WNY Fly Fishing Private Lessons

I offer private lessons for fly casting, the cost in $60.00 per student for two hours for casting, equipment, knots and general fly fishing. E mail me at jimguida@hotmail.com











I work with Project Healing Waters as well as Women In The Outdoors

Flies For Sale

My Patterns are as follows: Guida's Mirrored Minnows $2.50 ea, Guida's White Lighting/Black Thunder $2.00 ea, Guida's Emerald Shiners $2.00 ea, Hairballs, sucker spawn, single eggs $1.00 ea all orders must be in Qty's of 5's or 10's per style
e-mail orders to jimguida@hotmail.com

WNY Fly Fishing Trout Camps

Trout Camps are in the spring for inland trout. The classes are six hours and cover casting, fly selection, and reading the water. We provide lunch, guides, flies/leaders/tippet, rods and reels if needed, you must bring waders and wading boots, sunglasses. This is the best way to start out fly fishing and learn from some of the best instructors in WNY.

Cost is $250.00 per person $350.00 per two
Please call Brian Slavinski
716-834-4331















Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Stream Report 3/19/08

Well the rains have come and raised the levels to unfishable conditions on the catt. the smaller tribs may dirty for a day or two but they come down quick and game on.

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Stream Report

I went out his weekend to hit the Erie tribs with some friends just to stretch my legs a little and to test out a new streamer pattern that I have playing around with. The creeks all looked very fishy and the water levels were just about perfect, all of the fish I caught were on hairballs and my new white sculpin pattern, nobody brought a camera so no pics sorry.

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Fish Cognition and Behavior

By Culum Brown, Kevin N. Laland, Jens Krause

Of one interest is whether hatchery-reared fish retain the learned recognition of predators for relevant time frames. The fish demonstrated this, after high rates of predation for up to 3 weeks of stocking. They suggest after this period, hatchery-reared fish would have sufficient time to acquire the recognition of predators and/or learn appropriate avoidance behavior. Juvenile rainbow trout retain recognition of predators for at least 21 days, sufficient time for stocked fish to learn and recognize predators and how to avoid them.
That is to say, hatchery fish behave differently than natural fish, in the wild (I'll use the NOAA Fisheries terms for birth type: "wild" is born in the wild, "hatchery" is born in the hatchery, and "natural" is born in the wild of wild parents--hatchery ancestry is possible for all classes). Hatchery fish tend to school more, "hang out" higher in the water column, exert more energy pursuing food, and exert more energy while holding. This is not true if the fish are planted as eggs or very young. They tend to act as wild fish then. Basically, hatchery fish adapt to the hatchery. In studies where wild fish were introduced to hatchery ponds, they were badly out competed by the hatchery stock. Hatchery fish aren't stupid, they just learn how to be trout in an unnatural setting. Having said this, holdover fish can learn to be "real" trout, though will probably never be as good at surviving in nature as wild fish. Also, survivorship of hatchery-released fish is very low. Few will ever live to be holdovers.In terms of being able to tell the difference between hatchery and wild fish while/after you catch them, this is complicated. If the hatchery fish was recently stocked it will not fight like a wild fish (and may never). Hatchery fish are corralled and netted routinely, so they kind of get used to being handled. Also, they were bred to be easy to culture. Further, if you are born in (and live in) a stream you get better muscle development versus being reared in near-standing water in a concrete raceway. If the fish survives to be a holdover, this may become less of an issue. The color of a fish is also complicated. Often the differences in color you see are due to diet. People still don't know what the nutritional requirements of most fish are (as a result they just add fish meal, and assume it will have the necessary nutrients since it is from fish--often anchovettas(sp?) and other bait fish). Many of the striking colors in a Salmonid come from pigments that are ingested. For instance, rainbows don't get pink flesh or stripes if they don't get the proper diet. Hatchery foods can now be purchased with canthaxanthin (a red/orange pigment), but the fish still don't get as bright. Once a hatchery fish lives in nature for some time, it will look like it is wild, due to diet changes. Having said this, there are many strains/races/subspecies of the various Salmonidae, and as a result, two specimens of the same species can look quite different (not to mention individual/genetic color differences). So, if the strain being stocked in your home water was originally acquired from a very different population, you could see color differences between the natural/wild and hatchery fish. If there was a genetic bottleneck in the population's past, this could increase the consistent, unique colorations of the population. So, you may be right about the color differences between stocked/wild fish, or you may not be. Probably, you wouldn't be able to differentiate between wild/hatchery fish based on color after it was in the wild water for some time. Also, if hatchery fish are introduced to a place, and they can breed, they will. I guarantee that the fish of Little J have a fair amount of "hatchery genes" in them. This would lead to intermediate phenotypes, making differentiation even more difficult. In response to wild fish learning from being caught, a recent study showed that statistically you will not catch the same fish more than once or twice. That is not to say you never catch a fish more than once, it just becomes more difficult each time the fish is caught. This is true for hatchery fish as well. However, it will probably take them longer to catch on as they were handled in a hatchery, and as a result are more likely to "accept" such experiences as "normal." Of course, there is some speculation involved in this statement.

