Farmington TMA 7/25/2008 - good fishing, lots of walking

[alanb_ct]

Fished the TMA with Aaron today. As far as locations, it's easy - we fished almost the whole thing! We parked one vehicle at Rt. 219 and the other at Church Pool. We took a break halfway and I hoofed the rest from around Spare Tire to get my car at Church Pool. Tough walking in the mid-day heat.

The fishing was good (for Aaron anyway), but I guess not great. I started out with streamers and caught one, then nymphed for the rest of the day. I didn't get too many, never really got in to synch at all.

Aaron landed two twenty inchers and I was happy to oblige with pictures. They were both sight-fished and the first one (amazingly) turned towards Aaron making for an easy "plunk" cast right at our feet. Of course, it took the nymph immediately and Aaron set. I couldn't believe it! "It's better to be lucky than good!" Here's that fish:



A bit later, when I was driving back, Aaron nailed the next one and I waded over for the pictures. Here we go:




By the way, we ate a great lunch at Blue Sky Foods and struck up nice conversation with both shops. It was a good day to be out.

[AaronJasper]

Alain,

The conversation at lunch was the highlight of the day! The cheeseburger there was a close second...

[alanb_ct]

I agree! Here's the nice one at nearly full resolution:

[SlowNDeep]

Nice Tail!

With the stocking of bigger rats on the Farmington, the "magic number" has moved to 22 (or more).

[Nymphmeister]

Slo-

Are you crazy? Even with the 1,000 or so bigger 2 Year Olds that are stocked at the Farmington (averaging 16-18") every April, it still is an event/accomplishment to catch a 20" holdover trout in daylight. For all the days I've logged there this year, my biggest so far in '08 is 19 1/2"- caught lots of holdovers in the 18" to 19 1/2" range, but none made the magic 20" mark. I HEAR about 20 inch trout being caught there, but usually when you put a measuring tape to them, they magically shrink to 17-18".

On just about any public Northeastern trout stream, Farmington included, a 20 incher is a major league fish. Maybe on the Delaware River watershed 20" trout are not unusual, but they usually only come to the better fishermen, and you still typically catch many lesser fish for each 20" one you get. 20" is a damn big trout on just about any trout stream that I fish, and even on many Montana Rivers it's still a not so common occurence, with a few noteable exceptions (Big Horn, etc.). The Madison is famous for coughing up really big browns, and they still get some true trophies there, yet for every 20" fish caught there by Joe Average, I bet hundreds of 14-19" trout get caught. Aaron & I fished the Green River in UT a few years ago in March for several days, and although we caught lots of trout and SAW some some of 20" or better, guess what, our largest was about 19".

And remember, with stocked trout being the backbone of all the fisheries you & I fish with regularity, they all start as "rats" at some point.

20" is still the magic mark for me at the Farmington and almost anywhere else I fish (Great Lakes excepted!).

[SlowNDeep]

18 to 19.5 inches on the Farmington is common over the last few years, and the 18-19.5 inch trouts dont look so nice, the magic number on the Farmington has been increased to 22.

Ask Heron how many 20+ fish he got there this year alone.

6 or 8 years ago, an 18 inch fish was a prize on the Farmington, I've had at least 4 days this year alone with multiple 18+ fish and they dont look like multiple year holdovers, and I don't fish anymore (well not much anyway).

Lets just say we disagree.

[Magnet]

He's Ba-aack!

[Salter]

Nice report - WTG Aaron!!


[quote author=Magnet link=topic=1934.msg13483#msg13483 date=1217134239]
He's Ba-aack![/quote]

Salmon Parr anyone!?!

Magnet: Is that a Framy fish?

Michael

[Magnet]

It is Mike,from up above the TMA, but its an old picture from the spring time. With the thread going the way it was I thought it would be funny for the nymphmeister to see it again. Some times my sense of humor is funny to only me. Ha! Lol. It took a caddis pupa size #16. I used a "Jasper formula" leader with 5x tippet.

[heavyd]

Just my 2 cents. The number 20 gets thrown around way to much on the farmy. Dep stocked 60 fish this year through out the river ranging from 8-12 pounds. Thats were the monsters are coming from. I havent seen to many hold overs over 20 inches this year or past two years prior. If you watch the shocking study the dep does every year you would see that 20 is the majic number. True holdovers over 20 inches are rare. A 20 inch brown is a big fish.