River Fishin: Look before you Cast

[BeeGuy]

This is a thread about observing your spot on the river before you start fishing.

Usually I fish the Bow and rarely venture to smaller rivers, however recently I hit up a somewhat smaller piece of water.

It brought back many memories of hunting my way along small headwater streams for brookies in Ontario, Quebec, NS and Cape Breton.

I know this is a usual practice for fly fishermen (hopefully), but I thought I breach the topic for those gear chuckers (purists only) that walk up to the river and start rippin.

When you approach a smaller river, slowly creep up to the edge and look, you will be amazed at what you see once you train your eyes to pick out fish.

You will see fish basking, hiding, holding, and feeding in many different spots.

In my last venture I was able to watch pike, brookies and whitefish all doing their thing and without a doubt it helps increase your catch rate and identify techniques that are more specific to the species and conditions present.

Feel free to contribute.

[tight line]

I try and blend in with my surroundings, Dress to match the colour of the river bank, avoid wearing bright clothing. Good polarized glasses give you a better view, and allow you to see the fish that much easier.

[BeeGuy]

Creeping techniques:

I pillaged the brookies in Johnson Creek last year during the cull training by inching up to the creek on my belly and slowly sliding my fishing rod out over the log jams and lowering a fly along the edges.

If you didnt spook them you could get a half dozen from each spot.

just flip them up onto shore on the take.

then pan and hot grease

[jacenbeers]

Yesterday I fished a small river and couldn't agree more. It was fairly late so there was not a lot of sunlight where I was fishing. However, I could easily slowly approach the pools and see the fishing hanging out and chuck my gear right in front of them to maximize my chances and it worked well.

[fish gunner]

Geeze bee now everybody knows, the whole interwebmajobber will be belly crawling up and down the river banks now I have to not step on them