Report by: Chris Smith
Wednesday September 1, 2010
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Today’s Fish rating
Upriver: 8.5
Walk-In: 9 – before noon 8 after the water peaks
Key: 1 = Go fish somewhere else
10 = Rent a helicopter and get here now!
Today’s Weather: Mostly sunny with a high of 100 with a low of 70

Crowd Rating
Upriver: 2.0 No Crowds
Walk In: 3.0 Some Crowds
Key: 1 = Sleep late and fish where you want.
10 = Very crowded, get up early

Fly Fishing: NO NEW REPORTS Will UP_DATE 9/2/10

Walk in: This area has been fishing very well.
Report by: Chris Smith

New 8,000 cfs steady flows start today so much of the previous info on the walk-in might be useless. As soon as I am off work today I will be heading straight down there to try her out. I should have a new report out by tomorrow morning so stay tuned for an update.

Tight Lines,
Chris

Spin Fishing: Was reported as great this weekend, the lure of choice is still the panther martin in gold and black.

Anglers are also using large glo bugs, and bouncing them off the bottom.
The jig has been a fun one too, seems the black ones are working best when the cast is toward the shore. T

• If you have some news you would like to report about fishing lees ferry, the walk-in section or up river please e-mail your report to: anglers@leesferry.com Attn. Lees Ferry Fishing Report

• We would be happy to have your input, and pass it along.

Lees Ferry Fishing Report and Forecast 9/1/2010

Fall is in the air at Lees Ferry; this is the finest weather of the year and what many of us locals describe as the reason that we live here the other 10 months…just so we can experience September and October. The fishing this fall should be especially good as the releases from Glen Canyon Dam for the months of Sept., and Oct. will be 8,000-cfs constant with no fluctuations. This is part of a long term experimental flow and this is the third year of these level flows, however, this year’s flow will be the first that is this low, the first year was 12,000-cfs and last year’s flow was 10,000 cfs. The midge hatches have been very strong, I would say stronger than usual for this time of year. Normally when you combine low water with prolific midge hatches the fishing can be off the charts so be sure to keep an eye on our daily reports to confirm this. The water flows will return to normal fluctuating flows in November. The 8,000-cfs flows will be perfect wading flows for both the upriver and Walk-in section of Lees Ferry. If you are looking to get out and experience perfect weather and fishing conditions; Lees Ferry is the place to be this fall. By the way, you will likely see fewer people here than any time in the last 40 years. Thank goodness that fish don’t know that we are in a recession!

The fishing this last summer was better than any of us can remember, the fish have been growing and are in great shape and the population is higher than any time in the past decade. The cicada hatch was not really that good; however, drifting heavy nymphs from the boat was often on fire. I had a day in July where my two clients had double hook-ups every single drift of the day; these are the days that guides dreams are made of.

A little bug is about to change the environment at Lees Ferry and throughout the Colorado River corridor. A couple years ago a small beetle was released in Utah that eats and kills the tamarisk. The scientists behind the release assured everyone that this beetle could not survive any further south so it would not impact any areas other than the release area. Well, guess what? The tamarisk beetle has arrived at Lees Ferry. I do not believe that it arrived here naturally; it was likely delivered here by some “green-head” who thought that they were doing the world a favor by ridding the river of tamarisk. The best that I can tell is that the area near the boat launch is ground zero and the area where the beetle was released. It is beyond belief how quickly the tamarisk is dying. For those of you who do not know; tamarisk is an exotic tree species that line the banks of most of the rivers in the southwest. There are those that believe that they are harmful to the environment, however, they are great habitat for nesting birds. Without entering this argument I’m only stating a fact by telling you that within a couple of years all the tamarisk that line the river will be dead. As far as I know the national Park Service does not have in place a plan for clearing out the dead trees and replacing them with native trees. How is this going to affect the fishing? It will probably not have any effect on the trout other than it will likely limit the cicada hatch going forward, reduce shade for campers and be a fire hazard.

Fish Behavior 101. Why fish eat and why they don’t.

