Upper Connecticut River Fishing Report: 7/24

The fishing season is progressing along here on the upper Connecticut River in northern New Hampshire. More summery weather this past week, and even some willing trout and salmon that have been playing the game.

That’s Tall Timber guest Ken Bracewell with a nice rainbow that he caught and released on the Trophy Stretch with our fishing guide, Mickey Cunliffe. They spent a couple of days together out there harassing the local fish, finding them in all of the usual haunts, as well as some lesser known spots.

Nymphs are still producing well on these high sunny days as you would expect, but dries are also producing in certain spots. This is also a great time to trot out your Grasshopper patterns, and certainly, the “hopper dropper” strategy can be employed with some confidence now.

The latest news might be welcome for those anglers that like to sling and swing streamers, too. The river flow in the Trophy Stretch was raised to 200 CFS today and it should stay that way for a couple of weeks. Great River Hydro needs to replace some of the top boards on the dam at First Lake, so the lake has to be lowered a bit to accomplish this.

That increase of water should be welcome by the fish, as it gives them the opportunity to spread out for better lies presumably. Change is good in this case. It also means more spots to try to target trout and salmon in, so anglers should be able to spread out as well.

We expect it to go back to normal levels once the work starts at the dam in a couple of weeks. Elsewhere, the flows in the other stretches remain the same: 52 CFS in the No Kill Stretch and around 300 CFS below Murphy Dam.

Fall will be here before we know it …