Quiet in Ranger Cove: No Trout Respond as Rain Pauses

Quiet in Ranger Cove. The rain quit. The slightest breeze barely stirred. I was all alone until I gathered my two rods to leave after 45 minutes or so. Guy drove up from Hamilton. Asked him if he fishes Stony Brook. Yes. This puts an interesting twist on a post from September this year. My brother Rick claims the smallmouth bass fishing is all over with at Stony. This guy says it's good. What concurs is that the water level is lower (due to lowered water table, increased impervious surfaces). He also mentioned pickerel. I'm convinced they come from the lower of what used to be Princeton Day School ponds. They managed to get in there late in 1977. Before the 80's, chain pickerel were unheard of in Stony. I know the stream that enters into Stony from the PDS ponds above.

I fished two days here at Round Valley prior this week. Like today, nothing. Someone I spoke to Monday caught a 15-inch and 16 1/2-inch rainbow. The weather conditions seemed good for fish feeding, raining when I arrived. That stopped, so who knows? Higher pleasure blip? It's raining now. It's ridiculous at bottom to try to explain the likes of this anyhow. But it's good to be aware of environmental changes because you can't fish without being there.

Brown Trout for Thanksgiving

The rainy weather seemed right for fishing, and I had just over an hour at Round Valley, putting two lines with marshmallow & mealworm out, getting one hit, and catching the 16-inch brown. I set the half-ounce steel egg sinker in 20 to 25 feet of water, but when I set the hook and began reeling, the trout thrashed on the surface to my left right near shore in about five feet of water. It swam into the shallows and wrapped the line around weeds. I heaved at the fish. The weeds were already a great resistance, but before it got stuck in the weed mass, it had leapt clear out of the water. Thought I would lose it, but after working that six-pound test hard, the fish came in bunched in milfoil or whatever that vegetation is.

Keeping any lake trout caught becomes legal again after November 30th. I guess I'll try shiners. I don't understand why plenty of lakers are caught from shore in that reservoir inside the city limits of Boston, forget the name, and so few at Round Valley. The population is abundant, but the fish seem to stay out deep.  

Trout Options for Reservoir Winter; 35 Degrees with Arctic Ducks

Managed to fish Round Valley twice since I last fished, at Lake Hopatcong with Oliver, November 2nd. I've had some serious trouble with sciatica and while I kept busy with other things, fishing wasn't something I could do. Thursday last week I had a hit from a trout on the marshmallow and mealworm just a couple of minutes after the half-ounce egg sinker took hold. Today, nothing, but it was fully worth being out there, no disappointment at all.

After fishing all fall, winter, and into April last year, I'm fully familiar with how slow this fishing is after some possible fast action in October and perhaps November near the main boat ramp. Some guys caught some on artificials last winter--Redfin plugs, Binsky bladebaits, spinners, Kastmasters. Someone casting Redfin plugs claimed he was catching a lot of browns. Since I like to take it slow and get reading in, I probably won't follow suit with lures, but fish two lines instead of one and possibly some shiners pretty soon. I have lake trout in mind, but the chances of catching one seem to remain slim. The reservoir is loaded with them up to about six pounds, but the rainbows and browns are chiefly the species in close for the winter. And they have many of miles of shoreline to cruise, which involves why fishing is typically slow.

I met two birders and saw a few others. All I spotted was a loon, but heard report of a bufflehead duck, eared grebe, coots, and a common merganser besides. So birds that summer in the arctic are here--buffleheads with their white-barred wings that look like strobe lights in flight.

Fly Fishing the Claremont South Branch Raritan River

Fly fishing the Claremont, South Branch Raritan River

By Bruce Litton

This is another of my Recorder Newspaper column pieces, published recently in September or early October.

          Perhaps no length of river for fly fishing in New Jersey is as mysterious as the Claremont section of the South Branch Raritan. Last stocked in 1995, wild brown and rainbow trout, and native brook trout, flourish in a 1.1 mile section of river from the fence dividing off a private fishing club upstream, and Electric Brook in Long Valley downstream. An abandoned rail line is converted into a pathway that runs straight parallel to the river, but the river itself is out of sight in dense woodland well off the path. Climbing over downfalls and through brambles to wade it may be difficult, and many fishing situations allow roll casting at best. But the heart of the mystery is the size of some brown trout that may be there. They’ve been caught as large as eight pounds apparently.

          Fly casting the river recently with Oliver Round, I wondered just where such a fish could possibly be. The hole just below the bridge where Patriots Path crosses is very deep, but not really very large. Wading upstream, I found that the river averages about 20 feet wide and two and a half feet deep, not exactly territory for any browns to be expected over 17 inches or so. No doubt, a real large brown is a rarity. Even a 17-incher is a seldom encounter, and nothing has convinced me that the eight-pounder I heard about was a wild fish. Perhaps it made its way down from stockings by the private trout club above. More mystery yet to add to the picture; if the thought of a huge but stocked trout is disappointing, at least we consider realism.

