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South Fork

Jimmy's All Seasons Angler / South Fork (Page 62)

South Fork 08-11-11

The South Fork has  dropped  to 9,000 cfs and has been steady for a couple of days. The water clarity has also improved a lot from last week.. We have been having better success on the surface with bigger attractors like chubby chernobyls. Its important to twitch   these flies instead of dead drifting them. The most consistent fishing is still  with nymphs either under an indicator or dry.  Streamer action has been good from daylight till around 8:00 am and then again when the shadows fall in the evening. The Pale Morning Dun emergence is still spotty but they are appearing in more riffles with each day.

One note about the Lorenzo ramp. The Bureau of Land Management will be removing the large rocks in front the ramp as soon as flows permit.

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South Fork 8-8-2011

Flow out of Palisades Dam is down to 11000 cfs which is approaching normal for this time of year and is very close to current Palisades Reservoir inflow.  Temperature of water coming out of dam is around 57 Deg. F.  Nevertheless best fishing continues to be with nymphs, wet flies, and streamers.  Plenty of submerged food remains in the river, so fish have little need to come to the surface to feed.   Looking into the future, there will be more drops in the flow out of Palisades Dam as summer passes by. With these drops in flow fish will tend to come to the surface more often.   Keep in touch with this report as we will post dry fly action as it is bound to improve over the second half of summer.

Tim went down the Lower river this morning and has a report about the Lorenzo boat ramp. Check it out on Today at Jimmy’s or just click here.

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South Fork 8-05-2011

Flow out of Palisades Dam dropped to 12500 cfs yesterday.   The USGS reports a water temp at 4PM yesterday  56 Deg. F.  just below the dam.  So warming water and lower flows mean we are headed in the right direction for improving dry fly fishing.   Currently the best way to find action remains nymphing and presenting streamers, but dry fly fishing is coming on.  See Jimmy’s report for 8/3/2011 for dry and wet fly recommendations.

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South Fork 8-3-11

We are getting a lot of calls and questions as to when the dry fly fishing will finally turn on the South Fork. So here is our take on the situation. The river flow is very fishable at the present flow of 13,400 cfs.  There are plenty of riffles, drop offs and structure to fish around. Water clarity is slowly improving but what we really need is for the water to warm up so that the hatches start earlier in the day and last longer. We are catching some fish on dries in the afternoons on Pale Morning Duns, Yellow Sallies and Chubby Chernobyls.

Nymphing and Streamer fishing has been excellent. We have been using a size 6 or 8 dark rubber leg with a smaller golden stone or yellow sally nymph below it. For streamers we have fishing the slower banks and drop offs with a sink-tip. Brighter colored streamers that have some flash have been the best.

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South Fork 8/1

Flows on the South Fork have remained steady at 13,600 cfs. for the past few days. Fishing is defiantly picking up on the river. the Nymphing is really good and the dry fly is getting better everyday. PMD’s, Yellow Sallies and Golden stones are flying around, fish are starting to key in on them. Dry Fly fishing is better in the afternoons and they have been eating in riffles and slow flat water. Rubberlegs early in the morning have been producing large fish, and streamers presented against the bank have had the same results. The water temp is steadily rising and I expect to have red hot dry fly fishing very soon. Keep posted!

South Fork 07-26-11

Just wanted to give you an update on the conditions. The flow has dropped below 17,000 to 16,400 cfs. At 16,000 and below the river is within its banks and the islands are not submerged anymore. There are a lot of goldens and sallies hatching and we have had some reports of success on dries. The inflows into Palisades continue to drop steadily so conditions will continue to improve.

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South Fork 7/25

In our efforts to continue to keep you updated on the water flows and fishing conditions for the South Fork. Inflows are dropping very fast and the flows from Palisades Dam has been dropping as well, this morning the flows were at 17,400 cfs. We expect to have these flows to continue to drop this entire week.

Dry Fly fishing is beginning to pick up in the riffles. I heard very good reports of fish eating mayflies this weekend. The riffle fishing will only get better and better as the water drops and those gravel bars get exposed. There are very good hatches of Yellow Sallies and Golden Stones on the water as well. Nymphing is still the best fishing technique for catching fish, however this should change soon as the dry fly fishing continues to improve.

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South Fork 07-23-11

The inflow into Palisades is dropping fast and the Bureau of Reclamation has reduced the outflow from Palisades to 20,400. There will be another drop today of 1000 cfs. If we continue to see the inflow drop 1000 to 1500 cfs a day it is probable the Bureau will drop flows in the South fork and we will have very fishable flows week.

If you fish in the next couple of days I would continue to use nymphs below the drops. With each decrease in the flow there will be more holding water and the riffles will start to appear. I would also would not rule out trying a dry later in the day. The hatches have been steady through this high water so with the river coming into shape we should have the good fishing we have waiting for.

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South Fork 7-19-11

The flow below Palisades Dam was reduced to 20,400 cfs from  24,000 over the weekend. The inflow into Palisades is also dropping fast. We floated the canyon yesterday and caught fish on nymphs and san juan worms. There were a lot of yellow sallies and some golden stoneflies in the air. We saw pale morning duns in good numbers too but we saw very little surface action. The water clarity has improved and really isn’t bad at all. With the amount of bugs we saw I expected to see some fish next to shore in the slower current. (We did try dries along several of the better looking banks but had no takers.)We have caught fish on dries with this color of water so my guess is that we need to see the water drop into that 16,000 cfs range.

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