GR8 BWO Hatch On The PT 21Apr21

It was most decent in Pueblo (rather than snow in 11 Mile) so I hit the PT @ Nature Center yet again - my 12th outing there this year. It was only 50° and featured a full day of cloud cover, so I was hopeful for a good BWO hatch. Flows were oddly way back down to 92cfs, making fishing pretty technical again. I started at 11am due to the cold AM and in hopes of just scoring the BWO hatch immediately... and I did. Plus, the clouds aided an extended hatch which came in 2 waves: one from 11:30 - 12:45 and another 1:30-2:30. Just when I thought it was over, and changed my rig @ 1pm, the starlings went crazy overhead again and I had to change back. Today I caught many med-sized fish, and not all trout, but just one 20"er. All cutbows but one were on some BWO nymph - either the RS2, MHFBPT or Destiny's Child. I did attempt the spinner fall when the fish were sippin' but I didn't tie on a 6X tippet and my 4.5X just can't float a dry clean - no takes and no wonder. The fish have definitely moved throughout the river and out to the riffles for the hatches, but I still caught the 20" behind a weir (it was a targeted "2 footer" which came in shy - looked bigger due to water optics). I also caught a couple of massive suckers via snagging by accident. Here's a small sampling of today's catch. Grey lenses are not the ticket for flat light - hmmm.

Deadliest BWO Mayfliy Imitations By River 20Apr21

It was 12° this morning; I did not go fishing. What should I do? I've been fishing a number of rivers in Colorado for 20 years now. Below are my observed deadliest BWO mayfly imitations for some of the rivers I frequent. I typically tie #18-#20 for the spring and #20-#22 for the fall though I prefer #20 and #22 in most of these ties. This is not scientific data as I am biased to use these "matched ties" when fishing with mayfliy imitations on these rivers, though I do use others of course. The evidence was gathered from use experience. The MHFBPT and the grey MH flash wing RS2 are probably my most often used mayfly nymphs and use is somewhat suggested by whether it's time for an emerger. I often use a tungsten bead mayfly nymph as weight during mayfly seasons, especially a black ice variant (during BWOs) or the rainbow warrior (during PMDs). Anyway, here are my ties of the deadliest.

A Cold Wind This Way Comes - More CutBows On The PT 19Apr21

Tryin' to squeeze in another outing to the PT before the next snowfall - I made it several hours before the cold wind sent me packing after just 3 hours. I was doin' nothing early as I spent an hour fishing to four 2 footers and when one finally took my bug she leaped high, shook her mighty head, and broke off my rig. I moved on and the BWO hatch began and got some action which was quickly shut down due to howling chilly winds. I went back to midges and caught most of the bigger ones on Awesome Midge but others on Destiny's Child (I gotta tie more as I've been living off last fall's inventory). The 20'ers were a thick, strong male with whom I had a great fight to net and a strangely skinny lipless female. Fishing is good; there were plenty of other cutbows. The good news was that other fishermen read the forecast and stayed home - very few folks were at the Nature Center.

Sunday Funday On The PT 18Apr21

While it was pretty crowded (given a Sunday) and chilly & windy in the AM, the PT warmed up nicely to at least me. I caught more than a dozen nice medium-sized rainbows out of the nature center from 10am - 3pm. It was cloudless and sunny till mid-PM but there was bug sign throughout the day... mid-AM yielded small grey-brown #24 midges, mid-day moved to #20 BWOs, and after that back to black #22 midges. I was able to adjust as each hatch occurred and hookup were associated with what I observed. Best producers associated with these hatches were the awesome midge, the MH flash wing RS2, Destiny's Child, and the MHFB black zebra. I was target shooting all day despite flows jumping to 220cfs today - the earliest fishing was amongst debris but that subsided once the bumped flow was stabilized and the water cleared. I even managed three 20" fish today among the bounty of others, mostly 18"ers. All CutBows; they are all off the spawning redds and seemingly hungry. These are all different fish in different predicaments. Pretty fun.

Save The Spa! 15Feb21-17Apr21

Yep, Kala and I raced home from Summit Co in mid-Feb hoping to be in time to assure our Blodgett spa was going to survive the deep freeze. We got home in time to still see liquid but the water was cold and I could not get it to flow. We tried hot water and I installed a heater under the cowling (sketchy) but ultimately there was little we could do as the temps dropped to -22° and the pump would not turn over. I wasn't alerted in time as I didn't have instrumentation on the Blodgett spa as I do in Summit... a lesson.

The spa went into a very hard freeze and we began the search for a super-freak spa tech who would take on a likely massive rebuild. We found one, Chris Sawyer! We hired Chris by the hour hoping for a $2K rebuild. Ultimately though, massive PVC removal & replacement, including all manifolds, a pump replacement, the heater/controller replacement (went with Gecko), some jets and other parts yielded a $4.5K job. Don't get me wrong - this is so much better than having to buy new and we can't imagine there are many people capable of doing what Chris did. It did take 4+ full days to demo everything, rebuild everything and test, the rest was waiting for parts;  Chris even stayed over night in his camper on the street to complete some of the work. It was amazing and rarely was it as "nice" a day as the one shown here.

