Jimbo
Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
Thanks Doug! We should have the temp monitors working in the next month or so….
Until then, everybody bring a thermometer and check the water temps before fishing for Trout.Jimbo
Here’s what I suggest this time of year. When you come, plan on being on the river early. Bring a thermometer and take the water temps. If it’s below 68, and it should in the upper river, start fishing for Trout. Before it gets to 70 quit fishing for Trout where you are and either move upstream a good distance or…. Go way downstream, say River Bluff or Lower Rio and start fishing the edges and shadows for Perch and Bass where you’d expect them. Don’t fish the main currents and troughs because there still could be a few Trout down there trying to stay alive. Or even better yet, go below the 2nd crossing and pay for access at: River Road Camp, Janie’s, KL Ranch (the water between Janie’s and KL Ranch may be the best), Camp Huaco Springs or even Gruene. There will be topwater action for these fish this time of year which can be a lot of fun and you may end up landing 100 !!! Also I usually bring a couple of rods along too which gives some neglected rods a workout.(2 for Trout: A long nymphing rod and a dryfly rod, and one for Bass and one for Perch) There are other options close by too like: San Marcos River, Blanco, and the Guadalupe upstream of Canyon Lake.
So get out and fish !!!
Jimbo
Barbless, Fight them hard and fast, Keep’em Wet, Catch and Release…
And if possible on Dryflies, nothing like seeing the bite on top !!!!Jimbo
Nope, not kidding…..
Our lease sites information has been copied and pasted on other forums in the past.Jimbo
To make it more difficult on a hacker from gaining information about lease sites.
Jimbo
Good question. This is how I believe the process is initiated. It’s a cooperative effort between TPWD and the public. I know many discussions started with the us (GRTU V.P. of Fisheries, BOD, and members) and TPWD river biologist/manager. I believe we asked for a change in the regs and then a bunch of GRTU members chimed in on the TPWD when they asked if people wanted a change in the regs. When enough people asked for the change, TPWD put it before the public. They would announce to the public that their input was requested and would hold these meeting in the counties affected by any change in the regulations. That means Comal County. We’d show up and voice our support for the regs and a few showed up against. Then TPWD would take their findings before their own committee and make the decision. That’s how we did it back for the first Trophy Trout Zone. The second time for the Upper Zone 800 yards below the dam to the 2nd crossing on 306 I think TPWD just decided to change the regs after some on-line discussion/public input but I don’t remember any public gathering in Comal county.
Jimbo
It’s been about 12 years since the last survey went out when I was VP of Fisheries. The survey will be concerning the Lease Access Program itself, so who better to discuss the program, than those who are in it. I also understand that there are more people who would like to be in the program than there are memberships, but there are also many members in the LAP that have been in the program for years, or like me, decades, and so the perspective of experience. The survey will cover things that a majority of the respondents would like to see in future years. It is designed to adjust things that have been bothering members and are in our ability to change. Somethings like river flows or adding twice as many lease sites we have are things that are essentially out of our control. But fish size, fish numbers, Rainbows vs Browns, number of LAP memberships, even the cost of membership, are things we can easily adjust. I would encourage everyone who is in the LAP to respond to the survey so we can get a strong consensus about the desires of our members and the Board of Directors can make the best decisions about the future of the LAP.
Jimbo
The reason Palominos are the color they are because of a double recessive gene. They are really just Rainbow Trout that do not have “the gene” that produces the color blue, and without the ability to produce blue they can not look mainly green on their backs (yellow and blue make green). There are many myths about Palominos floating around out there. Another one I hear all the time is you can tell how any Trout are stocked by counting the Palominos and multiplying by 1000(or some number) because that’s how the hatchery tracks the numbers of Trout, which of course if laughably false.
Jimbo
But Texans are tough,… Just another day in Paradise….
Now go do it….Jimbo
I sure would like to be there and help out when our locals put a beat down on the field.
But again I’m going to be playing tag in another Doctor’s office down in Houston.
GRTU Rules !!!!!Just another Fan….
I don’t know what’s happening? I started the story on my other topic Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride, but I uploaded the first half, I spent another couple hours writing the second half and then editing the whole thing and I could not upload anything more. I finished it and uploaded the whole thing to FlyFishingAddicts.com just fine. I thought maybe I could try starting another topic and upload it,… Nope…. I keep getting Error 404 and 500, internal storage error. I contacted Dustin who told me to contact Adrian, no answers yet. It’s so weird because I can make short answers like this, but not that one ???
