Twenty One hours with no sleep, 274 miles round trip, three rivers in one day. I may recover in about a week. After a fitful 3 hours sleep Friday night, I was up at 3 A.M. and tying 3 more flies for the trip. These were a wet fly style representing a green caddis emerger which caught one rainbow.
Tomahawk State Wildlife Area:
Picked my friend Larry up at 5:30 and off we went for the Tomahawk State Wildlife Area on the Middle Fork of the South Platte. This stream runs through the Buffalo Peaks Ranch owned by the City of Aurora. The stream is reached by heading south up 285 from Denver to Fairplay and turning south on highway 9 toward Hartsel. About 6 miles from the turnoff, you will see a sign for the Tomahawk Wildlife Parking on the east side of the highway. The stream on the west side of the highway is more fishable than immediately by the bridge.
Tomahawk State Wildlife Area is designated as "Gold Medal Water". Big browns migrate from Spinney Reservoir to spawn in this area each fall. Check the fishing regulations as they change from year to year. Dry flies work well in this area. Here is a good map to the South Park area including Tomahawk Wildlife area, Spinney and Eleven Mile Reservoirs, Fairplay and the Tarryall Creek area.
If you go past the highway side parking and follow the road until it ends, there is parking for the Tomahawk Wildlife Area. Larry and I were alone as we got into our gear about 9 A.M. The air temp was cool but would soon warm up after the sun cleared the ridge behind the parking lot.
City of Aurora operates two water stations in this area. One was 99 CFS and the other 86 CFS. These would average out at 92 CFS but the stream looked closer to 110 to me. Water clarity was murky with visiblity to bottom only about 6 feet away if the water was over 1 foot deep. Larry and I started working the stream from the bridge upstream fishing west to east. Seining along the west bank produced some rock caddis nymphs, a few small mayfly nymphs about size 18 and some midge larvae.
I started with a size 16 bead head gold ribbed hare’s ear on top and an 18 gray white wing RS2 on the bottom. Somewhere about 10:30 or 11:00 the water had warmed up enough for hatch activity. In the area of the bridge, I saw some red quills, pmds, lots of tan caddis activity and a small midge hatch.
Later in the day, a fellow with a golden retriever by his side hooked and landed a beauty of a rainbow. About 18 - 19 inches long with a 7 inch girth on a hopper cast right along the bank. He was fishing west to east just upstream from the bridge.
Larry is a walk and fish type of guy, He was far ahead of me catching fish off the surface. Larry had changed to a tan caddis dry fly.
Larry’s next catch was about 12 inches. This was the average we hooked up with this day. Although Tomahawk does contain much larger fish they are very spooky. We did ok for the first time fishing the area.
Of course, the tan caddis would be the one I had not tied. I had a black, a yellow and an orange foam caddis with me. I decided to try the orange foam caddis.
On my side of the stream, I spotted a riser. Wading across a feeder stream, I positioned at the upstream edge where the two streams joined up. I was using my Terry L. Johnson 7′6" 4pc 4wt fly rod. My little T.L. Johnson performed a flawless cast 30 feet upstream and a little 9 inch rainbow smacked my orange caddis within a foot of drift. Letting him go, I cast several more times missing another riser with a too fast hook set. Interest in my orange caddis stopped.
Up the feeder stream, I spotted a small fish jumping for insects. Wading carefully into position at the base of large pool, I cast over the slack water and hooked a junior rainbow. None of the fish were big in this pool, but I had a blast casting a dry fly. (Normally I nymph fish only). This was fly fishing at its best. Feel of the rod loading and unloading to send a dry fly to its target. A trout snapping at the fly as it landed on the water. Moving upstream on this feeder, I took a fish from almost every pool or run with a main seam line. The orange caddis was extremely visible on the water too.
Larry and I fished this section of the Middle Fork of the South Platte for 3 hours before heading for the Dream Stream on the South Platte between Spinney Mountain Reservoir and Eleven Mile Reservoir.
Dream Stream:
Running 271 CFS. Was a total bust. Rain squall for an hour. We sat it out in the car. Water clarity was murky with bottom visible only some 4 feet away and less than 2 feet deep. Did not see fish, not any risers, not even a flash. No strikes, no hookups. No hatches Nothing. I went small, medium and large. Nothing.
Since we did not catch anything on the Dream Stream, enjoy this video of a large brown caught there.
South Platte River West of Highway 9 and 24 intersection:
Park in the parking area just off of Highway 9 on the west side before highway 24. It is a short meadow walk to the stream. Water flow appeared to be under 90 CFS. Clarity was medium but bottom had lots of moss in runs and pools. Rocks at stream side were often slimed over and slippery.
On the first pool, I hooked a nice 13 to 14 inch rainbow out of a fast main water seam along the pool. This little fighter took my #16 beadhead gr, fb hare’s ear.
Badger Basin Wildlife Area - nice 14 inch so platte river rainbow 080208 - approximately .75 pounds
Several pools upstream, a caddis hatch had some risers but by the time I had switched over, the hatch and activity had stopped. I fished several more runs and 2 foot deep pools without anymore activity.
Larry had disappeared upstream somewhere. I was exhausted and headed for the car. As I finished getting out of my gear, Larry came down through the meadow. He had been fishing a special place that I can’t disclose. His dry fly had received a couple of looks from something large as Larry put it.
After stowing the gear we headed for home. Two and half hours later, I dropped Larry at his car and headed for my home exhausted. But a great day on 3 separate waters. Slept for 8 and 1/2 hours totally out.
Tight Lines and Good Fishing,
Marshall, Editor
www.fly-fishing-colorado.com
www.110flyfishingtips.com
www.troutadventures.com
Alaska Trout Fishing Information
2 responses so far ↓
1 Michael // Aug 5, 2008 at 9:08 pm
Marshall - We were at the Dream Stream the day before. Sunny, with clear water, and still it was slow. Had to go extra-small to produce - and did pull in one on streamer (although it was like 14 and the sun was setting by then too).
Best, Michael
2 It’s Wednesday. Are you thinking about work, or fishing? | Michael Gracie // Aug 6, 2008 at 1:10 pm
[...] Estes has been prowling the South Platte, and putting them in the net. I applaud his choice of [...]
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