“Any man who claims to understand fish is a fool.” TG

“When you are guiding; some days you will be the dog, other days you’ll be the tree.” TG

Fish are weird; there is just no getting around it. One day they are jumping in the boat, the next, they are nowhere to be found. Some people say that this is what keeps bringing us back to the stream, that this uncertainty we call “fishing” makes us more competitive. After all
these years I do understand a little about fish and I would like to share some ideas on why fish are happy one day and not the next.

First and foremost the fish have to be present in the area of water that you are fishing.

Fish are not always going to be in the same spot. This is especially true at Lees Ferry where you have water that fluctuates on a daily and monthly basis. A spot that is stacked with fish at one flow may be a “fish desert” at another level.

FOOD and SHELTER: the two things that determine the location of fish.

If there is no food present there is no reason for a fish to be in a specific location. However, if you find the highest concentration of food, you will always find the highest concentration of fish, assuming that this concentration of food has been present long enough for the fish to locate it.

At Lees Ferry we have two different feeding plots (each with hundreds of sub-plots). The first is PROLIFIC MIDGE HATCHES. Midges hatch throughout the year; however, by far the largest hatches occur in the spring. The lifecycle of a midge is very similar to a butterfly; the adult midge’s sole purpose is to make babies. In a nut shell, this is how it works. The adult midge mates with other midges in a swarm, then the female lands on the water to lay the fertilized eggs, she stays on the water for a second or so then flies off the water and then lands again to lay more eggs (this is a survival mechanism which helps protect her from being eaten by a fish). The eggs slowly sink and eventually hatch into a larvae (think of a tiny caterpillar) the midge lives as a larvae for a long time, living in the algae and mud. Then though some miracle of nature the midge larvae get a call to pupate in mass, (think of a butterfly chrysalis). As they pupate the midge slowly floats to the surface. The size and color of the midge pupae varies with the specie and with 50 different species of midges inhabiting Lees Ferry we have a large variety of sizes and colors of pupae. When the pupae reaches the surface, the midge hatches through the husk and the adult midge crawls out, dries his wings and flies off to repeat the entire process.

Fish do feed on adult midges but mostly on the carcasses of dead midges that accumulate in back-eddies. The importance of a midge as a food source occurs in the emerging stage. When midges hatch they often do so in mass numbers and for long durations. The fish know this is happening and move into the riffles to feed on the emerging midges.

WHY DO FISH MOVE INTO RIFFLES TO FEED ON MIDGES?

Midge pupae are small, anywhere from a size #18 to #30. It takes a lot of midges to sustain a Lees Ferry trout; however, if you were to measure the midges as a percentage of total biomass, they far exceed all other food sources combined. Riffles are areas of river where the water transitions from very shallow to slowly deeper water. Do not confuse “points” with riffles, they look similar, however, the water on “points” transitions from shallow to deep in a short area. Fish move into the shallowest part of the riffles to feed on the CONCENTRATED MIDGES.

Imagine if you had a thousand midges in a column of water that was 3-feet deep or 6-inches deep, the midges are going to be much more concentrated in the 6-inch deep water. This is why we often tell people that they are wading in areas that they should be fishing.

The other kicker to midge hatches is water volume: as the water flow increase the midge hatches decrease. This is something that I do not understand but I know it to be true. So the best midge fishing is always in lower water flows. If I were to put a number to it I would say the best midge fishing is in water less than 14,000-cfs. This is why in the spring, (March, April, and May) some of our best fishing is on the weekends when the water is at the lowest level of the week. We often see good midge hatches in September and October, but not the swarms that happen in the spring.

The other situation that makes fish eat at Lees Ferry is HIGH WATER FLOWS. Anytime the water flows are high (above 16,000-cfs) food is dislodged, moved around, and transported by the current. Here we are talking about WORMS and SCUDS. High water flows normally occur 4 months each year, the 2 hottest months, July and August, and the 2 coldest months, December and January. This is all about electrical demand and high demand equals high flows. There are exceptions and high flows can occur at other times if there is a high lake level in Lake Powell and high runoff into the lake. This happened 1983-86 and a couple of other times in the 90’s. The best fishing periods at Lees Ferry has always been preceded by periods of higher than normal water flows. In high water the fish will concentrate in the rifles and the tail out of the riffles to feed on the drifting food. In addition to the riffles, feeding fish can be found though long runs between riffles. This is the time of year that the most productive fishing is usually from a drifting boat as opposed to wading.

