During the 1960s I was a kid growing up in central Ontario, Canada. I did a lot of fishing in the river that ran through the back of our farm. The only thing I ever caught there was catfish although there were some big pike in the river, I just didn’t have the gear for them.

I remember my older brother Chuck catching a huge walleye on one of his fishing trips. I was always to young to go on those trips as there was a lot of drinking. Anyways he didn’t call the walleye a walleye, ever. He always called it a pickerel.

I was actually 30 years old and living in New Brunswick Canada before I saw my first Chain pickerel and realized they weren’t the same species.

Chain pickerel are also known as “federation pickerel” and in SE U.S. they are nicknamed “jack fish”.

Caught My First Chain Pickerel on The Fly

It’s kind of cool the way I found out about pickerel here in New Brunswick as I mostly fished brook trout. I consider myself blessed to have caught my first real pickerel on the fly rod while fly fishing for trout so it was a happy accident.

Fishing A Flooded Forest on The Fly Rod

It feels like a lifetime ago I had been invited to go fishing with a fly fishing buddy. Wayne wanted to take me to a little spot he wants to keep secret. He told me we would be able to catch some big brook trout on the fly.

Once we arrived I could not believe he expected me to actually use a fly rod in there. It was a forest that had been flooded years earlier when busy beavers had blocked the flow of water and flooded a large patch of timber.

Wayne told me there was 16″ brookies within. I didn’t call him a liar however I’d been thinking it. I did become a believer after he landed the first 16″ brook trout.

Fly fishing through trees was really a brand new experience. I had fished ponds and brooks for trout using the fly rod, had even learned to deal with trees behind me just not a forest all around me.

I spent most of my time staying out of the trees but did get a few trout. As usual when it comes time to leave I usually need to get a couple more casts. Just as I pulled the fly from the water for that final cast a pencil like 10″ fish flew from the water and grabbed that fly.

I couldn’t imagine just how intense this tiny fish was. That was when I learned the difference between a walleye and a pickerel.

These days I fish Chain pickerel every chance I can. My record continues to grow from that first 10″ chain pickerel to 25″.

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I certainly enjoy brook trout fishing here in New Brunswick, on the fly or using my spinning rod. The thing is there can be so many brookies that all you catch are small ones while the big ones just get bigger. It really pays to study the water so you are casting to the places that should hold the biggest trout or you’ll be catching 10 inch brook trout all day.

Not saying there is anything wrong with that, it’s still a lot of fun.

For Me Spring Brook Trout Fishing Rocks

My favourite time of the year to fish trout is in the early spring as soon as our trout fishing season opens April 15. There can still be ice in the water but as long as you have a clear spot to cast to you can catch trout after trout and they can be quite active even though the water is only a degree or two about freezing.

I practice catch and release almost 100% but in the early spring when the water is so clear and cold the brook trout just tastes so good that I have to take a feed of trout home for my family to enjoy. The rest of the year it’s all CPR, catch, photograph and release for me.

Some places the fishing never shuts down, it’s an all year round thing but in New Brunswick our trout season is April 15 and ends Sept. 15 in all the areas I know of.

Brook Trout Fishing In Late August

When it comes to brook trout fishing I do prefer the fly rod. Fly fishing for brook trout is a lot of fun and most of the time I can fly fish using top water or dry flies that float. Just love seeing them take it from the surface.

The thing about evening fishing at the end of a long hot day is that everything becomes active as the sun drops and the air temp cools slightly. Just enough to make those nervous trout a little less nervous giving the opportunity for a great catch.

Brook Trout, Beaver Ponds And Early Morning Fog

When it comes to beaver ponds I love to get there with my float tube or canoe  just about day light. I used to get there and get right in the water but in the past few years I have relaxed a bit, just a bit and now I like to get there early and sit on the bank while I have a coffee and just watch to see what’s going on.

Get out on one of these ponds in the early morning mist can be almost mystical. Especially when you can’t see 30 feet in front. It’s the time that I find it’s most relaxing, until that first strike of course.

On a day to day basis I prefer to fish trout in the early morning before the sun is high on the water. If I’m fishing a river or a stream it doesn’t seem to matter so much as there are usually plenty of trees hanging over the water to keep the sun out of their eyes and making it harder for airborne predators to spot them.

