Delaware/Port Jervis

[Eagle Claw]

I ran into a guy in Roscoe yesterday who found it difficult to believe I come all the way up there to fish when he says there is great fishing in the Port Jervis area this time of year. Am I missing somthing here, anyone know about fishing in that area?

 

[Unregistered]

Try contacting Kevin Riley, a NYS licensed guide, who operates out of Port Jervis for information.

Google him at:
Riley, Reel 'em in, Port Jervis

Mostly warmwater species on the D that far south - walleye, smallmouth bass - some stripers.

However, early in the season - like now - when water temp is uniform throughout he river - 50 to 57 degrees - you might be into decent size trout.

Especially true where the Mongaup River dumps into the D at the Orange-Sullivan border on NYS Route 97.

Best...
TR
Narrowsburg
NYS Licensed Guide
www.delawareriverfishing.com

 

[Brett]

Port Jervis Area

The Mongaup River is a short drive north/west of Port Jervis. Last year the fishing was pretty decent there. I am heading there on Wednesday to fish midday to dark. I will update you on the condtitions.

 

[willowhead]

Well since he put it out there for everyone to know............lol. YES, the Mongaup outlet (where it dumps into the Big D.) is a great fishing site. Like he said though, for now. When water temps. rise........."forget about it." It's good again in the fall when the browns go up it to spawn. The Mongaup is NOT stocked, it is all wild fish. mark.........

 

[Brett]

I fished the Mongaup River below the power plant on Wednesday May 5. There was quite a bit of insect activity when we arrived at 230pm. And fishg were actively feeding on the surface. My friend landed half a dozen browns all 15 inches or better. Using royal wolfs, black gnats and blue wing olives. A water release started around 430 and that ended all dry fly activity. We then moved below the dam by rio reservoir and I caught a 15 inch brown on a blue wing olive. The trip was cut short by thunderstorms.

 

[willowhead]

Good deal Brett...glad you had a good time. I use to fish there a LOT! Those wild browns are beautiful fish. I've GOT to get back over there again. mark.......

 

[gobblehead]

Mongaup browns are beautiful fish. Also, there are a lot more browns in this section of the Delaware than most people give it credit for. Find tribs on both the PA and NY sides and you'll find some wild browns and brookies.

 

[willowhead]

Well the wild browns portion of your last sentence there gobblehad doesn't surprise me. They can deal with higher temps. But brookies........wow. That just goes to prove (if your right) that those tribs must have significantly lower temps than what is being touted on some of these threads. Cold enough to help cool the mainstem. Just one more way for the fish to survive the summer temps in the mainstem. Not to mention if there are healthy populations of trout that far down the river, they must be doing fine further up. Personally i find all the reactionary talk of fish-kills and such quite boring, when we know that the fish find ways to survive by migrating to areas where there are springs and colder water tribs. How many river miles is it from Callicoon to the mouth of the Mongaup? I have caught wild brown trout in the Mongaup in the summer time over and over again. And have never released one with any doubt of it's ability to live on. These are healthy fish. mark........

 

[JeffK]

I used to catch browns in Delaware River springholes down to Reiglesville NJ. It was hard work; you had to be a little compulsive to find them. I think the renewed striper population has really hurt the trout that far down. Also, big trout find a refuge off tiny Buckhorn Creek in Warren Co. NJ. These trout are big and healthy; only the strong survive the competition with all the warmwater fish. If trout can find refuges down that far in the Delaware, they should find a whole lot more in the Catskills.

 

[Unregistered]

"Wild" fish?

Excuse me for being so blunt, but why doesn't anyone ever acknowledge (or address) the fact that many of the trout in the system enter it by way of the numerous tributaries in PA, NY and NJ -- stocked tributaries -- and that 1000s and 1000s of stocked fish have free migratory access to that system? ...that a good portion of those fish caught are stocked fish and/or that no one can tell the difference once the fish is in the water for a while? (Any biologist will tell you that.)

 

[Fly Tier]

Hmmm, Maybe we should start fishing for the thousands and thousands of stocked fish in the D system with Salmon Eggs and Power bait.

I guess the distinction between wild and stocked goes back to the clipped fin thread.

I wonder if the stocked fish with clipped fins, if they holdover and reproduce, have little fishies with clipped fins. And I know they do travel far through a system. Look at Nemo's dad Marlin? He went al the way to Australia. Maybe we should pose the clipped fin question at Nemo? He had one didn't he?

Maybe Dory has a response to this?

 

[Unregistered]

That's a coincidence. It does sound like the clipped fins thread. Didn't see that. Will move my questions over there.

 

[fab]

stockers taste better than wild fish. anyway what makes a wild fish wild. Browns and rainbows were all imported here sometime. only brooks were around before the pilgrams

 

[Unregistered]

yeah, what he said above. I actually have a distaste for the term "wild." Wild to me conjures images of untamed, untouched anything in nature -- not animals, plants or ecosystems that were created (or sustained) by the systems man put in place.

if you want to distinguish, I say call 'em streambred vs. stocked.

 

[willowhead]

fab, that's a matter of opinion and or taste. I'd much rather eat a "wild" fish than something that's been force fed liver pellets. But i always try to release any wild fish i catch. Like the bumper sticker on the back of my truck says, "real trout don't eat pellets." It's a Hat Creek (Calif.) "Wild" Trout Lodge promotional sticker. Unregistered, all the more reason the DEC imho is totally screwing up by not clipping the fins of the wild fish they stock now. I've always encouraged people to take the stocked fish they catch up to the limit, so they can leave the wild fish to reproduce. Now, how the hell can they tell the difference if the stocked fish they catch have been in the river for a season say? mark.......

 

[RW]

Willow, RW here

This is the way I classify trout:

Native : been here since the last ice-age
Wild: Born to the river whether from stocked fish or not
Stocked: That's obvious
Holdovers: Stocked and holding over from one season to the next.
Frankenstein fish: DEC experiments like splake and tiger trout.

The only trout that are native to the Catskills are brook trout. Browns came about 1896 from Europe, rainbows in 1894 from California, and prematurely dumped in Callicoon Creek, from whence they spread through the Catskill river systems, and eventually were purposely stocked.

Later, RW

 

[willowhead]

RW, i agree all the way........except for the fact that i've always heard that the rainbows were dumped into the Main Stem Big D. in a train accident, NOT Callicoon Creek. No train tracks near the Callicoon.....east or north branch let alone the main stem Callicoon. I suppose i've released my fair share of "wild" fish that were from stocked trout that held over long enough to successfully spawn. Nothing wrong with that. If it made it thru the same rigors that any other "wild" fish had to endure, more power to 'em. It deserves to be released. But this business of not clipping the fins of the stocked fish, SMACKS of some Ivey Divey B.S. And for those who don't "know", Ivey Divey was Lester Youngs' term FOR B.S. And, for those who don't know who Lester Young was/IS...........heaven help you. Thank God, you DO RW. mark.....