WEATHER. Any change in the weather can shut off fish feeding. I cannot explain why this happens, however I guarantee you that it is true. I was in Placentia, Belize last year fishing with noted guide Eworth Gartbutt. A cold front was pushing through (it dropped to a frigid 78 degrees) and Eworth said “Terry, you realize that permit fishing and a north wind do not go together.” I thought to myself how fishing is fishing no matter where you are in the world.

Impending weather change make fish at Lees Ferry not want to eat. It might look like a normal day, the sun may be shining and not a breeze is blowing but a storm is on the way and the fish know it and for whatever reason they decide to take the day off from eating. I saw it this in the spring when I was fishing with a customer that I have fished with for 2 decades and the weather that day was a classic cold front, it was windy, cold, and spitting rain. My client is a good stick and at the end of the day he had landed 2 fish and his companion had landed 3 fish and they were all smaller fish. The next day started cold but warmed quickly due to the cloudless day and bright sunshine. They landed more than 30-fish including a 19-in football and several fish that were in the 18-in range. If they would have only fished the one day that might have concluded that the fishing at Lees Ferry sucks or that we are “blowing smoke” or overrating how good the fishing is. That actually happened with one trip last month when a couple of guys had a similar experience fishing with me one day with a cold front pushing through.

So poor weather makes for poor fishing most of the time, however, there are exceptions and I have seen some great fishing on days the wind is howling and the snow is flying. I can’t explain this but I can tell you that more often than not, a change in the weather will affect fishing in a negative way.

Lees Ferry Fishing Tips: I have been using 6 and 7X fluorocarbon tippet and feel that the lighter tippet results in a much higher success rate than say 5X. Anglers might argue that they break fish off on such light tippet but my argument is that in order to break a fish off, you first have to first get a fish to eat your fly and you are going to get more eaters with lighter tippet than heaver tippet.

When wading the riffles you need long dead drifts. There are 2 types of drifts; perfect dead drifts and all other drifts. Perfect dead drifts catch fish at Lees Ferry; all other drifts don’t catch fish here. You get a dead drift by mending the line, then throwing slack line on the water. If your line is straight from your rod tip to your indicator or you move your indicator during the drift, then your drift is not perfect and will not catch fish. The key to success is to stay over fish, get the flies down to the bottom, and get a long, perfect dead drift.

The turning point and the beginning for the recovery of the Lees Ferry fishery occurred in 2005 when Lake Powell had the first above normal snow-pack and runoff year since 1997. Last year we had almost exactly the same conditions. The above normal winter snow pack and runoff into Lake Powell in 2007-08, stirred up a tremendous amount of nutrient laden sediment that had accumulated at the lake mouths of the Colorado River, San Juan River, and the Green River. Lake Powell elevation increased 43-ft. and the rivers flowing into the lake mixed the sediment and nutrients into the lake water. It usually takes several months before we see this mixing affect. The increased nutrient load in the lake and river is evident this spring by the dramatic increase in aquatic vegetation and aquatic organisms throughout the river.

The high flow experiment, 4/08, was basically a non event as far as the fishery is concerned. It came and went with few visible changes to the river or the fishery. For more details and to see my complete comments go here: http://coloradoriverconservancy.org/

For details on Lake Powell conditions and snow-pack, go here: http://lakepowell.water-data.com/

For a real time graphic view of water releases and ramp rates go here: http://waterdata.usgs.gov/az/nwis/uv?09380000

The AZ Game and Fish Department has detected whirling disease in a very small percentage of Lees Ferry trout that were collected for a random sampling. More recent samplings have turned up no sign of the disease, which may mean that it was a “one time” exposure, where the disease was not established or that the disease is present but at a very low prevalence. Anglers should still use caution in cleaning their equipment both before and after they have fished here or in other waters. For more information visit: http://www.whirling-disease.org

