Skip to content

Contact Info:

315.283.8871
upstateguideservice@gmail.com
Upstate Guide Service
Upstate Guide Service

Primary Navigation Menu

Menu
  • What We Do
    • Fly Fishing
    • Light Tackle Angling
    • Ice Fishing
    • Hunting
    • Hosted Fly Fishing Trips
  • Where We Go
    • Finger Lakes
    • Central New York
    • The Adirondacks / North Country
    • The St. Lawrence River
    • The Northern Catskills
    • The Katmai
    • Patagonia
  • Who We Are
    • Mike Crawford — Professional Guide
    • John Fraser — Professional Guide
  • Details
  • Field Notes
  • Skaneateles Lake — An Anthology
  • Slide Shows
    • Ice Fishing Pics
    • Fly Fishing Pics
    • Trophy Trout And Salmon Pics
    • Adirondack / North Country Pics
    • Light Tackle Lake Angling Pics
    • Upstate Guide Service Owner — Professional Guide — Mike Crawford Pics

Fly Fishing (Page 2)

About Guiding

2020-04-15
By: admin
On: April 15, 2020
In: Fly Fishing, Professional Guide Service in Upstate New York, Trout fishing, Trout Fishing Guide In New York, Trout Fishing In New York

Since as long as I can remember I have always wanted to guide or lead people in search of fish. Mostly trout. The early seeds of which were planted in me by my father who brought me along to the trout rivers and streams each spring when I was a boy. My father would put me on his back when it came time to cross the river to reach another hole. He would let me fight a trout he hooked. And I watched him as he gutted the trout and inspected its stomach contents. To a 10 year old boy this was incredible stuff! SomeRead More →

The Wonder Rod

2020-04-13
By: admin
On: April 13, 2020
In: Central New York Fishing, Fly Fishing, Trout fishing, Trout Fishing In New York

As a boy, with my spinning rod and reel bundled and tied to the frame of my BMX bike with rubber bands and bread ties, I spent many summer days pedaling from my home in the hilly suburbia of Syracuse to the nearby Erie Canal towpath. Once reached, I could travel the towpath west to Butternut Creek or east to Limestone Creek.  Each creek, with its remote green pools of cold water, was an oasis of summer adventure where I fished and explored. In those days the creeks were healthy. Shaded by dense softwood canopies and rich with beds of clean gravel. Colorful trout wereRead More →

Spring Season Lost To Covid-19

2020-04-13
By: admin
On: April 13, 2020
In: Central New York Fishing, Fly Fishing, Professional Guide Service in Upstate New York, Trout fishing, Trout Fishing Guide In New York, Trout Fishing In New York

In the world of professional fly fishing and guiding there is no more anticipated time of the year than the Spring. The busiest season of the year. The Spring trips on my calendar are the  benchmark that can determine my success for the entire year. The loss of the 2020 Spring season will be difficult to survive for my modest guide service. But it is a nothing when considering the gravity and scale of what New York and the country is going through right now. Most frustrating is not all the cancelled fishing trips. It is being stuck here at home. The degree of sufferingRead More →

Autumn Dry Fly Fishing

2019-09-27
By: admin
On: September 27, 2019
In: Fly Fishing, Trout fishing, Trout Fishing Guide In New York, Trout Fishing In New York

On a tailwater river I fish often the consistent and large hatches decline in early July. By mid August there are just a few reliable species of mayflies hatching each day. As the month progresses these hatches become unreliable and can disappear. The flies tied to replicate these mayflies are dressed on size 18 to 22 hooks and consist of sulphur, olives and tricos. Mid summer will find the river quiet. The bulk of fly fishermen have abandoned the banks. As summer ends and the shorter days and cooler nights begin, the insect activity begins to pick up again. Angling pressure does not. In theRead More →

Early Summer on The Creek

2018-06-15
By: admin
On: June 15, 2018
In: Central New York Fishing, Fly Fishing, Trout fishing, Trout Fishing Guide In New York, Trout Fishing In New York

Each year, peaking in the early summer, I enjoy nothing so much as fly fishing on small streams for wild trout. It is, in fact, the most enjoyable form of angling. Within five minutes drive of my cabin is ten miles of catch-and-release trout stream that is loaded with wild trout.  This creek is small. Very small. The county puts a few thousand run-of-the-mill stock rainbow trout in it each spring. But it is the brown trout that thrive. Wild browns that average 12 inches are common and when approached with a three or four weight fly rod they make for great angling. My guideRead More →

Rainbows and Waterfalls

2018-04-15
By: admin
On: April 15, 2018
In: Central New York Fishing, Fly Fishing, Trout fishing, Trout Fishing Guide In New York, Trout Fishing In New York