          This was one of the first of this fall’s chilly mornings when Oliver and I fished—about 42 degrees. However, Oliver has actually waded this section in January—downed trees, brambles, briar patches and all—and happened to catch eight browns that cold day on flies which imitate trout eggs. After all, these trout reproduce and feed on one another’s spawn, as odd as the behavior may seem. This September morning, we spotted a lot of trout but caught only one on a size 14 stonefly nymph. The water was clear, the trout skittish, and time in fairly short supply. A few rose in the hole below the bridge where we first arrived, but I was disappointed that none would take my size 18 parachute ant, size 20 blue winged olive, or size 20 Adams. I tried a fly that resembles a small worm, then switched to a white-bodied streamer with a golden flair of hackle rising over its back and walked over the bridge the way we came, to crawl between bush boughs and begin roll casting to the spot where I had seen a trout rise three times. I got a strike and believe it was that fish, but missed it. Meanwhile, Oliver had three hits from the same rainbow trout on a streamer just upstream of the bridge.

          We waded upstream and the day got more interesting as my hands warmed, and we had the sense of a wild place isolated from the byways, homes, and businesses that fill New Jersey. Once it was the other way around. Villages, towns, homes, even cities, scattered about isolated in the general wilderness. I checked my phone for the time, and of course it had service too. Oliver took out his phone and showed me a video he had filmed of a spring in the woods somewhere nearby between the path and the river. It is immense, wherever it is exactly. Oliver spoke of bringing a GPS and trying to find it again. It didn’t bubble; it welled up like a fire hydrant flow from the ground.

          On the high end of Schooley’s Mountain, Budd Lake—a shallow warm-water lake—is the origin of the South Branch Raritan River not many miles from where we fished. During summer, the water flowing out of the sluggish, weed-choked lagoon at the end of the lake is very warm. But all the way down the mountain the river is spring fed. I had no idea springs like the one Oliver showed me on video exist in New Jersey. But I have read that the river is so rich in springs keeping the water cool that native brook trout exist within a quarter mile of the lake. In any case, there are wild and native trout in the South Branch Raritan’s upper reaches, and exploration may reveal surprises unexpected.

Overview of South Branch Raritan River Fishing

Prepare for Winter: Enjoy the Ice

Black Ice is Best and We May Have Some Soon

 

Every year in November, I look forward to ice fishing, so I thought it appropriate to post. In the meantime, I may be fishing Round Valley next week.

I made a prediction about the winter ahead being a mild one, and I was pretty much right, although we had at least a week of more and less safe ice. I have no hunch about this winter, so just maybe it will be colder than the last two.

 

Another mild week after skim ice formed on ponds two consecutive cold mornings recently. Even that didn’t move my conviction that this is a mild winter. Typically we get about two months of ice thickening to at least a foot, sometimes twice this or more in northern, high elevations of the New Jersey. In 2008 we had no more than two weeks of marginally safe ice; to get no safe ice over winter’s course is very rare.

For any first timers at ice fishing, paying heed to safety is a life requirement. I never recommend any newcomer go out on ice fewer than five inches thick—clear, hard ice, not refrozen. No one really wants to go out on a deep lake for the first time, poking ahead of himself nervously with a splitting bar, with no adequate knowledge about whether or not the ice he stands on will give way to water that would kill him in 10 minutes. Get a guide to show you how for as long as it takes until you feel comfortable and are knowledgable out there. It’s probably a foregone conclusion of your own that if you want to try this, you should find someone reliable to introduce you to it. Joining the Knee Deep Club of Lake Hopatcong may suffice.

The larger lakes freeze unevenly. Well inside a cove—where pickerel and perch especially are caught—the ice may be quite safe. But walk towards the mouth of that cove, where winds have kept water open until it froze an inch the night before, and you’ll go through. Always, no matter how safe the ice, wear a pair of ice spikes available at many sporting goods shops. If you do go through, as unlikely as this is, the points can be jammed into ice so you can pull yourself out, then belly squirm away from the thin area.

In my experience, there’s really no other outdoor pursuit like ice fishing. I've done it for years, have never fallen through, have never seen anyone fall through. I have also, many times, broken the thin ice of Barnegat Bay as I ploughed in bodily, wearing layered wetsuits for commercial clamming. Once I worked in the bay for five hours beginning at dawn with 10 degrees Fahrenheit and snow, ending at 17 degrees, 45 mph winds, and the wind chill 26 below. Clamming paid well during the 1980’s, and was more of an adventure than ice fishing, but ice fishing is serene, easier, yet plenty adventuresome. It allows you to get in touch with nature in quiet, leisurely ways, so long as not too many snowmobiles, quads, and power augers are nearby. Plenty of fish species are available in our Highlands, New Jersey, region—pickerel, largemouth and smallmouth bass, muskies, northern pike, walleyes, trout species, channel catfish, hybrid stripers, and all manner of panfish including roving yellow perch in some waters.