Glen Canyon Dam / Lake Powell

The unregulated inflow volume into Lake Powell for July 2010 was 676 kaf (43% of average). Lake Powell reached a low water surface elevation for water year 2010 on April 15, 2010 when the elevation dipped to 3618.64 feet above sea level. The elevation of Lake Powell reached its peak for the water year on June 30, 2010 which was 3638.82 feet above sea level. On August 1st the elevation of Lake Powell was 3636.52 feet above sea level. The April through July unregulated inflow to Lake Powell was 5.796 maf (73% of average). Releases from Glen Canyon Dam during the month of August will fluctuate each day for power generation between a peak hourly average release of about 16,500 cfs, during the morning and late afternoon and a daily low hourly average release of 8,500 cfs during the late evening and early morning hours. The release volume scheduled for August is 800,000 acre-feet. On August 30th and 31st, the hourly release pattern will be moderated somewhat in order to provide a steady transition the steady flow experiment which begins on September 1, 2010.
On September 1, 2010 and continuing through October 31, 2010, the releases from Glen Canyon Dam will be steady with no fluctuations for power production (excluding system regulation and spinning reserves) for the steady flow experiment pursuant to the February 2008 Finding of No Significant Impact ‘Experimental Releases from Glen Canyon Dam, Arizona 2008 through 2012′. This year will be the third year of steady flows of the 5 year experiment. The steady release rate is projected to be 8,000 cfs which is equivalent to a monthly release volume of approximately 476,000 acre-feet in September 2010 and 492,000 acre-feet in October 2010. During the steady flow experiment the instantaneous releases from Glen Canyon Dam may fluctuate somewhat to provide approximately 40 megawatts (approximately 1,100 cfs) of system regulation to maintain stable conditions within the electrical generation and transmission system. This translates into momentary release fluctuations of about +/-1100 cfs above or below the targeted steady release target (8000 cfs). These momentary fluctuations for regulation are very short lived and will typically balance out over the hour. Spinning and non-spinning reserve generation will also be carried at Glen Canyon Dam during the steady flow experiment. When an unanticipated outage event occurs in the generation system, reserve generation at Glen Canyon Dam can also be called upon up to a limit of 83 megawatts (approximately 2,250 cfs of release) for a duration of 2 hours or less. Under normal circumstances, calls for reserve generation occur fairly infrequently and are for much less than the limit of 83 megawatts. Pursuant to the Colorado River Interim Guidelines for Lower Basin Shortages and Coordinated Operations for Lakes Powell and Mead (Interim Guidelines) the operational tier for water year 2010 is Upper Elevation Balancing and the projected water year release volume is 8.23 maf. Under this operational tier there was a possibility that Equalization could occur in 2010 if the April 2010 24-Month Study ,with 8.23 maf projected for release during water year 2010, indicated a Lake Powell projected elevation on September 30 , 2010 greater than 3642 feet above sea level (the Equalization level for water year 2010). This condition was not projected in the April 24-Month Study and for this reason, the release volume for water year 2010 will be 8.23 maf. Monthly release volumes for the remainder of the water year will be scheduled to achieve this water year release volume. The August 2010 24-Month Study projects that the operation tier for Glen Canyon Dam in water year 2011 will be Upper Elevation Balancing but also projects a shift in operations where Equalization will govern the operation beginning in April 2011. The most probable run of the August 24-Month Study projects the water year 2011 release volume to be 11.58 maf. At this point in time, there is a high level of uncertainty regarding the hydrologic conditions that will be experience in 2011. The August 24- Month Study, which includes analysis of a range of possible inflow scenarios in water year 2011, projects that the most probable range of annual releases from Lake Powell will be from 9.0 maf to approximately 14.1 maf. It is currently forecasted that there is approximately a 62% probability that Equalization will occur in water year 2011 with the annual release being at or above approximately 10.7 maf. This forecast will be updated each month as conditions change.
Upper Colorado River Basin Hydrology
In the Upper Colorado River Basin during water year 2009, the overall precipitation accumulated through September 30, 2009 was approximately 95% of average based on the 30 year average for the period from 1971 through 2000. For water year 2010 dry conditions have persisted. Estimated percentages of average precipitation for the months thus far in water year 2010 are as follows: October 85%, November 40%, December 130%, January 100% and February 100%, March 90%, April 120%, May 75%, June 100%, July 95%. The overall estimated precipitation percentage of average thus far in water year 2010 for the Upper Colorado River Basin is 96% of average. The Climate Prediction Center outlook (dated July 15, 2010) for temperature over the next 3 months indicates that temperatures in the Upper Colorado River Basin are expected to be above average while precipitation over the next 3 months is projected to be below average.
Upper Colorado River Basin Drought
The Upper Colorado River Basin continues to experience a protracted multi-year drought. Since 1999, inflow to Lake Powell has been below average in every year except water years 2005 and 2008. In the summer of 1999, Lake Powell was close to full with reservoir storage at 23.5 million acre-feet, or 97 percent of capacity. During the next 5 years (2000 through 2004) unregulated inflow to Lake Powell was well below average. This resulted in Lake Powell storage decreasing during this period to 8.0 million acre-feet (33 percent of capacity) which occurred on April 8, 2005. During 2005, 2008 and 2009, drought conditions eased somewhat with net gains in storage to Lake Powell. As of August 10, 2010 the storage in Lake Powell was 15.59 million acre-feet (64.1 % of capacity) which is still below desired levels while the overall reservoir storage in the Colorado River Basin as of August 10, 2010 is 34.14 million acre-feet (57.4 % of capacity).

