Little River Browns

The little river in Charlton-Oxford is a gem of a stream in my childhood backyard. I never fished it until this year, and I'm disappointed that I didn't know enough about it until now. Very easy access at the route 20 bridge and the new Fulling Mill trout park on fulling mill dr where the river empties into Buffumville. The latter place is where I fished Saturday evening with a local conservation officer. We started down at the lake with high hopes of holdovers and stockies that made their way downstream from the bridge, but the fish hadn't moved yet. In my experience it takes about a week for the stockies to travel down/upstream from the bridges they are put in it. Typically it's downstream first. We made our way up to the bridge and found a double digit pod of browns sitting above the fast water, just below the bridge. I tied on a prince nymph and caught a few. Tried a bugger, caught a few more. Ende with a stonefly and landed another 3. Lost the biggest one (12") on the stonefly. The largest fish in this stream won't break 14" but fishing here is worth it. It's the perfect size stream for a 3 wt.





Hit the quinnie on the way home from work. Nothing hatching, no top water action. Just one take on a golden stonefly nymph on a swing. Good size rainbow, lost him before he got to the net. Flows are right about where I like them for this stream, just above 100 CFS. Should get hit with more fish this week. Smaller stones still coming off, but we're looking at the larger guys to start to make an appearance soon. I've seen green, yellow and a pale orange in the past. I've got this fly ready for its first trial run as soon as I see them. I call it "The Flying Todd." Super easy to tie. Peacock body, foam top with segmented body, and an elk wing. I'm going to experiment some more with a tail and some rubber legs. Make it your own!