Report on July 30 outing

We had our July 30th FPC Fly Fishing outing on South Boulder Creek, below Gross reservoir. Mark Liebetrau, Keith Vandegrift and I got on the water about 8:30 and fished until noon. The water was at 210 cfs, which is still fairly high for this stretch, and still a little off-color. Fishing was slow early on, but picked up a little by mid-morning. Not much surface activity was seen, but everyone landed at least a few fish on nymphs -- pheasant tail and 20-incher stonefly patterns were both effective. The fish seemed to be holding in the deep channels and the slower water behind rocks, and the largest fish were taken in the water below the trail bridge.
Sorry, no photos for this trip :-(

Watch the blog for an announcement about our August trip on another local trout stream!

Next Outing is Saturday July 30

Our next FPC Fly Fishing Fellowship will be Saturday, July 30. We will again meet up at 7:00 AM at Rocky Mountain Anglers, check in with Chet's friendly staff, and carpool to our chosen site. At the time of this post, we do not have a destination selected, and the extended runoff makes it a little difficult to plan far ahead. However, flows should be tapering off over the next few weeks and choices should become clearer, just like the water ;-)

Next Outing is Saturday June 11

Our next FPC Fly Fishing Fellowship will be Saturday, June 11. We will again meet up at 7:00 AM at Rocky Mountain Anglers, pick up the hot fly and carpool to our chosen site. At the time of this post, we are still deciding where to fish, but we're thinking stillwater -- a mountain lake or local warmwater lake. Hope to see many of you there!

Next Outing is Saturday May 7

Our next FPC Fly Fishing Fellowship will be Saturday, May 7. We will again meet up at 7:00 AM at Rocky Mountain Anglers, devise strategy and carpool to our chosen stream. At the time of this post, we are still deciding where to fish, but we're looking at Clear Creek and Boulder Creek as possibilities. Our goal is to keep the majority of our outings within an hour drive of Boulder.

Continue to follow this blog for updates...

April 9th Outing was a Blast!

On our first outing of the year last Saturday, a small group of us fished the Big Thompson River below Lake Estes. The condensed report: great weather, great company, and lots of fish to cast to!

Tyler and John work the pool at Sleepy Hollow Park on a glorious spring day



This nice brown was fooled by a beadhead Prince Nymph



Chris Miller, John Bahr, Tyler Hildebrand and Larry Rider met up at Rocky Mountain Anglers at 7. We had a cup of coffee courtesy of Chet and Randy, picked up a few flies, and headed off to the river. We parked at Sleepy Hollow Park about 6 miles down the canyon. The river was running about 50 cfs and clear, so careful casts and drag-free drifts were the order of the day. As expected, fishing was a little slow early on, but by mid-morning, the fish became more active and we were soon hooking up on nymphs and soft hackle flies.



Tyler with a nice rainbow taken on a BWO

 There were a lot of fishermen on the river, but you didn’t need to move very far to find good numbers of fish, and it somehow didn’t feel crowded. There is a nice variety of water in the little stretch near the parking lot, and we switched off between the riffles and large pools upstream, the deep pool and adjacent flats right at the parking area, and the small pockets and pools downstream. The fish became very active as the sun rose higher, and by mid-day, we were casting dries to large numbers of rising browns and rainbows.

Typical catch du jour

  



Gin-clear water made it just a bit more challenging

 

 


Pretty Rainbow, courtesy of John

  

It looks like the trout wintered over in very fine shape, so if you have a chance to get up to the Big T over the next few weeks, take it!

2011 FFF is Underway!
The FPC Fly Fishing Fellowship will continue in 2011 with monthly outings on local waters. We are planning the first trip for April 9, with the location TBD (Big Thompson canyon?). Follow this blog for updates.

To get on our mailing list, send an e-mail to Chris Miller at: cdmillerzz@aol.com

June 26th - Bail !

As we had no one in town to organize our June 26th trip we bailed. Bummer. Water should be much better on July 10th anyway though.

warm water day at sawhill pods - and no skunks!

our beginner's day started at rocky mountain anglers in boulder with coffee, doughnuts and bagels. (thanks chet!) we talked fishing, looked at flies and borrowed some kids waders then headed out to sawhill ponds in boulder. there were only 4 of us.

the weather was perfect for fishing (overcast) and the water was around 54 degrees, just enough that the fish were active. bwo's were coming off bit-by-bit and there was a lot of activity on the surface.

all four of us hooked up with tiny (~3") but if you wanted to keep the bluegills off the line you had to go bigger on your fly. (this didn't stop them from trying to eat it though!) seriously, this is a great place to bring kids/adults who want to try "catching", not just "fishing" with a fly rod.

between the four of us we probably caught 50 fish in 3.5 hours, consisting of large and small mouth bass, perch, crappie and tons of bluegills (some with beautiful coloring). we saw carp in one of the ponds.


the rain held off until after we packed up at noon. it was a great day but i wish more of you had come out. if you get a chance, head out to sawhill ponds, west of 75th street, just north of valmont. note the map near the parking lot to be sure you're not fishing in a restricted pond.

moraine park didn't dissappoint

we had our second fpc fly fishing fellowship outing of 2009 on july 25th in moraine park. the big t and cub creek didn't dissappoint. even though the forcast was for storms and rain by noon, we only got a sprinkle and the cloud cover helped the fishing!

8 guys had a great day on the water. we had 2 guys who just got started with a fly rod and our resident ex-guide had them casting like pros and getting hits in no time.

we were catching mostly brookies and some bigger browns.

lunch was a great time to hear about what was working where and where the lunker brown trout were holding. after scaring off the magpies from eating bob's pb&j sandwhich right out of my van, we had a little watermellon and headed back out.

the afternoon was cloudy, like the morning, and convinced the caddis flies to hatch earlier than normal which made for some exciting takes after lunch!

if you haven't yet fished with us, our next outing is saturday, august 22nd and we'd love to share the fun of fishing in God's amazing creation with you!

cheers!

next event planned - july 25th

the next fpc fff outing is saturday july 25th. the plan is to meet in the annex parking lot (not the church parking lot) at 7:00am, organize carpools and head up to a good trout stream – exact destination is yet to be determined.

fishermen of all skill levels and ages are invited, but you do need to have all your own equipment. however, we have a limited number of loaner rods/reels (please contact john bahr if you're interested in a loaner before july 23rd.

come and enjoy fellowship with other men in a beautiful setting. there is another outing planned for saturday august 22^nd. for more information contact John Bahr.