Check out: www.kutv.com/content/outdoors/default.aspx

I have had some people that are fishing on their own (unguided) tell me that they are having a difficult time catching fish. The fishing has changed from the peak of 2000 and many people are not adapting to the new conditions. The current fish population is lower than it was in 2000 and there are not fish “everywhere” in the river like there were several years back (this is probably the reason that we are seeing better conditioned and larger fish today). Just because you might have been successful in one spot on the river in the past does not mean that particular spot is always good. There are many times of the year that the water flows, or conditions are not right to hold fish at “famous” spots such as 4 mile or Dam Island. It is often challenging, even for a good guide, to stay on top of where the fish are and what they are eating; but we do have the advantage of spending a lot of time on the water.

Lees Ferry Anglers - Fly Shop Specials:
“GIFT CERTIFICATES AVAILABLE!!”
*****CLOSEOUTS******
PATAGONIA- Women’s Stretch Jacket was $315.00 now $175.00
Call for all current sale items as they change quickly.

Cliff Dwellers Lodge:
Our lodge has rooms with cable TV (20 channels), in-room coffee, and the basic amenities. Choices of rooms are ONE king-size bed, TWO doubles and TWO queen-size beds. Also our group unit we call the HOUSE, sleeps six with two baths, dining area, kitchen, patio with a view, and cable TV. Rates vary with season. We are excited about the cool fall season and have some great “black board” specials planned. Patio dining is available. (Enclosed in the winter months)

Meet the Guides:
THE GUIDES AND STAFF OF LEES FERRY ANGLERS have thousands of days on this water, and over 100 years combined fish-guiding experience. Captains’ Terry Gunn, Jeff English, Skip Dixon, Rick Smith, Natalie Jensen, J.D. Miller, Luke Blaser and Tom Jones make up our guiding staff. Lees Ferry Anglers is proud of our fly-fishing guide team! Wendy Gunn, Ted Welling, Chris Smith, and Kris Stoudt work in the fly shop to provide you with the best customer service in the industry.

Email: anglers@leesferry.com
Lees Ferry Anglers
HC-67 Box 30
Marble Canyon, AZ 86036
Toll Free 1-800-962-9755
Direct 1-928-355-2261
Fax 1-928-355-2271

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All rights reserved Lees Ferry Fishing Report

Terry Gunn
Lees Ferry Anglers Fly Shop, Guides, & Rentals
Cliff Dwellers Lodge
http://www.terrygunn.com
http://www.leesferry.com
http://www.cliffdwellerslodge.com
800-962-9755