Millington Gorge Passaic River Trout

Millington Gorge has the expected strong currents in abundance, though the river does get some relief here and there where it slows a bit. Water isn't especially deep but plenty to hold trout. And while you may think of the Passaic as a mud-bottomed river where carp thrive, don't expect to catch any carp in the Gorge. Rocks are all over the place, and if you're careless while wading, you'll get wet. 

In addition to trout, Brenden Kuprel, who showed me the way today, says the Gorge has sunfish and largemouth bass. At the time, I was preoccupied with salmon eggs that seemed too soft to have been salted, very frustrated with them, as trout after trout hit and snitched them, so the thought of smallmouth bass didn't occur to me until later. Brenden had already left.

So I will leave the question of their existence for a later post. I could text message Brenden right now but feel there's more class in leaving the question open. 

Smallmouths are abundant in the Passaic near Patterson.

Brenden had invited me last night. We met at 9:30 a.m. in the lot near the railroad tracks. Classic American scene of free-growing and free-flowing wilds. I fear that if we lose such access, we'll lose our nation, too. It will implode like an ancient bag woman who sits against a wall staring at a Time Square screen all day, all night, with a look of infinite appall. 

We each got our waders on, and I believe it was when I reached for my vest, that I realized I had left my rod at home. That is the first time I have ever gone fishing and forgotten the rod. Or rods. Any amount of rods forgotten. I'm told my memory loss is normal for my age. Everyone seems to dance around the fact that both of my parents died due to complications from Alzheimer's. Just putting that out there in case you're wondering. I'm not much afraid of it. I already know from apparently normal memory loss that you can know you're at loss and not suffer. The important thing is that you're beginning to enter the final stages of a full and flourishing life.

That life never was perfect, so what's the difference?

Or, it was never perfect for very long, so what's the difference, when imperfection is what calls upon acceptance?

I got my rod and got back to the Millington Gorge, parking my Honda Civic right next to Brenden's Forrester. I left my cell phone in the car, because I didn't want the responsibility. But you can see that Gorge is down there, by looking at the photos. I got down there and didn't see Brenden. I took a few casts in some slower water, missing a hit. Later, I asked Brenden if they actually stock on downstream there at the tracks. He thinks they do but isn't certain. In any event, we found trout everywhere in the Gorge, and plenty of water remained that we didn't fish. 

I decided to climb back up and call Brenden. He had made his way upstream and said I could park up there. I drove up Pond Hill Road and took a spot from very little space left. A couple of good 'ole boy types, full of foul language, told me they had caught one trout. I later said to Brenden that can mean one of two things: either few trout are there, or they left plenty behind. (Simple minds all round.)

Anyway, plenty of trout were there. I took some home. As I had been saying, I missed hits from fish after fish. Finally, I caught one after I did the obvious thing and tried a different jar of eggs. Then another after Brenden left. (He had caught some on a fake worm under a float, though I don't know how many.) I walked just a little further upstream where Brenden had caught one, and began picking off one after another from that run and yet another run even further up. I ran up a total of 15 trout caught.

The second fish I hooked on further upstream from where I caught the first two, was a real river horse, a trout of at least 16 inches, hooked in powerful current and hugging bottom...so I felt I had control, because slack water is at bottom. You don't work a fish too hard on a microlight rod and two-pound test, but you can put pressure on it, which is what I did, knowing I had to tire it out, however long it would take, and it was taking a while. Instead, the hook pulled free. Oh, well.

"Good fight," I felt.

 

Having climbed almost to the top.

 Basking Ridge Road

Hunterdon County Trout

New Jersey Trout Anglers for Browns Stocked

Brown Trout Petition Surprised to see the petition launched in 2019, but it just goes to show that the sentiment gaining strength now is not new. I guess it's being communicated more. The growing call among New Jersey trout stamp holders to see brown trout stocked again. I know many of us talk about brookies stocked again, too, but that seems very unlikely, now that the new law is in place. That brook trout in the Trout Conservation Zone must be released. The zone dominates northwestern New Jersey. Once a legal precedent is set, it's difficult to go back on it.  

Why is New Jersey special? Furunculosis happens in state hatcheries across the country. A common disease that other states deal with, without discontinuing brown trout stockings. Perhaps more research would serve me well, but since I'm cramped for time, I'll suggest that anyone who wants to know more about why can look for answers online. I just point out, as we all know, that having only rainbow trout stocked makes for a less interesting fishery.

Scott Fisher's petition needs more signatures. It's not that I know about politics in New Jersey. I'm not very informed, because I spend my time otherwise. But anyone can tell that a petition with a large percentage of signatures from among everyone who buys the stamp, is a moving document in and of itself. It makes the difference of objectifying our cause. Whether the people in office do anything or not. They can't help but listen when collectively we become loud. 