Twice a year trout migrate from the lakes into the streams and rivers that flow into them. Some species travel upstream to spawn in the fall, like brown trout, brook trout and salmon. Another species of trout, the rainbow trout, migrate upstream in the spring to spawn. Anglers take advantage of this bi-annual run of fish and stalk wary lake-run trout in the pools, runs, riffles and eddies in streams and creeks swollen with run-off. In the Finger Lakes on the first day of April each year hundreds of anglers descend upon the creeks flowing into the lakes to catch spawning rainbow trout. In some biological logicRead More →

Technical Fly Fishing — “Threading The Needle”

2017-08-29
By: admin
On: August 29, 2017
In: Fly Fishing, Trout fishing, Trout Fishing Guide In New York, Trout Fishing In New York

In Leon Chandlers’ boyhood he fished the same waters that I do today. I imagine him a teen with a fly rod in his hand roll casting a hand-tied callibaetis at dimpling browns. He was most likely fishing a nightcrawler at that age. The reason I fly fish the boyhood home of Leon Chandler is due to geography and proximity. Just coincidental. But, if not for Leon Chandler I may not fish with a fly rod at all. Leon Chandler was the catalyst of fly fishing and fly fishing products in America. He was a Catskill fly fisherman, Cortland native, and a gentleman who introduced American flyRead More →

Professional Guide Service In The Adirondacks

Backcountry Brook Trout

2017-05-10
By: admin
On: May 10, 2017
In: Fly Fishing, Trout fishing, Trout Fishing Guide In New York, Trout Fishing In New York

The first brook trout I caught was over thirty years ago. My Dad left me on the bank of a swollen Spring trout river on the Tug Hill with a can of worms, some hooks and split-shot, and instructions to not fall in or wander off. Perched high above a turbulent eddy hole on the precarious sod bank I drowned a worm and set the hook into a beautiful hook-jawed male brookie’ of about 16 inches in length and shaped like a nerf football. Knowing this trout was a rare find, and big for its kind, it was not going back into the creek. ItRead More →

Admiring a Spring Rainbow

Dead Drift Float Fishing — Fly Fishing — Final Chapter

2017-04-12
By: admin
On: April 12, 2017
In: Fly Fishing, Trout fishing, Trout Fishing Guide In New York, Trout Fishing In New York

A popular early spring technique for fly casters is throwing streamers. It is suitable for fisheries that harbor good populations of baitfish…Forage-based lakes and rivers. A large eastern Finger Lake that I fish often is unique in that it has escaped (so far) becoming a forage-based lake. No introduced baitfish are present. While sculpin and immature yellow perch are a staple of the lake-dwelling rainbows’ diet in this natural lake, the trout are keyed in on insects, crayfish, and scuds. But matching the hatch, on big trout lakes, is often unnecessary in early spring when water temperatures hover in the low 40’s or below. In fact, theRead More →

Dead Drift Float Fishing – Fly Fishing – Part 3

2017-04-03
By: admin
On: April 3, 2017
In: Fly Fishing, Trout Fishing Guide In New York, Trout Fishing In New York

  So I began this blog, weeks ago, to describe and introduce a technique I have refined that I call dead drift float fishing. But I have lost my way. And the whole topic of fly fishing lakes for trout is a voluminous one. One that I could write a book on. And these blogs may be the seed of what will grow into just such an endeavor. I will soon come back to the components of dead drift float fishing, both for the fly rod and the spinning rod, but here today I digress into “The Other” kind of fly fishing on lakes. ThereRead More →

Posts navigation

Previous 1 2 3 Next

Recent Posts

  • There Is No Such Thing As Safe Ice?
  • Hardwater Season Approaches!

Archives

  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • March 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • June 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • February 2020
  • December 2019
  • September 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • June 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • August 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • February 2016

“Promote The Remote”

Upstate Guide Service

As a responsible steward UGS Inc. promotes sustainable outdoor pursuits with an obvious respect for Upstate New Yorks’ spectacular and unique environments. 

We practice low-impact, leave-no-trace backcountry travel techniques, catch-and-release fly fishing and fair chase hunting.

Need more information about where to go and where to stay for outdoor recreation and sporting pursuits in Upstate New York?

Feel free to call or email us.

315.283.8871

upstateguideservice@gmail.com

Recent Posts

  • There Is No Such Thing As Safe Ice?
  • Hardwater Season Approaches!

Archives

  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • March 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • June 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • February 2020
  • December 2019
  • September 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • June 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • August 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • February 2016
 

Loading Comments...