If it’s cloudy all day I find the fishing can be fairly constant all day long.

When the day has been long sunny and hot I like to get my fly rod out and hit the water in the evening as it starts to cool off. Even the bugs like it when it cools off a bit and become active. It’s a great opportunity to catch a number of trout but also to catch that trophy you’ve been seeking.

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One of my favourite ways to fish for trout or pretty much anything I fish, is on the fly. Using my flyrod gives me an entirely different feel than any other way I fish. I also tie most of my own flies which gives me another thrill each time I hook a fish on a new fly I tied.

I catch trout on some flies that are so small, some a size 22, that I’m surprised they even see it as a food source. But man can they attack those little. Some days it’s just not stop all day and evening. Usually in the heat of summer.

You can stop at just about any stream or brook here in New Brunswick and there will be brook trout. If you can get a fly in there you’re most likely to get some however I have found that moving off the road about a 15 minute walk will land you many more trout and bigger ones as most people don’t go far off the road. You have to break through that barrier of Alders before you get to where you can cast your fly, at most places.

My Choice For Brook Trout Flies

I enjoy tying my own trout flies for my fly fishing trips although I don’t get to tie as many as I once did. Life tends to get too busy some times but there is such a difference mentally when I use my own flies. I guess that would be pride.

I’m a real sucker for the dry fly but then again I’m the same way with my spinning gear. I just love top water action. Very visual. You cast that fly out there and it lands so softly on the water it barely makes a ripple and then BAM. A trout slams it and it’s game on.

My personal favourite dry, wet and streamer trout flies:

Dry Flies – Hair Wing Dry Flies – size 8-18

- Gray Wulff
- White Wulff
- Irrisistible

Dry Flies – Fan Wing – size 10-20

- Adams
- Royal Coachman Fanwing
- Dark Hendrickson

Other Trout Dry Flies I Use

- Misquito size 10-20
- Brown Bivisible sizes 10-20
- Brown Hackle Peacock sizes 12-20

Wet Flies

- Black and Grizzly Weighted Wooly Worm – size 2-10
- Coachman Lead Wing Wet Fly sizes 12 -18
- March Brown English Wet Fly sizes 10-14

Streamers For Brook Trout

- Mickey Finn – size – 6-10
- White Maribou Streamer sizes 10-14
- Black Woolly Bugger – size – 6-10

There are flies that just seem to catch everything so it’s important to treat your fish with respect and if you’re not taking them home get them back in the water quickly. Keep them in the water and only take them out for a quick picture or two and then release them back so others can have that same experience some day. So practice CPR – Catch, Photograph and Release.

I release more than 90% of my fish back into the wild to catch another day but I do keep a few, mostly in early spring while the water is still ice cold. They always taste so good at that time of year. Maybe it’s because I haven’t had any since the previous season. Of course if I damage a fish I will not put it back hoping it will survive. I just take it home and cook it up for dinner.

Many happy days on the water my friend.

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I don’t seem to get out fly fishing for trout and salmon as often as I would like these days and I don’t mean because the season is closed. It’s more because I have some new fishing buddies over the past couple of years and we are kind of addicted to fishing for bass and chain pickerel, although they are a blast on the fly rod as well but I don’t use the same flies for these guys that I use for trout and salmon here in New Brunswick. I prefer to use small dry flies when ever possible but for bass and pickerel I like to use big flies, like streamers and big deer hair bugs.

When I am fly fishing trout streams I like to start with dry flies like the Adams dry fly with a lot of brown in it. There is just something about using brown hackle dry flies, the trout just love them and I seem to catch far more trout with them. I haven’t tied any Adams for years so I jumped onto Youtube and looked up a video for tying an Adams dry fly, check it out.

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Trout are cold blooded creatures and are directly affected by the change in water temperature, so the colder the water the slower their rate of metabolism. To accelerate their metabolic rate they are going to stay close to the surface in the direct sunlight where it is more effective so they can warm up their body.

The quicker a predator can swim the more they can eat. Of course the faster their food source can swim the hungrier the predator will get so it’s important to get that first direct sunlight in order to be the fastest.

