “dawn,” because that was when the water temps were down to a barely acceptable 64.

I made the acquaintance of several stocked browns and of a handful of their wild cousins. The wild fish are smaller and nimbler.

The successful ploy was an Adams wet fly, size 16, drifted behind something big, like a Parachute Adams or Stimulator.