First ice is best ice—so long as it’s safe. The “black ice” we sometimes have before snow blocks sunlight reaching through clear water depths, often safely covering only two to 10 acre ponds that freeze first (and evenly) before that snow falls, is easy to cut with a splitting bar since it’s not thick as a vault door. But sunlight’s the secret to this fishing. Try to get out on a cloudless day, the kind of day that “isn’t good for fishing.” Fish water 10 feet deep or shallower, clear water among residual weeds preferably. Bait tip-ups with live shiners, and try some chrome finished spoons using short jigging rods.

Shiner scales serve shiners' schooling interests, if you can say this line without twisting your tongue. The flashes of reflected light confuse perceptions of predators. But when isolated on a hook beneath a tip-up device (these also available at many sporting goods stores), these light-reflecting shields do just the opposite, attracting gamefish like a beacon to zero in upon directly and hit. Silvery, chrome spoons like small Kastmasters do the same.

I go for largemouth and pickerel when I have first ice opportunity, this ice which hasn’t been corrupted yet by melting and refreezing. These two species prowl relatively shallow water penetrated by needed light. So long as adequate fish holding depths are nearby (if any), and fairly thick residual vegetation is present if the pond or lake has any, the irony is that fish will be skittish, off the feed, and even residing in the thickest of cover, but they will strike by aggressive reaction. I’ve experienced tip-up flags flying high, bass stripping off five or ten yards of line and dropping shiners, refusing to swallow. This happens no other time.

 

Hunch Leads to Binsky Jigged Walleye

I phoned Oliver at 5:00 a.m., complaining to his message recorder of severe nerve pain in my left leg, saying I probably had to cancel. He phoned back within five minutes and I said I had done some exercises, it felt better, I would phone him back. Meanwhile, I fixed eggs and coffee. The car was loaded. I phoned and said, "Let's hit the road."

The weather was sort of mild and the lake perfectly calm. Once again, I made a night crossing from Dows, running lights with the useless suction cups in each of our hands. By the time we got to Raccoon Island, it was still pretty dark. The rods were rigged but a little tangled. Soon we put herring on two rods directly under the boat and casted Binsky bladebaits, jigging them off bottom along the drop-off. We were disappointed after an hour or so of persistence but no action and resorted to nightcrawlers for some perch, sunfish, and each of us caught a largemouth near the rocks. My leg gave me no serious trouble; I had forgotten about it and really didn't think about it for the rest of the outing. It had got chillier even after sunrise, and I expected the weather to warm when we arrived at our next spot.

We jigged Elba and Pickerel Points, a very slight breeze allowing us to drift only a bit while I used the electric to help position. It was getting milder, too. The herring yielded nothing nor the Binskies. But I had one of my hunches and immediately suggested we try Chestnut Point. That's where I had planned to try next, but I knew right away it was time to go. The hunch was the only one I had all day, deep and resonant as qualifies such intuition, rather than ordinary guesses as are common.

That's where--with a light breeze that was about perfect to jig vertically while moving parallel along the drop--I jigged the walleye, which made a very slow day a little more interesting. I told Oliver my hunches seem no better than superstition, since I was in no position to offer him anything close to resembling proof. I can't offer you, the reader, proof either. But I feel them distinctly when they happen, and I'm always eager to act upon them at once, because more often than not, perhaps, I get results. I noticed that in addition to catching the walleye, my hunch put us on the best drifts for jigging of the day as well. I had a glimmer of recognition about this before we got to Chestnut, but I think after I felt the possibility of a fish. We drifted the drop three times and headed in at 11:30. One of the herring rods bent under the weight of a fish that dropped the bait shortly after my catch.

When you think about it, what is "fishing" but feeling around in the dark of water for a catch? A great deal of emphasis is put on explicit knowledge in the pursuit, but when you get down to it, every cast is a sort of shot in the dark. So, apart from sighting fish or very obvious cover, if something or other within you informs messing around in the dark, it might be a good idea to follow it.

  



Brown Trout Round Valley Reservoir Shoreline

When I checked on my two lines out with the bails open, one of the reels was almost spooled. I had casted marshmallows and mealworms into about 25 feet of water and let them be. It took forever to reel this 19 1/2 inch brown to the bank, and when it was in view, it became docile as if submitting to capture, something innocent and aware about the eyes on the large head moving me to a kind of compassion, a sense of shared life between us. I began thinking that this trout hadn't been devouring many herring and shiners out in the reservoir, as skinny as it is. I had the natural hope that other trout are. The 24 inch rainbow I caught last December was very full bodied. Perhaps the distinct spots accentuated the life gleam in the dark eyes. Whatever the case, it's a beautiful fish with a tag, which means it hasn't been in Round Valley very long, and I wonder if for some reason it never acclimated to food sources. However, my big rainbow last year had a tag also.

The rainbows arrive along the shorelines first in late September. I really don't when the browns come in, but I guess they're pretty much in close now.