Jimbo
I’m not sure what is going on but I can not upload the end of this story…..
It says Error 500, internal server error?Jimbo
Did you take the temperatures out in the current or right next to the shore? It could make a difference in these lower flows.
Jimbo
Before the Flood
Again in an attempt to integrate my thoughts to align with more civilized times, I present another few words to be believed or not….
As I look in the mirror I see an old man. Where thick curly brown hair once covered my scalp that made women laugh as they ran their fingers through it in my youth, now a few wild loners stick out like dying timber in an old lake, and require to be covered when out in the open to prevent sunburn on delicate skin. There are crow’s feet in the corner’s of my eyes, from years of squinting with straining eyes to peer through the filtered glare on the surface and reveal what lies beneath. The tops of my hands have liver spots from constant exposure of the intense rays of the sun that have permanently damaged the tissues of the dermis even though gallons of sunscreen have been applied. Joints that once seemed to bend at all angles and spring back for more when enthusiasm and vigor exceeded common sense and skill, now feel like rusty hinges that require effort when attempting to flex them early in the morning. Scars mark my knees, hip, and neck where skilled hands of surgeons attempted to repair with screws, plates, and rods what nature could not.
All these are my badges of honor. The marks of an ancient mariner, who has seen sights that would strike fear into the heart of even Ahab. Days spent running before the storm in Bass Boats traveling at interstate speeds, the winds blowing so hard that the tailwind made it almost feel calm in the cockpit while traveling over a mile a minute. The hull slamming into only the very crests of each wave, sailing across the troughs, and then again feeling thunderous shocks of the angry seas shutter through the boat, as lightning bolts struck the lake all around us on the inland seas they call Amistad and Falcon. A day to be remembered when I was caught in open water in a aluminum canoe on Fayette Power Project when a rogue summer thunderstorm that seemed to linger southeast of the dam was suddenly driven by strong winds coming off the gulf. Trying with all my might to keep the canoe pointed downwind, surfing passing waves driven by downwind gales, and trying to make it to the safety of the boat ramp on the opposite side of the lake before this silver hull with all my gear and myself disappeared into the depths forever.
Days in the high country caught in the open by nature. I remember a afternoon climbing Casa Grande in Big Bend National Park. It took longer than expected to negotiate up the talus fall that spilled out the only route to the top that did not require piton and rope to make to the crested rim of the ancient caldrea. And a storm the brews too quickly out of a hot summer day. An all out desperate attempt to get back down the talus field as the rain and hail fell on us, the dark 50,000′ cloud turning day into night, with only the flashes of lightning illuminating our path through wetted sharp and loose rock that made every step a death defying wish for the boot’s sole to find purchase and not the being caught in a deadly ever accelerating game of moving too fast down hill to make the bottom without spilling blood. Another day Fishing On a Stream that will Remain Nameless solo, after a long day working up a steep sided canyon and deciding to climb out a another loose slope with a Thunderstorm upstream threatened to send a cascade into my face, only to have it avalanche beneath my very feet, started by only the weight of my body, carrying me down the 45 degree slope towards the edge of eternity. Yes I have looked over the edge many times and managed to pull myself back in various states of good health or need for surgery.
What does this all have to do with the Guadalupe you ask?
I am a Texan, born and raised in the Hill Country. I think I was a fisherman even before I held a rod. Many days spent on Medina Lake and the limestone streams that drain across the Camino del Real of Tejas before I had a driver’s license. I fished the Guadalupe River before Canyon Dam was even a dream. I’ve fished what was the Guadalupe River and is now the bottom of the lake in 140′ of water. And started fishing for the Trout swimming in the Guadalupe back in the 1970’s. The river changes I have seen over the years are usually slow and gradual, but sometimes they come in mere minutes.You see, this, the Hill Country is one of the most flood prone areas in the world. These Hills create channels that funnel what mother nature creates from Gulf Moisture as it meets the rising elevations of the Hill Country Plateau on a steady wind from the southeast. Legendary floods like the one that drowned many in downtown San Antonio in 1921. Many floods, too many to name, and many never seen before man even set foot in Texas shaped the land. In fact flooding occurred so often the Corps of Engineers stepped to try and control the rath of Mother Nature.