I, for one, have felt very proud of Pequest. Just read my article from 2020, which I link to at bottom. I've felt as if New Jersey must be an exceptionally well-stocked state. But when it comes down to division, I'm on the side of the trout fishermen, being one of them, of course. And it's come down to division, already, when we should be a whole community--the Division of Fish and Wildlife and us together. Tom Kean used to say it. "Perfect together." People in the Division don't really want to be left out, nobody does, but maybe the onus is on them to make the difference only they can, through hearing our petition. 

Whether we're well-stocked or not, we're certainly a state like no other when it comes to attitude among anglers. I've done a little searching out of Facebook trout communities, and I never found another like Trout Fishing in Nj. Now we have NJ Multispecies Mayhem on Facebook, too, and I doubt it's possible for any online fishing community as brash to arise anywhere else. Maybe I could have looked harder, but I doubt it. As we all know, New Jersey is the most densely populated state. That gets us at each others throats, but it also concentrates the passion among us. It makes us the most socially vibrant trout community anywhere in the world, I'll bet.

Pequest Hatchery

Pink Worm Bobber and Salmon Eggs Trout

Brenden Kuprel and I began fishing mid-morning on the Musconetcong River near Waterloo Village, and though the water was high with a strong current, clarity was good, and I got hit pretty quickly. I missed some more hits before I caught two trout on my microlight rod before Brenden caught his first, photographed above, on a pink worm under an arrangement of split shots of descending heaviness on the line under a float. Nice trout with a kype. I hoped the fish would holdover. Soon, he caught another, though after I lost another almost at the net, hits quit coming and we left. 

We tried a few spots near Tilcon Lake, where Brenden caught his third on the worm. It's a productive arrangement for a river. I miss a lot more hits on salmon eggs than he misses on the worm. If I got hit here once near Tilcon, though, it was a very subtle take.

At Stephen's State Park, we separated. Brenden decided to fish a couple of big eddies in front of the parking lot, while I walked downstream an eighth of a mile or so. Flow seemed even heavier, With so much water in the river, fish have far to go if they please. I situated myself far from the stocking point, but surely some of the trout had made it much further downstream. My second cast yielded an 11-incher, and no more hits came after that. I had made the walk with a certain spot in mind, and it was occupied by two fishermen who looked like they wanted to stay a long time.

I marched back to the lot.

Brenden had caught nothing, and we drove off for Changewater. There I thought that with some weight on my line, it was possible to get hit, but that never happened, nor to Brenden. By then I had had it with the high water and Lockatong Creek felt promising. I never got hold of my feelings to realize I could, of course, put even more weight on the line and fish right down the torrent. Because at bottom, the current is slack. Trout hold down there.  

Brenden set a new destination on his mobile device. I believe I've made my way there from Changewater without one, but it got us there faster. Midway, we stopped at Mulhockaway Creek. The water was beautiful. Clear like tap water. I never saw a trout and never got hit. Nice hole six feet deep, too. Brenden never got hit, either, and his float arrangement might have felt out of place to him. He began talking about the appropriateness of microlight method to little streams. I made a mental note to be sure my book emphasizes the fit sufficiently.

I can't remember ever getting skunked on the Lockatong, but my favorite two spots yielded nothing and possibly not a hit, as the three I thought I got were so subtle I'm not certain that's what they were. Brenden cast a spinner for nothing, and on downstream a few miles, taking Federal Twist Road, we tried a beautiful pool full of shale in its depth, and I got hit hard. Three taps followed and then no more, so I figured the trout got fed up on the four eggs. Brenden had a few taps on his pink worm that took some of it, and he thinks they could have been sunfish. 

Enough.

We took State Highway 29 southward along the D & R Canal and Delaware River, getting onto U.S. 202 East above Lambertville. We were near Three Bridges when Brenden remembered Tuesday is the South Branch Raritan stocking day. I shot a look at the clock--4:51.

We got to the river where the hands of middle-aged men standing in a line had begun to turn reels. Right about opening time at 5:00. 

Almost always, it's like taking candy from a baby on stocking days. When you use a microlight rod. Drifting eggs naturally along the bottom. Even when the South Branch Raritan is full of water as it was today. (Though rather clear.) But you do miss hits. Many. And you lose trout almost at hand. (And it's easier to release them by a quick pinch at the hook rather than netting them.) So when you hookup and catch three or four in row--or even 25 or 30 sometimes--that's your reward after all the preceding effort. After all, Brenden and I had spent all day for six fish. No complaint, but effort should eventually culminate in success. 

Brenden did get another on the pink worm. I caught seven more on the eggs. You see the nice one in the photograph below.     

