Fishing the Housatonic River in Ct.
I drove to Kent, Ct. to pick up my daughter from school for the weekend – and to watch her soccer game. Since she has classes on Saturday morning and the game was at 3pm, I decided to do a little fly fishing on the Housatonic River.
It was a beautiful day – sunny and chilly, so I got an early start. I began my exploration north of the West Cornwall covered bridge.
(photo from a visit earlier this summer)
The river is wide with a rocky bottom. Plenty of pocket water and pools to choose from. Not much was happening in the air (no mayflies/caddis/etc) so I started my day with a Black Beadhead Wooly Bugger. Within a few minutes I had this nice Brown Trout in hand:
As I headed downstream, the water was shallow with lots of large boulders. I caught one, then two nice small mouth bass. They really put up a fight and know how to work the current to their advantage! Further downstream, I was nymphing with a copper Copper John (#16) below a larger grasshopper (John Barr’s famous Hopper-Dropper combo – hey, it works!). Caught this slightly smaller Brown:
After a quick break to eat a granola bar and have some water, I headed downstream from the covered bridge. A paved road leading through a religious camp terminates at a parking area with a trail to access the river along the east side. I followed the trail for about 15 minutes before finding a spot that looked appealing. It was this large rock that caught my attention:
A few drifts with the Copper-Dropper combo yielded this:
which I believe is a Fallfish (Semotilus corporalis). When I first hooked it, I thought I had a big Brown Trout! This little guy put up one heck of a fight.
Shortly after noon, the weekend flotilla of drift boats and then canoeists started drifting by. The fishing slowed to a standstill and it was time to head to Kent to see my daughter play soccer. The Housatonic is a beautiful river with lots of variety. I’ll be back later this fall!