Sunday, March 2, 2008

Trout Senses

Trout, as with most animals, are very in tune to their surroundings. They locate, inspect, and eat natural foods using their senses of sight, hearing, smell, and taste/touch. They use a highly developed set of senses to locate foods and to avoid or escape their predators.


Sight
Trout possess a very keen sense of sight although they have no need to see more than 20 or 30 feet away because of water clarity. Trout see through what scientists have called the “trout’s window”. This is a cone shaped view extending up from the trout’s eye at an increasing diameter. Without going into details, this is why trout see better at greater depths. They also have good color vision which is why fishing the same fly in two different colors can produce drastically different results. Trout possess excellent night vision as well. I’ve never personally done any night fishing as I don’t enjoy the extra challenges it involves but have talked to those who have, many with great success. Sight is arguably the most important sense a trout uses when deciding whether or not to take you’re offering. Because of these things it is important for the angler to make sure he presents the fly upstream from the trout so the fly doesn’t suddenly appear in its window and give it a chance to be spooked.


Hearing
Trout have highly developed dual hearing systems. First, the ears in their heads are used to detect the movement of nearby objects. These ears allow the trout to hear sound frequencies well outside the human hearing range. This hearing receptor of the trout is what allows the fish to find food even in very murky water.
Fish also have a lateral-line system on each side of their bodies that picks up frequency vibrations. This lateral line, which runs from behind the head to the base of the tail, is a series of tiny drum-like membranes with nerve endings that run back to the spinal cord.
Some things to note about a trout’s hearing are: 1) Trout cannot hear human voices as we speak at a range outside of their hearing frequency so it’s ok to have the stream-side conversation. 2) Trout are very aware of their surroundings so it is important to wade slowly and quietly so as not to spook them and stay as far back from the target area as possible.


Smell
Amazingly, trout have a highly developed sense of smell that is much better than that of humans and supposedly even surpasses that of other animals. For this reason it is important that you don’t introduce any foreign smells into the water. When heading out to the stream leave the smelly colognes and deodorants in the medicine cabinet until after you’re finished fishing. Also, take care to purchase the newer fly floatants and line cleaners that “mask” the chemical smell. Be careful with the insect repellents as well as these smells are not masked and are quite foreign to trout.


Taste/Touch
On the surfaces of their bodies, fins, and mouths, fish have sensors that can taste and feel their foods. These are considered secondary senses which are used after the potential food is located or captured. A trout might locate your fly and rub its body across it or bite it to determine if it is real food or fake. This is demonstrated when it appears that the trout has missed the fly when, in reality, it has touched and tasted it and in an instant rejected it because it did not feel or taste right. This is why you must react to a strike quickly before the fish can recognize your fly as a fake and reject it.

