Delaware River Smallmouth

[JAR1]

I need some direction. Not new to fly fishing, but new to fly fishing for smallmouth this summer. I have had only limited success. I have been fishing between Frenchtown and Trenton approx (Lumberville-Stockton on the PA side mainly because its on my way to work)

What type of water should I be looking for? What flies and what times of day? I can't seem to break past 1-3 fish for 2-3 hours.:crap:

 

[quality time]

Suggest you read through davethetrout's Delaware River thread on this site. There is a LOT of good information there about the section of the river you are referring to.

To give you some quick tips.....try dusk on flat water sections below riffles using topwater poppers. In mid day periods try the riffles with Clouser Minnows. You need to get down to the bottom, so sinking line and possibly extra weight on the leader are needed. I haven't been on the Delaware in a couple of weeks so let us know how you make out.

QT

 

[JeffK]

The classic patterns for me used to be crayfish/dark nymph patterns on the bottom in riffles during the day and streamers and pencil poppers in the flats near riffles in the evening through daybreak. Clousers work all the time. For riffles, look for color break where the light colored silt is replaced by dark, short weeds on the rocks. Find the deepest runs you can. For night fishing, note the shallows with the most minnows during the day and head back at night when the predators come shallow to munch on them. Watch for fish or bait breaking.

For 40 years this simple pattern has done well for me, but the last few years with floods and droughts jammed together and the colored water this summer these patterns seemed to have changed. Therefore, I need to do plenty of experimenting. Things that have worked are flats in the day in colored water, strong seams (particularly where a trib comes in) and a drop off across the river. My old reliable patterns aren't so reliable and it takes work to find fish, but you can usually find a pod by exploring around. This year there seems to be plenty of baby shad and fallfish, so maybe the smallies just aren't hungry.

 

[JAR1]

JeffK,

Do you fish the crayfish pattern with any action or let it tumble/drift w/ the current?

Thx
JAR

 

[McAwful]

Jar,

I did two Smallmouth videos That are on the Shannon's Fly & Tackle Website at
Rise Form Studio-The First Monthly Fly Fishing Vidcast
Watch episode 5 first. It is a primer on what flies and techniques work. Episode 6 shows the techniques on the river. Good luck with the bronze. They are on of my favorite species...

McA

 

[smittin]

fishing the lower d can be hit or miss some night's or mornings can be magical depending on conditions, weather, fish location on that day, ect. A boat really help's the best suggestion I can give is cover as much area as you can to find fish. fly's I use most of the time: poppers, ant's, spinners, clousers i like meduim size larger eye's to get the fly down work it fast first and then work slow if fish are not hitting it on a fast retrieve. from a boat you can jig your fly on the drift with the boat thats how I have had some of my best day's when I can pirate my buddy boat. All in All the lower D each section can take a season to learn and now with the floods those sections can change, it's a constant learning experiance at least for me.

 

[theartoflee]

Two other hot flys for smallies are polar minnows and circus peanuts they are both streamers. The Polar minnow has accounted for my largest smalies they seem to go nuts for them. Zuddlers also produce well but hands down the polar minnow will show you your backing when wet.

 

[Ryan R]

I love smallies on the fly, matter of fact I just chased them yesterday morning on the Lehigh River in JT. Pound for pound, the most exciting flyfishing the average, local angler can expect to find around here. We've floated the Delaware in our inflatable pontoon boats quite abit this summer and we're seeing more on the water fishing this way too. We mostly float a stretch just a few miles upriver of Easton. I got my first flyrod-caught 20" smallie this year.

The key to smallie fishing is definitely weight- you have to get that fly down on the bottom most of the time. We're talking several larger splitshot or a good deal of tungsten putty. Don't be shy you can always take some weight off if it's too much (it rarely is). If you're not hooking bottom from time to time, than you're only catching 1 or 2 of the fish available. My friend is a guide and many times he uses a two-fly system using streamers or buggers: a conehead bugger or muddler trailed by a beadhead woolly bugger, he adds 1-2 splitshot as well in front of the point fly. Also, use shorter leader & tippet sections than you normally would for trout, anything more than a 7.5 foot leader is too long. I usually just use a 4ft braided leader with only 2-3 ft of 3X or 4X tippet or 6lb Maxima. Don't worry much about setting the hook, smallies usually take care of that on their own. Basically just use a strip set for the hookset: as the fish takes just strip in the slack line quickly to put tension on the line, this "sets" the hook for smallies.

The fish are on the feed now and surface poppers can bring big strikes in the large pools & runs on calm evenings. During the day, fish the riffles and tick the fly along the bottom and hold on.

My favorite flies are white clousers, gotchas, and zonkers to mimic shad fry and black or brown woolly buggers and meat whistles to mimic the abundant crayfish and helgrammites.

I could walk down there to the Delaware with just a handful of white clousers and black woolly buggers and have confidence that if the fish are feeding I'll pick up at least a half-dozen smallies without too much trouble... as long as I have enough weight to get the bugger to the bottom! Many times, I've seen weight be the difference between a 3 fish day and a 12 fish day.