I have noticed when the water reaches a certain temp, typically late spring, they tend not to lay in the sunlight as long.

Fishing During The Burning Hot Summer Days

From the beginning of spring through the beginning summer months fish, small and big, are making an effort to warm up. But, when early spring moves into summer the high temperature coming from direct sunshine gets a lot more extreme. At this time they tend to search for protection out of the burning rays of sunlight.

Fish have a tendency to try to find deeper, cooler water or just about any barrier that offers shade from the sunlight.

It’s at these times angling becomes extremely enjoyable because fish could explode on a lure from the cover of weeds.

It’s been a year since I went fly fishing, when I took Tim fly fishing for his first Atlantic salmon in the Cains River. It was 5 long years before that since I was out with my fly rod.

I love fly fishing but my health took a sharp 180 back in 2004 and it 5 years before I was able to wave my arms around like I like to do when fly fishing.

I was a little out of practice but it comes back quickly. It was also quite windy and I worked hard to keep control and ended up with three big blisters on my right hand. Ha, they will heal in a few days and for the fun I had it was definitely worth it.

Jamie, who I have never done any fly fishing with, gave me a call and asked if I wanted to go fly fishing . He would be here to pick me up in a half hour. Well I was ready in 5 minutes and paced the floor for the next 25 minutes.

As the title says we went to Penobsquis, near Sussex New Brunswick. I have done a lot of fly fishing in that area over the last 30 years and missed getting there.

The fact that it’s only about a 3/4 of an hour away is great and we were in the water with fly rods waving by 3pm for an evening of brook trout fishing.

The weather has been so hot it was nice to get out fishing while it was a bit cooler. It actually cooled off so much that I started to get chilled. But every time I caught a trout I warmed up.

The water in Stone Creek was the highest I have ever seen it for this time of year and I had to get out of the water in a few places so that I would have to swim.

I didn’t keep track of the number of brookies we caught and released but there was enough to keep us both happy and that’s what it’s all about.

This little Brookie was only out of the water for about
8 seconds and was happy to get back in the water.

Where we were fishing was strictly catch and release and we were fine with that as we pretty much catch and release everything. Well I like to keep the grilse I catch.

Jamie hooked into a brookie and yelled something about supper. Anyways I had to take a picture of his prize catch and laughed for a bit. Such a funny guy.

We did hook into a couple of bigger trout, not a lot bigger but they just won’t stay on the end of our line.

A couple of times it looked like it was going to down pour on us but then it passed but man it got windy and dark. It was at that point that I took a chill so I had to hook into another trout or two to warm up.

Time flew by like we couldn’t believe and before long it was starting to get dark. It took me hours to go to sleep, even though I was beat. I just couldn’t get the day out of my mind and was very cool with that.

A nice thing about this fly fishing spot is you can fish all day, have great fun, catch lots of trout and then it’s just a 15 or 20 minute walk back to the car on the railroad tracks.

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Fly fishing for beginners, trout fishing tips truly make a difference. First of all, it would be a good thing to know that trout are fish whose metabolism depends on the temperature of water. Their metabolism accelerates as the temperature gets higher. If the water where they live is cold, as it is in deeper waters, they show less active and need to eat less.

Moreover, around January those interested in catching trout start to be directed towards warm waters as trout tend to leave cold deep waters for environments more favourable to spawning. Also, this migration takes place the other way round in autumn, when the trout prepare for winter in cold deep waters. Yet fishermen should not expect them to travel distances too rapidly. The migration cycles from one place to another follow the seasons and last for several months.

Also good to know when trout fishing is that these animals are social ones. Similar sized marine fish will tend to gather in schools. Therefore, if you have already caught some trout, you are likely to catch more in the same area as long as you do not throw the dead caught fish in the water to panic the rest of the school.

In addition, trout fishing areas are easy to spot. trout prey on smaller fish, but they are not great hunters due to their slow motion features. They rather wait for the prey to come along and then strike. Sometimes, they feed on injured marine animals even though this kind of food might not be on their regular menu. They normally eat frogs craw-fish, worms, minnows insects and so on. If fishermen learn such things on trout, together with their feeding and mating habits, fishing would be much easier and more fun.

