I complained a bit in my last post about my clinch knots pulling out and resulting in lost fish and more importantly lost fish WITH hooks in their craws (which I certainly wouldn't want). I had been using a knot called the Davy Knot prior to these past few outings, so I suppose I regressed into something that was familiar (and fast to tie).  With the break-offs I've been having I think I better get back into using a Davy or a "Double Davy" shown below (courtesy of Matt's Bucket Blog) or a non-slip mono loop for looped connections.  Here is also a great article by Tim Romano about what life is like from a fishy point of view.

Report 7/6/2012
Conditions: Sunny 67-91F
Location: Oatka Creek, 2.43'
Time: 7:30A-12:00P
Predominant Bug(s): Tricos to start then Cahills a little while before I left

 It's been an exciting summer for my fiance and I for many reasons.  The weather, cook-outs, parties, weddings and receptions (not ours yet), camping, seeing old friends, soccer, even the purchase of our first house together!  woohoo!  ...And of course, the fishing's been great!!

With the 4th being on a Wednesday this year and couple extra days in the vacation pool, I decided take advantage and make it a nice 5 day weekend.  We're closing on our house next week so I wanted to take a bit of time to clean and start packing things up so that's what I'm concentrating on, but I fortunately found some time to get out to Oatka this morning and see what our little stream had to offer.


Evidently others had the same idea (and I don't blame them because today was beautiful!) as there were 5 cars already there which always leaves me concerned it'll be too crowded.  Alas, this isn't Spring Creek and I had nothing to fear.  Plentiful space abounds at Oatka and there are so many great spots that we didn't have to cast on top of one another to get into some fish.


I mentioned the Tricos were on in spinner form and much to my dismay, I was ill prepared for the occasion.  I'm still very new to fly fishing in general so I'm still feeling out the hatches and specifically when they occur.   I usually glance at WNY Fly Fisher's blog the night before to get an idea of what I should be tying and I did get some Cahills tied to add to the Sulphurs I already had.  I tied some parachute style Rusty Spinners which I tried when I got there, but they weren't having any of those.  I had read some Spinners end up looking like Duns with their wings upright, so that's what I was going for, but at least for today the internet was wrong.


I had about an hour left before I wanted to leave but decided to stop off at one more spot that has produced for me in the past.  I had seen a few more Cahills pop off from the surface, however I had exhausted most of my supply by that point, said what the heck, and tied on a Sulphur Dun.  I guess by pure dumb luck I started fishing that when the Cahills really started coming off and I guess they didn't mind the color because I started hooking them left and right.  Knots were my bane today though, I hooked 6 fish in that last hour and landed just the one pictured.  I had been employing Davy Knots prior to a month ago, but found Clinch Knots easier to tie for me right now.  I lost five flies to undone knots today so I think I'll revisit the Davy or go to an Improved Clinch.


Have a great weekend everyone.

Report 7/1/2012
Oatka Creek 2.45' 8:30AM
84F Air, Various bugs
Just a quick report from my outing a few days ago, no predominant hatch with 1 landed and two others hooked, each on a different fly, a size 16 caddis, size 20 antron spinner, and a size 16 CDC dun.  What a great day to get out!

So it turns out I was dead wrong about the water level/flow up in the 'Dacks.  Many of the mountain streams up there are fed from the surrounding lakes.  The streams I scouted were no exception and were fed from either Sacandaga Lake or Lake Pleasant in Speculator, the location of our normal base camp.  I was a bit overwhelmed trying to discover potential new locations, especially since it's my first time searching specifically for trout streams in Speculator, so I unfortunately didn't get a chance to get down to business and fish for our little friends.


I did learn some invaluable information on where I should try for them next time and hopefully I'll be more prepared than I was with regard to flies next time.


We did get pretty rained out on Saturday with a few thunderstorms rolling in, but all in all, a great weekend to be out and with the family and doing some boating, kayaking, light lake fishing, playing bocce, sitting by the fire, etc.  Enjoy the pictures!

My little brother Chip loves the Reese's Puffs, what a coincidence, I do too!