The Guadalupe has seen it’s fair share of these floods. The towns of New Braunfels, Seguin, and Gonzales have all spent their times under the waters of the Guadalupe. The Corps of Engineers designed and built, what was at the time Canyon Lake was impounded, the largest earthen dam on the face of the earth. The construction began in 1958 at a hard rock narrows at mile 303 on the river. The dam was finished in 1964 and the impoundment of water began. It was thought it might take 20 years or more to fill the lake to pool, but mother nature stepped in with one of her deluges and the lake reached pool in 1968. The waters that flowed from the dam were cold from lying at the bottom of a lake that reaches 160 feet in places.
What does all this historical perspective do other than make me sound as old as Moses?
Back on Subject…. In the many years since I started fishing for Trout on the Guadalupe, the character of the river has changed. Even after the dam was built there were floods raging down the Guadalupe below the dam that changed things forever. There are two that had some of the biggest impacts on the river and set a dividing line of what it was like before and after the floods. These were the famous floods of 1998 and 2002. In October 17 & 18 1998 moisture from two hurricane’s, one in the pacific and one in the Gulf combined with a Cold Front and anywhere from 20-24″ of rain fell below Canyon Dam and were therefore uncontrolled and headed downstream. Many of the flow gages were overtopped by the wall of water. On June 30 2002 a tropical wave moved off the gulf and into the Hill Country where it stalled and became stationary for over 2 weeks. Areas over the upper Guadalupe received estimates of over 60″ of rain. Canyon lake rose and rose till for the first time ever water started coming over the spillway at 943’msl. The lake continued to rise and reached a level of 950.37’msl with 60,000cfs that came roaring over and down spillway creek. Houses were swept away in the Horseshoe Bend subdivision. The destruction along the banks of the river was terrible. There were pictures of the flood making national news and famously the video of what was left of a home, the roof sticking out of the river floating over the submerged bridge at Comal Street in New Braunfels.These events also changed the makeup and bio-diversity and abundance of the river itself.
Back when I started fishing the Guadalupe for Trout there were many more caddis flys in the river. So much so that many evenings a layer of caddis flys, holding millions of individuals, hovered over the river in a layer several feet thick. So many that fishing an adult on the water was an exercise in frustration. How would a Trout pick out your offering among the thousands that surrounded it. I tried and about the only success fishing drys was when you skittered the fly so it appeared to be trying to escape and drawing a reflex strike. There were also many more BWO’s and Trico Hatches. There was such a dependable Trico sinner fall at 10am you could set your watch by it. And these were some of the first times I was able to successfully fish and emergence and spinner fall with reliable success.
After the floods the river was scoured to bedrock. Gravels beds moved around filled in old holes and opened up new ones. But there was so much debris washed into the river that the county actually paid contractors to get into the river bed with front-end loaders, and other heavy equipment to remove it from the stream bed. Everything was scraped and dragged around. They removed everything that was washed into the river and ground up by the moving waters into pieces. Everything from Houses, Stores and businesses along the river to the small stuff like fences, picknick benches, canoes, and kayaks from outfitters was dragged of of the river bottom and picked out of the tree tops. The bridge at Rio was under about 5-10′ of water and when the waters finally receded it was totally covered in woody debris and barbed wire. River Road was closed for weeks afterward. The cleanup took months after it started. I remember watching a front-end loader work the riverbed below me while fishing at Cedar Bend an old campground above Rockin R.
After the floods the huge insect bio-masses were gone. There was just a few spotty hatches for a long time. It took years for the insects to come back. The Caddis have never again reached their abundance of the pre-flood times. The mayflys came back first but their abundant has made a painfully slow comeback. The BWO’s seemed to be the first to have returned close to what they were before and a lesser extent the Tricos. The larger Drakes, Hexs, and PMDs seem to be making a significant comeback this last decade and are now fishable hatches.
TBC….
-
This reply was modified 3 years, 1 month ago by
.
-
This reply was modified 3 years, 1 month ago by .
-
This reply was modified 3 years, 1 month ago by .
-
This reply was modified 3 years, 1 month ago by .
-
This reply was modified 3 years, 1 month ago by
