Great Lakes, Fall 2001
This marked my forth annual trip to New York with my Rep. and friend, Dave Halblom. Along on this trip were my friend Kelly Galloup of the Troutsman in Traverse City, Mi. and my long time friend Gene Hering who owns and operates Fly Fish TV which airs on Outdoor Life Network, Saturday Evenings and Sunday Morning.
We were hoping to do at least three television programs and one instructional video on fly fishing for German Browns and Steelhead. I am very happy to say that in just four days of fishing we accomplished our goal! Our prior three seasons of fishing the area helped us to know what we should be using as far as rod weights, line selection and flies.
Depending on the type of waters that we fished, we used either the Teeny Mini-Tip line or our T-200 sinking line. The Mini-Tip worked very well in smaller waters because only the first 5' sink and the rest floats. This allowed us to make a clean drift and swing with our fly. In deeper, faster type waters our T-200 was near perfect. Only one time when they were letting out water to drain down the Erie Canal did I need to go to our Tip-Taper 275 grain line. This line proved very effective and got my fly down quickly to the fish.
Our leader lengths played a very important part to our success. Normally on the T-200 or TT-275 we w uld use a 4 to 6' leader. On the Mini-Tip it varied from 4 to 9'. In the riffles and in fast moving waters, 4' proved most effective. In the runs and tail outs the longer leader was without question more effective as it kept the shadow of the fly line away from the fish which did not scare them and allowed us to present the fly properly.
We caught Steelhead in good numbers up to 10 pounds and German Browns over 15 pounds. Our largest Brown was 31" long with a 19 1/2" girth. I used our Teeny Nymphs and Leeches with outstanding success in colors of Antique Gold, Natural, and Ginger. We also caught fish on Insect Green, Orange and Chili. The first three colors were the most consistent and productive. Best sizes ranged from a large size 4 to the smaller #10. I caught most of my fish on size 4, 6 & 8.
I would recommend this strip to anyone who wants to fish for numbers of trophy trout. A good contact is Ron, who owns "Orleans Outdoors," for an up to the minute report on whats Happening!
Orleans Outdoor, Ron Bierstine (716) 682-4546.
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