Wow, it took 2 months but we are completely back online! Chris said it was the most extensive freeze damage he's ever seen (and I believe it). I dialed in the chemicals and installed a wireless instrumentation system that can control the spa remotely as well as alert me on issues. This option plugged directly into the Gecko controller and uses an iOS app. Now both spas are part of my IoT networks.

Spa time for COS is back, and that's great as we are experiencing another 10 days of snowfall and cold temps here in mid-April and Kala's elliptical workouts deserve some back soothing and my arm is sore from hauling in pigs.

 

UPDATE 26Apr21 - No warranties were ever expressed or implied by Chris and Gecko tech support responded negatively to my request to be alerted/notified on a low temperature condition via their app - I though it had the capability when purchased, but it didn't; it's mainly a control app. Anyway, these led me to crack open the spa again on this gorgeous 72° Saturday and check for leaks and make some final hookups. I installed a separate temp sensor by taping it to the filter section. I modified it to run off of a 110v transformer and ran an extension cord to it. Noticing wetness inside I ran the jets and found some leaks - I fixed them on one of the manifolds by tightening and adding more hose clamps. Finally, I traced down air supply issues to some of the jets and got them going again. The spa is now running great and leakless and my Accurite sensor is alerting me to any temperature issues. It's buttoned up tight and true.

UPDATE 25May21 - The temp/humidity sensor connected to my Accurite wireless network was unreliable as to regular reporting - I couldn't effectively count on it to monitor and alert on low temperature in my spa really. I upgraded to an Aeotec Water Sensor 7 Pro for ~$45 today. This is a modern generation (700 chip) ZWave sensor which reports on temperature, humidity, and wet/dry state. I directly replaced my Accurite sensor; I velcroed it right to my filter area. It's connected directly into my SmartThings IoT network and there's automation there to alert me on wetness or low temps. A little more expensive but reliable and effective.

Sorry Rob - Fishing Was Pretty Good 13Apr21

While RobH & I called off the CoWW FR Tailwater trip this week due to inclement weather - the badness is still just pending and I hit the PT again today. We are mostly post-spawn at this point on the PT and the cutbows  are moving out of the deep lies and off the redds into the full river and shallower feeding lanes. The weather was 42° on arrival and 52° at departure and mostly overcast all day with scattered occasional sun. Flows were dropped again (probably due to the thinish snowpack and desire to fill the Pueblo Rez before summer) to just 90cfs! This made fishing a smidge more technical than typical in mid-Apr. I was target shooting all day and could see plenty of good fish - sometimes feeding on my bugs, sometimes not. I didn't try the mayfly spinner fall here but some medium-sized fish were exclusively on it at 1:30pm. I caught a passel of medium sized fish with more 18" ladies today (must be hungry after  the spawn) and the biggest a flying 20"er male (jumped during the profile obviously) on the weight. Everything from black ice (BWO nymph) weight to #22 RS2 to #24 MHFB zebra to #22 green and #22 grey vinyl KF midges worked today. BWOs are definitely a front row ticket now with mid-day being hatch time - we'll see what the next 3 days of snow do to the fishing in Pueblo. Just a few pics closing with "what not to do fighting a big fish" - I lost a number of fish today too, despite the awesome Rodfather Cutty action, as I became impatient and wanted to "land now" and held the line/reel... I'm a dumb ass.

The spring '21 edition of Project Dank has arrived... Yeah, I bought what they had; it'll last a week or more. :)

Wandering Around 713, Lehigh Lax & Inside Dining For Leslie 10Apr21

Kala and I hiked Tr 713 from home out to the tiny reservoirs on West Monument where the alternative north ridgeline approach to Blodgett Pk starts. We didn't go up another 500m and 1.5 mi passed the downed aircraft just scoped out the distance for a possible ascent later. It was a blast in great weather but the drop back onto the utilities maintenance road is washed out and sketchy on the way out - it's a little better on the way back.

We took the risk and had a great dinner inside at Le French restaurant to celebrate Leslie Wilke's birthday. This relatively new spot in the DTC served Senegalese-inspired French food and was excellent. Of course it's always a blast to be with our Boulder buddies especially when Leslie calls for air cover at an expensive spot. Woohoo.

I had to see how Lehigh's day on the lacrosse field bore out against their in south conference rivals, the Navy midshipmen. They won 12-7 against this #19 tough opponent and remain one of few teams undefeated in D1 this year. Lehigh has beat Loyola, #7 Army and Navy this year to this point. Looking good in the Patriot league.