Fishing the B Water

[ajfromnj]

Here is a short video of Euro Nymphing through water that really does not get fished much in the gorge. Pay attention as most of the trout are wild. I was doing what would be deemed as a French/Spanish style. I was using very light flies in this very thin water. I only fished the water for a short period. If I was more thourough I would h ave taken more. I just wanted to show people what they are missing by sticking to the pools.

Check it out. Hot the HD button as it was shot with an HD camera.

YouTube - Fishing the "B" Water

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[coolkyle]

Thanks! How do you like those Streamflex rods? They look pretty nice.

 

[Dr. Gonzo]

Great video, thanks!

 

[NJpatbee]

OK, I'll ask - What is "French/Spanish" type nymphing?

 

[coolkyle]

Just stole this from an old post on my other favorite board, Washington Fly Fishing: "Take about four good flies (the French use 6), remember the more you use the harder it is to cast and to fish them properly. Put a nice big floater as your top fly and strike indicator. A Joe's Hopper or any thing real boyant will work. Put a big leach or some sort of hellgramite nymph like a woolly bugger on the tippet end, and then attach two more wet flies or other jewels you think might be hot spaced in between. Be sure your tippet is smaller than all the rest of your leader or a rock might clean you out. Fish as you normally would, up to stink, let drift, mend as you go down. Watch that big dry fly as something may suck it down, but a little jiggle should be struck. Too many jiggles and no fish means your on the rocks and so shorten up."

 

[CreekAddict]

That isn't right at all.

It's just long line euro nymphing with 2 or 3 nymphs. The french fish upstream. The spanish quarter upstream.

While the czech or polish use 9 to 15 foot leaders, the spanish and french use 20 to 30 foot leaders. Maybe even longer. It was developed for fishing to spooky hard to catch fish.

Just think czech nymphing, 30 feet away from you. Really effective.

 

[jlajoie]

Nice stuff there, Aaron!

 

[ajfromnj]

Thanks for the kind words guys.

Creekaddict did a good job explaining it. I would add a few things:

French nymphinh usually uses much lighter flies than other Euro methods as a result of the direct upstream presentations. It is very easy to achieve depth with small flies when fishing upstream. Also, they will at times use only one fly and two the majority of the time.

Spanish nymphing is another long leader technique. This can be used to fish deep water zones as well as your average riffle.

I have 2 presentations in NJ next week. I will be at Central Jersey TU on Tuesday and Hacklebarney TU on thursday.

In addition to that I will be doing a show for Fy Fishing Internet Radio next Wednesday. So come to one of the presentations or listen to the show!

 

[CreekAddict]

Nice job on getting a spot on the radio show, Aaron. I'll be tuning in for sure.

 

[Corndog]

AJ,

Great video!

I think I heard you correctly...you were using a 10' 3wt? I love long rods, but have never considered a 10 footer in a 3wt. You're using it so you must like it's performance. Please explain the benefits of using a 10' rod.

Well know everyone knows my favorite technique and fishing spots on any given river.

Thanks,
Cdog

 

[CreekAddict]

I'm using the grey's 10ft 3 wt for euro nymphing as well. It's a great rod, with the perfect action for this style of fishing. You can land any fish with this rod, it's sensitive to buffer the lightest tippets, but it has enough backbone to take control of a fish's head. The extra foot(or more) is perfect for controlling the super long leaders used in euro nymphing.

I think Aaron is actually fishing 11 foot rods now. From what I've been told, that's the perfect size for the medium and large rivers. If you've ever fished with the long line euro techniques, the benifits of a longer rod are self explanitory.

 

[JeffK]

Funny thing is Thaddeus Norris recommended fishing the "other" water back in the 1860s, Ray Bergman did it in the 1930s (Trout has a great section of how most people fish a stream and how the guys who catch all the fish do it), Ed Shenk did it in the Musky in the 1950s with his Big Gray Nymph, and AJ is doing it today. People still congregate in the pools and the few guys fishing the water in between are still catching lots of fish.

AJ,
Looking forward to meeting next Thursday at Hacklebarney. Need to find out where to get longer fly rods. I made a 10' 4wt from a blank no longer available and an 11' one from a cheap crappie pole - but the ones you show look much lighter and nicer.

Jeff

 

[GARYB]

Spanish, French, Czech, Euro whatever........nymphing is nymphing. All these hi-tech
labels crack me up. The big hip term this season is "high sticking". The basics for nymphing
are good a dead drift upstream cast, nymph bouncing off the bottom, period, whether using a 7 foot or 12 foot leader. It's called the Jersey self taught way.
If you want a good book on nymphing, read Charles Brooks "nymphing for large trout"
basically using the Leisring lift method which is the same as all the new BS.

 

[Drossi]

Spanish, French, Czech, Euro whatever........nymphing is nymphing. All these hi-tech
labels crack me up. The big hip term this season is "high sticking". The basics for nymphing
are good a dead drift upstream cast, nymph bouncing off the bottom, period, whether using a 7 foot or 12 foot leader. It's called the Jersey self taught way.
If you want a good book on nymphing, read Charles Brooks "nymphing for large trout"
basically using the Leisring lift method which is the same as all the new BS.

