Hi Folks, Well June is on the books. Pretty decent month of trout fishing. Lots of hatching insects and feeding fish. The weather has created some issues. We went from near drought conditions to a tropical rain forest. Stable weather in fishing is always preferred. The last couple of weeks, the weather, has been all over the board. Our river levels have all come up. As of yesterday, the Lamoille and Winooski main stems were not fish able. High and muddy. Trib. streams are in good shape and I like fishing them when they are high. You tend to see the larger fish actively feeding. Water temperatures have maintained in the smaller brooks. The larger rivers are starting to reach a point where they are too warm for trout fishing. Water temperatures in the brooks I have visited have ranged from 59 to 64 degrees. We have presented a variety of big dry fly patterns from a #14 Royal Chubby, a #12Royal Wulff, a #14 x-caddis, a #12/#14 Royal rubber legged Trude, and a #12-#16 parachute Adams. I have been fishing small dropper patterns off the dry flies. A #20 JuJu Baetis, #16-#18 olive caddis pupa, and #16-#18 pheasant tails. Regardless of the fly attached to the tippet, the presentation still needs to be good. Good drifts catch fish! Bass fishing has been inconsistent for me. We are working hard to catch a few fish. I think the unstable weather and post spawn conditions can make bass fishing tricky at times. It has been tough to find a pattern in the bass fishing. The giant mayfly #4 Hexagenia Limbata in now hatching on our NE Kingdom lakes. It is a burrowing May fly and hatches at dark in and around soft bottom areas of lakes and ponds. Typically where streams dump into lakes at the the first sharp drop off are good areas to locate trout gulping the giant bug! The issue is most of the fishing is done at dark from 9:00pm to 5 am in the morning. When the Hex spinners drop, the fish go bonkers! However, this typically occurs while most folks are asleep. I will begin to concentrate more on catching smallmouth bass as summer sets up and continue to walk the small brooks in search of wild trout. Remember to clean your gear and keep the non-native species at home. Have Fun, Willy
