The Catskill Fly Fishing Center had a banner weekend, with its third annual F3T fest (Fly Fishing Film Tour 2025) on Friday night. The sold-out event was held in the Wulff Gallery, and filled with enthusiastic fly-fishers, who were happy to enjoy delicious food and beverages, take chances on lots of exciting raffle prizes and watch several films on fly-fishing around the world. 

The evening was a great success and a great time was had by all. On Saturday the Museum was the gathering place for the Guest Fly-Tyer, Christina Muller, who demonstrated her fly-tying techniques and shared some of her beautiful flies.

Recent rains (and snows!) have slowly raised water levels a bit closer to the average flows for this time of year. On Sunday evening the Beaverkill at Cooks Falls registered 903 cubic feet per second, which is up substantially from last week but still below the median average flow for April 13 of 1060 cfs over 111 years of record-keeping. Water temperatures on the lower river were still a chilly 45 degrees, although the upper river was a bit warmer later in the day.

It seemed like a good afternoon to head back out on the stream, as the sun finally parted the clouds and temperatures were predicted to be in the 50s. 

We headed over to the East Branch Delaware watershed on Sunday afternoon; the truck’s thermometer measured a balmy 55 degrees once we passed over the snow-covered mountain and on the down side of the Barkaboom. The goal was to try out the Bush Kill, a tributary of the East Branch above Margaretville, but very disappointing to find that there were no Public Fishing Signs posted along that stream, even though there is a fair amount of public fishing water that appears online! 

One area that seemed to coincide with PFR on the map was actually Posted against trespassing. The other was not posted, but there were no identifying PFR signs to be found. Undaunted, I decided to try my luck in a decent-looking run. Water temperatures were 47 degrees but there were absolutely no flies on the water or in the air, quite a difference from last week’s outing on the Beaverkill, where water temps were noticeably chillier but the air was filled with hundreds of tiny Blue-Winged Olives. 

(No rises yet on either outing, as the trout tend to wait for the stream to reach that Magic Number of 50 degrees Fahrenheit to encourage them to rise.) Nothing seemed interested in my casts, whether wet or dry flies.

I reeled up and decided to try my luck on the Beaverkill on my way home; it was pretty late in the afternoon but still warm outside. The Beaverkill above Roscoe was almost 47 degrees at about 6:00 p.m, air temps still in the mid-50s. 

Although there were very few flies at all to be seen, I made a few casts with a dry fly, before switching to the Baby Brown Trout streamer my friend John Apgar gave me and…… Bang! It was pounced on by a sizeable brown trout that shot out of the water for the pounce so quickly it startled me, and got off shortly afterward. After several more tries, I decided to try a different fly and put on a Black Leech that Ed had tied. 

A few casts and….Bingo! Fish on! Was delighted to reel in a beautiful wild rainbow trout, the first of the season. As it was getting late it was time to return home, with a sense of accomplishment and the promise of a good season ahead.

Judy Van Put is a long-time member of the NYS Outdoor Writers Association, and is the recipient of the New York State Council of Trout Unlimited’s Professional Communications Award.