The Valles Calderas is a National Preserve in northern NM, in the Jemez Mountains not far from Los Alamos. It was an original Spanish land grant, operated as a ranch continually from the early 19th century, until it was bought by the Federal Government in the 1980s. There are a number of streams on the property, which are tightly regulated to manage fishing pressure. You have to make a reservation and pay a $35 rod fee.
On a good day, the fishing is outstanding. Day 1, I fished the East Fork of the Jemez. See image below.
If you can't see the stream, don't feel bad. It's what it's like. The stream is that dark squiggle towards the right side of the image, and and you can just see (in the darker curves) how it meanders through the middle of the image. Here, the average width is only 18" or so, and it's often nearly hidden by the grass, even when you're on top of it. Every now and then, typically at a bend, it broadens out a bit, and that's where you can cast.
Fishing was dominated by the fact that it's been a very dry July in NM, and all of the streams in the Valles Caldera were running low. On the Jemez, it meant that you saw very few fish. Normally, when the fishing is good, the fish hold on top of the weed beds. (The Jemez fishes like a spring creek with ranunculus weeds covering much of the bottom. There's a good 18" of water BELOW the weeds, and when the water is high, a good 6" or more on top). Normally, when you come to a decent-sized opening, you can see 6, 8, or 10 fish on top of the weeds. They're spooky, you have to put in a good cast, but it's all sight fishing. They're not particularly selective (a hopper almost always works), so if you can get in a good cast, you can catch fish.
On THIS DAY, I saw only one fish all day that I actually cast to, and it was holding in a pocket above the true bottom, not above the weeds. I did see a trout burrow down through the weeds. But I didn't see a single trout holding on top - I think the water was just too low.
The only way I could figure out to catch fish was to spy an opening from a distance (the fish are really spooky, so you can't get a good look). If I saw a patch of light brown, it suggested there was a bit of bottom showing. Often, this patch was very small, maybe a 18" square within an opening that wasn't all that big to begin with...perhaps 2' by 4'. From about 30' I needed to drop a hopper onto the patch on the first cast (miss the cast, and the hopper would invariably snag on the grass... the commotion of retrieving it would spook any fish; get closer, and you'd spook the fish).
If I did everything right, most of the time I was rewarded with a strike. So I wasn't casting to fish (except in the one case I mentioned where I saw the trout above the patch). I was casting to patches of bottom.
It took me about 90 minutes minutes to figure this out. Another 30 minutes to adjust my casting to the appropriate accuracy. Luckily, I found myself in a "zone" for about 90 minutes, and in that period I managed a dozen strikes or so, and landed 6 fish. Five were rainbows. The smallest was probably 10" and the biggest 13". The sixth fish was a 10" chub. After that, while it took me a couple of hours to admit it, I was exhausted (did I mention I'd walked about 3 miles over this hummocky grass?). I walked downstream another mile and a half to get to "bigger water", but was so exhausted by the time got there, that I couldn't focus on the fishing, and wasn't catching anything. Then thunderstorms threatened, and I pretty much gave up after that.
I met a fisherman the next day who'd fished the East Fork several times in prior years, with good success, and had fished it that day, catching only 2 chub. So I guess I did OK. He was pissed.
The next two days I fished the San Antonio. The image below is from Reach 3 (of 4), which I fished Saturday. This is pretty typical of the size of the water, and is relatively "big" for the San Antonio. Only reach 4 has bigger water. Reach 1 (which I fished Sunday) is about half the average width you see here, though it does broaden into pools at least this wide in places.
While spring fed, the San Antonio fishes a lot more like a freestone stream, and has structure with riffles, pockets, undercuts, etc.
There are a LOT of fish on this stream. If you could get a fly drifting on water with any depth (anywhere) you would almost certainly get a strike, as long as you hadn't spooked the fish. And that was the rub. With the water so low, the fish were insanely spooky.
As you can see, there's basically no cover. You had to approach the stream bent over, rod tip down, and as you got closer, crawling on your elbows and knees. Sometimes you could take advantage of a tuft of taller grass, or bank erosion to provide a little extra cover. Once in position, you could carefully peer over the grass at the structure, and cast from a seated or kneeling stance. I don't think I ever caught fish if I was closer than 20' from where I was casting. And 30' was a lot better. With the 3 wt rod I was using, and a light breeze, it was constantly challenging, especially as the low position meant your backcast could snag on grass or thistles if you weren't careful.
As long as you didn't "line" fish, you could cast two or three times before spooking everything. However, generally you didn't need to cast more than once. Fish would swim well off their lie to snag your fly (they were delighted with my #12 hopper). However, you'd only get one take per structure. Whether you got a refusal, a strike, or hooked a fish, every other fish in the structure was spooked after that. They were very good at wriggling off the hook, frequently leaping, and diving into the weeds.
I hooked probably 30 fish, and landed 15ish, all but one browns (one 'bow). Most were 11-12". Large was perhaps 13". Judging from comments in the shuttle bus coming back from the stream, that was a whole lot better than most other folks did. Two fishermen admitted to catching two fish all day each. A couple of others just looked glum.
Sunday I asked for Reach 1, on the theory that the narrower banks would restrict the vision of the fish more and make them easier to approach. That turned out to be the case. While I did have to be careful, and cast from at least 20 feet, I never had to crawl into position (stooped over was OK), and half the time I could cast from a standing position. I was into fish all day. I never really counted, but it had to be 30+. Average size was smaller than on Reach 3. Typical was 9"-10". Maybe a third were 11"-12".
Overall, I had fun on the San Antonio. I'm sure that when the fishing is "on" this can be an easy river. Several anglers I spoke to recounted catching fish "on every cast" in other trips, and I believe it given the number if fish I saw. My fear going in was that this would be too easy. In the final analysis, I was fully challenged on the San Antonio. On the Jemez, it was totally challenging, but I can't say it was fun. Next time I'll try May.
No comments:
Post a Comment