Near Tilcon Lake

Running high

High but clear

Lockatong Creek

South Branch Raritan

Musconetcong

 

Rainbow Trout Early Season High Water

Took a trip to the Pequest Trout Conservation Area. It's not as I remember from 13 years ago. I expected an easy trail to walk and a couple of deep holes with relatively slow water. I really didn't expect the river to be high and muddy yet, either, because the last time I fished in heavy rain, back in January, the North Branch remained in good shape. But I don't really know when the heavy rain began. When I awoke at 10:00 a.m. it was raining moderately at best, if that much, and it was easy to assume not much water reached the rivers yet. I went online and checked United States Geological Survey for the Pequest, too, and the water level had got pretty low since the last rain, having risen only one increment.

I'm looking at the graph now. It still shows that single increment, but after that, the level rises almost in a perfectly vertical line and it's quite high by now as I write at 6:35 shortly after getting home. I managed to get my casts in just in time.

The water had just enough clarity. Back in early March, I confronted much the same of the South Branch Raritan and didn't even bother trying. The thought of getting a winter rainbow to hit in water discolored and high. But now it's spring, and who knows, the water might be three degrees warmer. Any case, my feeling was altogether different. The photo I shot of the spot just after I released my only rainbow shows there was still some clarity. An hour later and the bottom somewhat visible in the photo wouldn't have been visible. And though I did find a spot that proved to be productive...where the water slows somewhat and has at least a little depth...most of the river moved very fast over shallows. I did try behind rocks breaking flow and behind trees in the water, but the only action came here where I took the photo. A nice rainbow of at least 14 inches got hooked there, too, but it leapt high and threw the hook. Using a jig with a barbless hook is a problem because the lead at the head means it can get thrown easier than a fly would get thrown. 

Both TCAs--Point Mountain and Pequest--gobble up jigs. I got snagged more than once at Point Mountain, though I never lost a jig, but today I lost three jigs. On the way home I stopped at the Sporting Life and bought four packs of four jigs each pack.

Did I get wet? A little. I guess last time, I put my rain jacket on over my neoprene waders, because water managed to run down my back and get the front of my thighs wet, too. I brought no gloves. Temperature was about 44. Pretty cold. But my wet hands never felt cold. I never felt cold anywhere, but especially during my drive home, after I took my waders off, where I got wet felt uncomfortable.  

Pequest

 

Georgia Dugouts, Glued, Other Boats Prompt Own Appreciation

My Caravelle 17 1/2-foot runabout, which a nor'easter did some damage to, and I used for my clam treading business out of Long Beach Island.

National Fisherman Very interesting article on Georgia boats, originally published in 1980. Same year I began treading clams commercially, and probably the same year I learned of the National Fisherman, reading a little of it. For commercial fishermen. Some business on the island had that magazine for sale, but I can't place it!

Boats are definitely "crafts" and I'd say there's certainly an art to creating the dugouts photographed in the article. Cypress again. I can't quite place that kind of tree, though I've heard of it from boyhood, but I might have seen some and taken note of them while in Florida or Louisiana. 

Nothing beats handcrafted boats, but even commercially molded boats are cool for what they're made of. My squareback canoe is rotomolded polyethylene plastic, and though I can never rid the impression altogether of that being cheap, it's durable stuff and shows no signs of aging after eight years. I did have to buy a plastic welding kit and fix where the bottom rubbed through on the keel, but that worked, so no problem. Flex Seal and the like does not bond to polyethylene. Virtually nothing does, and I judged it best to weld the material. (The weld sticks are polyethylene also.)

I worked on my Caravelle after the starboard side got punched through by a bulkhead, nor'easter winds pulling it out of its mooring, when the top and bottom constructions also separated. Used fiberglass strips and fill, then painted it. Very pleasurable. 

So I found the article's descriptions of epoxy use in boat building interesting. And the mention of composite plastic/wood construction--cool. When the words came to the part about making sure one is doing it right, I felt "aha" because I was thinking the same thing from the moment I read the caption about the glued boat. (I don't always read an article from first word to the last, though I usually do.) 

I still think the coolest thing is the dugout canoe at the article's head. How a boat that well proportioned was dug out of a tree trunk. Wow.

Shore Adventure 

Point Mountain Conservation Area Trout Outing

Penwell Mill

Even though catching a trout today wouldn't exactly count as a fall stocker caught during the winter season, I went after whatever I might catch in the Point Mountain Trout Conservation Area, where the Musconetcong River is open to fishing year round. I came with my four-and-a-half-foot St. Croix, the jig's barb broken and pressed down. I intend to graduate to fly fishing eventually but not yet. 

I followed a trail in that led to a likely spot. Though I judged it a little shallow, I had no doubt about the boulder-created eddies and holes dug out by the way currents must get directed during periods of high water. They must hold trout. Once, I thought I might have got hit--hard. It seemed too hard a pull to have been a momentary snag, given the speed I retrieved, but I felt it probably was a snag. 