On the other hand, these fish are prey themselves therefore, in the normal habitat, there should be rocks and all sorts of sea vegetation to provide them a safe retreat. That is why trout fishing gets carried out in areas where they could find safety like small or big rocks, weeds and other shady or sunny well-lit areas where the eye makes it difficult for them to be spotted.

Successful trout fishing may also depend on the type of bait that is chosen by the anglers. Thus, the seasons as well as the spawning cycle of the fish influence the choice of bait. Hence, those new to trout fishing should pay attention to more experienced anglers to learn the basic steps.

Much of New Brunswick is under a heavy rain fall this morning. It’s going to feed a lot of streams so the water level’s going to very high again. Good thing we have has some mild weather earlier this month, so it may not be as bad as it would most other years.

I was looking for a video on fly fishing for trout and came across this helpful video on the fact trout seek protection from various things that help them live longer. Knowing these little tips will help you land more trout on the fly.

Enjoy Scott Linden’s Fly Fishing Tips: Trout Hiding Places.

Learn where the trout hide for their protection and you can have great fly fishing days most of the time, just be sure to practice CPR (Catch, Photograph and Release) so our kids have the same opportunity when they start fly fishing for trout.

Have you ever done any fishing from a float tube. I’m not talking about a tire tube you float down stream in. I mean one that was designed to fish from, with a seat and back-rest?

If you have fished from a float tube I am sure you will agree that there is a lot of fun to be had fishing from a float tube and if you haven’t you need to give it a try.

My first trip was with my fly rod. It was for chain pickerel and we had our spinning gear that day. That day is for another post.

The first place I took my float tube fishing trout was to a spot that I have carried my canoe into. I was a rough go with the canoe and by the time I would get in there I was exhausted from fighting my way through the trees. Plus I always had to make at least two trips in order to have all my fishing gear, paddles and life-vest.

When I first started fishing this trout pond I walked in and fished only from the shore. I always caught my dinner but wondered just what it would be like to fish away from the shore.

Some of these ponds I fish used to have rafts that had been constructed from downed trees. They were great but after a few years they would sink to the bottom during spring flooding.

The float tube is so light I can carry it on my back which freed up my hands to carry the rest of what I need to fish for the day. That shorted my time getting on the water and I wasn’t the slightest bit exhausted once I got there.

I immediately saw that I could catch more trout and bigger trout fishing toward the bank instead of fishing from the bank.

My fishing buddies would come fishing with me and of course they would bring their canoes. I would be at the water fishing long before they ever reached the water with their canoes and then they still had to go back for the rest of there gear.

After a few trips like that I got a phone call. Both the buddies I am referring to have now purchased their own float tubes and now they are fishing the same time I am. I haven’t seen them use their canoe since.

So if you haven’t tried float tube fishing yet you are in for a real treat.

I went to bible college for 4 years and never missed a day even though I had to drive almost an hour each way. I was dedicated but every day I drove by a number of great trout fishing streams, brooks and rivers. It was tough on those perfect fly fishing days but I never once stopped to wet a line.

It seemed that all my off time was studying and working to pay for college.

The college sat on a hill top overlooking a valley that had streams full of brookies and even some salmon criss-crossing the landscape. About half my classes had a view of that valley and called to me daily until finally I couldn’t take it any more and went to the main office where I explained that I had never missed a day, even when students that lived on campus missed days because of bad weather.

And then I asked for a day off to go fly fishing for trout. Well the profession I was talking to laughed and told me that he had to fight that urge during classes, but that he lived right there and was fly fishing every evening for an hour or two.

Then he not only said that I could have any day off I wished, with his blessing. He also added that he knew of some great hot spots that he would share with me if I promised not to share these spots with anyone for 4 years.

For a minute I was thinking he was pulling my leg but he wasn’t. I agreed.

The next day I went fly fishing and had a great day. I think I was blessed with the perfect day, maybe because I never gave in to temptation during those months of classes.

The professor I was talking with did take me fishing, in some of the areas I already fished but he showed me how to catch the big trout, 16 and 18 inch brook trout. And I kept my promise not to tell anyone for 4 years. At that time I took my best fishing buddy, who I told about this promise from day one, so he waited 4 years to get this same opportunity.

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