Lets examine some photos.
First 'river herring' of the year. First fish caught last Friday at Chain Bridge.
Not long after we got into hickory shad. Water temps were in the low 60's. I like them to be above 63.
Bent 5wt is what I want to see. Aggressive stripping causes the hickories to go frantic and attack flies
One of the smaller hickory shad from last week
Just a few hours later the hickories increased in size. The biggest of the day was about 15"
Nothing beats a bit of hickory shad spooge on your wellies
Check out this hickory, it has damage to its operculum. We got one last year that had this on both sides
I wanted to switch up the color of 1/32 oz shad jigs from chartreuse to pink
On the boat on the Occoquan. Plenty of fish around just not biting. We spooked a striper that was over two feet long. The bird watching was exceptional
Back up to Fletcher's on Sunday. I've never had anyone redeem a donated trip from a raffle until this day. We got into fish. Often and steady but not insane. Mostly on the Snowhite Damsel.
This one was massive. 1.3lbs
The wind was relentless. I was cold and glad I wore waders. The trip up with my dinky outboard was 45 minutes
A bunch of Apache helicopters flew over. They looked like they were ready for battle
Bent rods above Walker's Point.
One nasty gizzard shad
Art from Orvis Tysons Corner joined me at the Tidal Basin yesterday. Harry got one MASSIVE LARGE MOUTH BASS. You have heard me talk about him on the podcast. He is such a sweet guy. He gives these to others to eat and he can fish like you wish you could fish
'Artemis" with a yellow perch. He got this on a Senyo Ice Man Minnow
Here is that huge herring fly
Jamal got this one (fourth of the day) on a spinner bait
Here is all the botanical flotsam that floats down during flood stage
POTUS breaking off from the other Sikorski and Blackhawk
Since the river is blown out and better be fishable by tomorrow, lets look at some film:
Just a sample of the shorts I've filmed this week. Water is dropping so get your flies tied up now and get out this weekend. Dress warm. Water temps are dropping just as the air temps, just not as slow.