Funny thing you should say this, I can remember an article in the old NJ Outdoors magazine (1977, 1978?) about doing the "nymph dance" on the Musky. If I remember correctly the method was almost a dead ringer for the Czech style, without the exotic name. I wish I still had that mag. It had a bunch of pics taken behind the diner (Orange Pit) in the old No-Kill.

Outfitters just create these sexy names to sell more gear. The techniques have been around far longer but come in and out of style.

 

[CreekAddict]

Euro nymphing is not really a new high tech label on an old technique.

Brooks's book is pretty good, but doesn't he talk a lot about using yarn indicators and split shot?

It's similar to what Humphries was doing, but still not the same. This is definitely its own technique. If you don't think so, you don't know what euro nymphing even is.

 

[JeffK]

All these are similar techniques - the end result is to drift a nymph in front of a trout - but have different subtleties in how you mend, how you weight, how you present the flies etc. In International competitive fly fishing you can't put weight on the line, so many of the European techniques developed by competitive fly fishermen use weighted nymphs rather than shot to get down. Some styles never let the nymphs get below the fisherman, others follow the fly downstream. Generally, competive fishermen, whether BASS or fly, are pretty precise on rigging and technique. Regular fishermen sure follow what the winning competitors are doing in either world too. The more tricks you have up your sleeve the better off you will be. Each style has a few special tricks and is adapted best to certain conditions - typically conditions like the locations where they were developed. We can all be better fishermen by learning what details separate the winners in tough competitions. All the competitors are excellent fishermen and all seem at first glance to be doing basically the same thing - but some guys win all the time so they have to be doing something different. Just like some guys catch all the fish when everybody seems to be doing largely the same thing.

The other comment about Czech nymphing, French nymphing etc are that these styles are not static. The competitors are always refining their techniques and are not bound to a rigid definition of a style. The French altered their techniques after the Czechs started winning in the late 1980's and are now back on top again. For example, leaders get longer and shorter, fly design is refined, number of flies fished can go up and down, and all sorts of techniques to detect hits are coming along. The object is to win competitions within the rules and not be stuck to fishing a given way. Only dry fly purists do that. On the other hand, we are not bound by competitive rules and can put a split shot on if needed.

 

[ajfromnj]

Gary,

I am sorry that you feel that way. Its ok I understand that some people are resistant to something new. Its only new here in the states. I am just happy that most guys are open to new things, and are looking to improve their skill level.

I am just curious, what brought out that rash of anger towards a fly fishing technique? There was no need for that. The exchange opf information was very pleasant.

Cheers!

Aaron

 

[GARYB]

AJ

Great video, sorry,rant wasn't personal; just believe they are similar methods of nymphing.
Didn't realize they had national teams.

 

[ajfromnj]

Gary,

No problem at all!! Come to one of my presentations next week of tune into fly fishing internet radio. You might like what you hear! I am sure that you will learn a lot!

 

[TheHeron]

The concept of fishing the "skinny" water and such makes sense since there are plenty of trout in those runs and most guys ignore them.

As for the technique, I like the Austrian Italian Chinese Antarctican Low Stick No Indicator Method myself.

Try fishing a dry in that same water and you'll have some real fun.

Mel

 

[GARYB]

Drossi

The old Orange Pit is where I learnt nymphing from this older guy we used to call the "Shrimp Man" because that's all he used. He taught me a lot about nymphing and how to tie the Musky shrimp. We used to kick butt in the old No-Kill and down thru Stephensburg.

 

[ajfromnj]

Funny uou should say that. I le3ned a lot there too. My favorite spot was the pool right below the Dairy Queen! The next riffle down was also ver productive as well,

 

[Drossi]

Drossi

The old Orange Pit is where I learnt nymphing from this older guy we used to call the "Shrimp Man" because that's all he used. He taught me a lot about nymphing and how to tie the Musky shrimp. We used to kick butt in the old No-Kill and down thru Stephensburg.

I didn't yet practice the art well enough to fish there (I was less than ten). I used to watch my uncle and dad fish from there down to the DQ. I used to lke the pool by the car wash and the one by the high tension wires. I haven't fished there since it became general regs. That's odd because I fish mostly general regs water. I think its because of the memories of what once was but is now lost.

 

[NJpatbee]

Funny uou should say that. I le3ned a lot there too. My favorite spot was the pool right below the Dairy Queen! The next riffle down was also ver productive as well,

We used to call that the "Esso", "Exxon", "Shell", or "Mobil" Pool depending on what oil company had a station there. It was actually very good water before the intense development added miles of macadam and we lost the fields where the water used to seep into the ground table.

As for nymphing techniques there are many different ones, and I jump at every opportunity to add a new one to my arsenal. We also have to call them something to give our dialogue some consistency and not confuse what we are talking about. When I first read about Czech nymphing, it was one of a number of techniques that I tried and used (because someone else showed me) over the years but never gave a thought as to what its "name" was. Who knows if it was first used in Eastern Europe, but if they made it popular calling it "Czech" is fine with me.

 

[theartoflee]

To quote Hemingway "There is a time and place for every thing" so each technique has its moments when it shines.

I always enjoy Aarons videos because he has character and is narration is usually good. Just because hes so into it makes you want to get into it even though its nymphing.

:victory: