Ramapo River

New PB brown trout! I came home this weekend to celebrate my birthday, and the river did not dissapoint. This fish ties my longest at 18" but is definitely much larger. After the downpour yesterday and the continuous rain today, I was worried the river would be blown out, however, it was just a bit high and dirty. This of course made the perfect conditions for these fish. Overall, I landed 2 fish and missed another 3, but this time I managed to land the largest fish of the day. One of the fish that I missed was about the same size as this one, but launched its entire body out of the water to try and hit my rapala. I had it on the surface less than a foot from shore and was about to lift it out of the water when the fish came out of nowhere. I have a feeling that I could throw a popper and get a brown on topwater in this stream. The fish that I caught was in a run that is usually shallow. There is a large hole under a stump, but the last two days there was only a trickle going into this hole. Because of the rain, the trickle was now a very nice run, and sure enough he smashed it in the current. I'm very lucky I was still using my braid rod, because he wrapped me around a tree, and I had to go into the run to net him. If I had my ultralight, I most definitely would have lost him. All of this happened in 3 hours of fishing, and I still havent explored upstream. This is definitely my new favorite fishing spot!

Today was basically a repeat of yesterday, except it took place further downstream. I caught 1 fish and moved 3 others. I missed the hookset on a brown a similar size, I had a little stocked bow who must've swam up from downstream chase the husky jerk right to the bank multiple times, never committing, and a 3rd fish swipe at it once and never came back. The 3rd fish must've been 18-20", and even though he didn't feel the hooks, knew better not to come back. I can't wait until I have a full day to explore this river. Unfortunately this is my last day in NJ for about the next month. I'm taking a dummer class up in VT, but that just means I get to experience summer up there, which I hear is great. There's a handful of fish up there that I am planning on targeting that I have yet to add to my species list. I actually looked at the weather this time, and it is supposed to be 72 and sunny in southern VT, so I think I will attempt to cross at least one, potentially two off of my list.

In just about 2 hours of fishing, I was rather successful. Headed to a trophy brown trout stream basically in my backyard. I've had okay luck here in the past but today was definitely the best so far. Landed this one foot long wild brown, but I also missed the hookset on another, and had a 3rd fish follow me in. I think I had a fourth break me off, but it easily could have been a rock. All of this was on a little green husky jerk. Of course, the smallest fish of the day was the one I managed to net, as the other two looked to be about 16-18". Since I only had one husky jerk, I called it a day after I lost it. The good thing though is that I can walk here from my house, and I most likely will head back early tomorrow morning.

Smallie hit that Thomas !!