Tangled Lines: Casting into depths at dawn

Gary Dodson working a tricky pool on the Schoharie Creek, hoping to lure something other than a rock bass from the depths.

Photo by Patrick L. Sullivan

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.

Latest News

Letters to the Editor - May 15, 2025

In Gaza, what have we become?

Israel has decided to starve to death an entire population of more than two million people, half of whom are children, allegedly because they say that it is the way to bring back the remaining 59 hostages taken by Hamas.Now they don’t even try to hide the main reason, which is to displace to other countries an entire indigenous people, or preferably exterminate them as Hitler perpetrated on many of their ancestors.The Israels are preventing everything from entering Gaza — water, food, medicine, fuel.Everything.It’s war crime pure and simple, and there is no moral or ethical excuse for it.

Keep ReadingShow less
Turning Back the Pages

125 years ago — May 1900

Steeple Jack has painted the smoke stack at the Morse-Keefer Co.’s factory. The stack is 72 feet in height.

Keep ReadingShow less
Fed waits, market rises & trade talks

One country down, only 194 more to go. Last week, the announcement of a “framework” for President Trump’s first trade deal and the first high-level meeting between the U.S. and China encouraged investors.

Wall Street’s enthusiasm was somewhat tempered, given that the United Kingdom was an easy deal to make. The terms of trade have always favored the U.S., where we have run a capital trade surplus for years. On the China front, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent met with his counterpart in Switzerland last weekend; on Friday before, President Trump floated the idea of a possible decline in U.S. trade tariffs to 80%, which he said “seems right.” It was a clear message to the Chinese that he wanted to de-escalate his trade war.

Keep ReadingShow less