Following a footpath downriver from Penwell Road involved parting the way between a lot of briars and bloodied hands. I fished at a couple of spots. One of them, on my way back, presented a nice seam along the opposite shore, so I made sure to fan cast that. It was all shallow fast water, but trout hide in pockets behind rocks. You really can't wade most of it, though. Rocks all over and slippery. Current strong. 

I got way downstream when I came to a rock-created weir extending from bank to bank. Naturally, depth was dug in below it. A series of cuts where flow gets the best of the river bottom. I might have got hit by a small trout. (There are small wild fish, of course.) Again, I couldn't really tell. Even so, the depth wasn't much, but enough for a few fish. 

I also cast out into the middle, hoping for any trout hiding behind rocks, and I got snagged. In the middle of the river where rocks studded the bottom everywhere and knee-deep or better current raced by. I put my camera bag on the ground, took off my vest, took my car keys out of my pocket and put them on my vest, and then I put my wading belt on, knowing that without cleats on my boots, slipping and getting wet was likely. And the rocks were slippery, but I found my boots just pliable enough to sort of grip bottom with my feet as I edge my way. All that for a three dollar jig, but it got adrenaline up a little.

Shallow Flow

Footpath recently traveled

Pequest

 

Morris County Brook Trout Stream

Inspired by John Garbarini's wild trout catches displayed on Facebook, and remembering what Gerry Dumont told me during a recent interview, I decided to try a native brook trout stream that careens down a mountain. 

First, I tried to access the brook from below, from near where it enters a river, but I found residential lawns bordering on it. So I parked in the lot of a county park, realizing I might have to hike well down below to avoid the warmwater influence of a dammed pond. (I caught a 14-inch largemouth on a spinnerbait in that pond some 10 years ago.) Of course, this time of year, who knows? Do brook trout swim upstream?

In any event, from what I've gathered, a quarter mile below from where the South Branch departs warmwater Budd Lake, the river is full of native brook trout protected by myriad springs that keep the water chilly. I figure the same must happen here, but how far down? In the photo above, you see I found a plunge pool I couldn't pass by. But it was maybe 300 yards below the dam. 

I went further downsteam and attempted to work a good-looking pool with a seven-and-a-half-foot 6X leader and two feet of tippet. A mess. Not nearly enough control. So I removed the leader and just tied on three feet of two-pound test. Gave me all the control I needed, until I came to another deep plunge pool. Put a BB split shot on and got the #12 Pheasant Tail down there. 

I found the rocks difficult to walk. They were everywhere. I had to climb a steep hill back towards the car. I hadn't much time and did not get very down below the dam. In the open-air Loree Chapel, I sat on a varnished bench that looked new, and I felt deeply moved by the cross in front of me. So I stayed put maybe five minutes. 

I came to resolve I hadn't expected to come to. Down among those rocks, I feared for my lower back, as traversing the terrain required putting it into positions that caused pain. And I never want to get hospitalized for it again as I did last summer. Besides, throw it out down among rocks and I might have a very trying time getting back to my car! 

Well, sitting on the bench I recognized I felt no more pain, my fishing had been successful insofar as its management was concerned. So the problem was less real than complicated by subjective fears. I'm no old man, not yet. I can do this. 

Skunked, though. Again. I see what's online, so I know something of what's possible in New Jersey. I'm proud of the fact that I've caught some natives and wild trout myself. Wild browns and one wild rainbow, besides a number of wild rainbows I caught in the mountains of Georgia.. Native brook trout, I've caught plenty of them in New Jersey, some in New Hampshire. But I'd like to make some outstanding catches, besides once catching four or five native New Jersey brookies as big as nine inches, and today I was trying to gauge how possible it might be, given that my elasticity is not that of a young man now, and I have only so many years. I catch a lot of largemouths. You know? Maybe stick to what I do best. 

But I'm not going to give up. Only a couple of years ago, I felt the same about fall and winter river trout. I had gone after them, had a few on, lost one at my feet, but just could not make any catches. Now I've got that fishing under control. At least with a spinning rod. (First step.)

Speaking of which, I noticed today that the South Branch at Long Valley is running reasonably clear and not very high. At High Bridge, it was somewhat high but on the clear side. My wife and I had taken a hike at Round Valley, our black Lab Loki and my camera along, got take out from Metropolitan Seafood, and driven to Gronsky's after eating at the main launch. I realized I should have taken my spinning rod with black maribou jig along. There's a good spot right above where we sat at a picnic table and ate ice cream. 

Brook's rocks and riffles.

Sort of pool I know from experience can hold a trout or two.

Look at the rocks.

 

You can see Trish in the lower middle.

4.23-Pound Rainbow