Pros Say Game Fish are Getting Smarter

By BRENT FRAZEE of the Kansas City Star
Published Monday, March 19, 2007

There’s no doubt that fishermen are becoming better educated.
But is it possible that the fish are, too?
Denny Brauer certainly thinks so. He is convinced that the more fishermen learn, the more the prey learns, too.
"There’s no doubt in my mind that we’ve educated the fish," said Brauer, a top bass pro from Camdenton. "In the old days, you could go down to a bank with a spinner bait and catch all the bass you’d want. It’s not that way anymore.
"The fish have seen it all. They have seen a lot of different lures and different techniques, and they react. We’ve conditioned them. That’s why it’s so important to keep looking for new ways and places to catch them."
Rick Clunn, another legendary bass fisherman, agrees. He, too, has seen signs that the bass are learning just as quickly as the fishermen.
"There is an extra variable now - fishing pressure," Clunn said. "A lot of these fish have been caught and released, and they’ve learned. Fish are a lot like deer. When they feel pressure, they’ll avoid it.
"I believe that’s why we’re not finding them in a lot of the places where we used to. They’re still out there, but they’re being pushed to more subtle places. They’re reacting to the fishing pressure."
Educated fish, some might find it hard to believe that a creature with a brain the size of a grape can become an Einstein. Fisheries biologists say it really isn’t that way. They say the fish, if anything, become conditioned. When they have a negative experience - say, being stung by a hook - they react.
In most cases, a fish’s memory is short-term. But if it is caught and released often enough, it can become conditioned. And that can shape behavior.
Luckily, there are other factors at work - weather, barometric pressure, and water temperature, to name a few - that can trigger aggression and cause a fish to hit. But fishermen know that fishing pressure can be a factor.
"I believe the conditioning factor is real," said Al Lindner, a fisherman from Brainerd, Minn., who founded "In-Fisherman" magazine. "Species such as bass and muskies that are exposed to a lot of intelligent fishing pressure definitely will change behavior. I’ve seen it many times.
"That’s why the good fisherman is continually adjusting, like going to more subtle presentations with smaller baits or by going to the grotesquely large baits. You’re trying to present something the fish haven’t seen before."
Though there have been few studies documenting a fish’s reaction to fishing pressure, fisheries biologists also believe it has an effect on their behavior. But they shy away from drawing conclusions.
They say fishing pressure might be one of many factors affecting fish behavior.
"Fishing pressure does present challenges for us from a management standpoint," said Mike Kruse, fisheries program supervisor for the Missouri Department of Conservation. "Sometimes, fishing success doesn’t match what we find in our surveys."
Gene Gilliland, a noted fisheries biologist for the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation, doesn’t deny that negative experiences can affect fish behavior. But he, too, thinks there is many other influences, some of which man might not fully understand yet.
"I talked to another fisheries biologist who went diving one time to observe how bass reacted to the lures cast their way," Gilliland said. "They watched lure after lure come right past them, and they wouldn’t even move.
"But all of a sudden, it was like a light switch and they started hitting the same type of lure they had seen an hour earlier. The biologist tried to tie it to solar/lunar tables, the barometer, the weather, all kinds of things, but he couldn’t find anything. "More than anything, that told me we still have a way to go before we understand why fish act the way they do

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WNY Hatch Chart

Name Size Dates
Stoneflies 10-18 April - September
B.W.O 18-22 April - September
Hendrickson 12-14 April - May
Black Caddis 16-18 March - May
Caddis 14-18 April - September
March Brown 10-12 May - June
Grey Fox 12-14 May - June
Sulpher 14-18 May - June
P.M.D. 16-20 May - June
Lt. Cahill 14-16 June - July
Green Drake 8-10 May - June
Isonchia 12-14 June - August
Yellow Stonefly 12-14 June - September
Hexagina 6-8 June - July
Trico 20-24 July - September

Ants 16-22 June - September
Beetles 12-16 June - September
Flying Ants 16-18 June - September
Hoppers 10-12 August
Crickets 10-12 August

USGS Height Gage

USGS Height Gage

Flow Rate Guide

Oatka Creek
2.60 – 2.80 low water flows·
2.80 – 3.00 moderate flows·
3.00 – 3.20 good fishing flow·
3.20 – 3.40 starting to rise·
3.40 – 3.60 High Water


Genesee River near Wellsville
100 – 200cfs Summer Flows Low water
200 – 300cfs Summer Flows Good Water
300 – 400cfs Spring Flows Fishable·
400 – 500cfs Spring Flows High Water·
650cfs + Stay Home


Cattaraugus Creek

Cattaraugus in Fall
100 – 250cfs Low Water Flow·
250 – 400cfs Good Fishing Flow·
400 – 650cfs Fishable Flow·
650 – 800cfs High Water Flow·
800 – 1000cfs Very High Water Flow·
1000 – 1200cfs Stay Home Tie Flies


Cattaraugus in Spring

100 – 250cfs Low Water Flow·
250 – 400cfs Good Fishing Flow·
400 – 650cfs Normal Fishing Flow·
650 – 800cfs High Water Flow·
800 – 1000cfs Very High Water Flow·
1000 – 1200cfs + Stay Home Tie Flies

Followers

Mirrored Minnow

Mirrored Minnow

Rainbow Runner

Rainbow Runner

Emilee's Spey

Emilee's Spey

Thunder Creek Minnow

Thunder Creek Minnow

Simple Sculpin

Simple Sculpin

Hairball

Hairball

Rabbit Leech

Rabbit Leech

Hare's Ear Wet

Hare's Ear Wet

Peacock Emerger

Peacock Emerger

Sulpher Emerger

Sulpher Emerger

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