Also vary your retreive, sometimes they want the fly stripped in slow and will take it on the pause. Other days they want it stripped fast and will savagely take the fly during a fast strip. Each day can be different, that's fishing.

 

[Big Bushkill]

Great stuff, I love Smallies.

 

[BIGBOW]

I usually fish smallies with a sink tip in deeper, faster water with nothing more than woolly buggers.. they've never failed me (I've had more luck with them than switching diff streamers). As for slower water, try some poppers and dont be afraid to make some noise with them.. the fish are looking for movement.

 

[klg neighbor]

Describe this fishing method for me. Do you dead drift or cast across current and let it swing? I've only fished for smalleis a few times with no success.

I usually fish smallies with a sink tip in deeper, faster water with nothing more than woolly buggers.. they've never failed me (I've had more luck with them than switching diff streamers). As for slower water, try some poppers and dont be afraid to make some noise with them.. the fish are looking for movement.

 

[Ryan R]

Describe this fishing method for me. Do you dead drift or cast across current and let it swing? I've only fished for smalleis a few times with no success.

I don't want to speak for him but I fish 'em too at times with a sink-tip line, especially on a real windy day. It's not real easy or practical to dead-drift with a sink-tip line, I usually cast across the current and let it swing just like you said. In real deep, slow pools I've tried a sink tip to help get a fly down and dead drift it as we float along in the pontoon boat.

One thing's for sure there is some good information flowing on this topic. And now's the time to get out and try this stuff out. Big smallies will be feeding much more urgently and often aggressively before the onset of winter. A lot of people will be thinking about just fall trout but if you're not mixing in enough smallie trips in the fall you're missing out.

 

[rckrego]

Are you using mostly meat whistles this time of year? I would imagine that the 'dads are quite large right now, and the smallies are munching mostly on them. Thoughts?

 

[Ryan R]

Are you using mostly meat whistles this time of year? I would imagine that the 'dads are quite large right now, and the smallies are munching mostly on them. Thoughts?

Actually I've been using big black buggers lately, I've been mostly on the Lehigh recently for trout & smallies. Beleive ot or not meat whistles don't seem to be as heavy as you might expect but the have great action. According to reports Delaware River smallie action is red hot right now, especially on live minnows. So knowing that my butt willl likely be on the Delaware this Sunday (got a riparian buffer planting on Saturday otherwise I'd be out then.) Today after work I might hit it too if I don't try for trout. Instead of live minnows I'll likely try some natural or white zonkers, big muddlers. If that doesn't work I'll got to black buggers or meat whistles because black almost always works, as long as you're deep enough.

Big zoo cougars in yellow or white would likely work great too. I picked up some for my NH trip and then tried them at the KLG one day. It's a trigger fly meant to trigger a trout's predatory instinct. It creates a fight or flight reaction. The trout either take off or attack it aggressively. I lost several fish in the 15" range, landed two and also had about 10" rainbow attack it and then landed a 9" wild brown. The fly was half as long as the fish! No monsters yet on it but I got put more time in fishing it.

 

[jerseydude]

crawfish imitations work really well for me in the shallow riffles where I always thought there were no fish...for some reason the hellgramites and crawfish like to hang out in those areas under the rocks

 

[The Royal Coachman]

I've been fishing the Big D in the summer for a couple of years now and highly recommend the fishery. In July/August there isn't much Trout fishing and I would go party boat fishing for Fluke or Stripers but that was getting expensive. Not only that, you can't exactly run down to Sandy Hook for a few hours fishing from North Jersey. You invest the day. So I scaled that back and started fishing here instead.

I've spin fished it but this summer I want to start fly fishing. I have two questions:

Does anyone have success fishing nymphs dead drift in the riffles? If so what patterns and sizes.

When you say BIG Buggers or meat whistles what sizes are you talking about?

The Rise Form videos were good and gave me some ideas on techniques. I'm looking forward to experimenting this summer.

One more question....Does anyone here target Walleyes or Stripers specifically? or do you catch them while fishing for smallies?

 

[Ryan R]

For sizes on meat whistles, buggers, or clousers I generally use larger offerings in say size 2-6. Dead drifting larger nymphs thru riffles should work, I haven't really done it much yet on the Big D. I have had some good success dead drifting woolly buggers thru large pools. For the most apart I try to cover and work a good deal of water so I don't usually nymph for Delaware River fish. I basically streamer fish for the most part. The smallies and other predators are usually targeting either shad fry, crayfish, or hellgramites so I tend to stick with larger flies that mimic these 3 prey items. I've never specifically targeted walleye... yet. I've gone after stripers specifically (before/during first light) with the flyrod only a few times but have not had much luck as of yet. I do catch them from time to time while targeting smallies. I keep it simple and just cover water and I'm mainly concerned with getting the fly near the bottom.

 

[lonehunter]

I 2nd 3rd etc woolybuggers. I have seen some tied crayfish patterns, never tried them yet but they interest me.

 

[The Royal Coachman]

I 2nd 3rd etc woolybuggers. I have seen some tied crayfish patterns, never tried them yet but they interest me.

That's why the meat whistle fly interests me. While spin fishing I have great success with tube jigs in pumpkin. They are a good imitation of a crayfish.