• Trouting the Beaverkill

    Photo by John Papciak

    Along the far bank is a ledge of New York granite that runs the length of the pool. At first and last light the darkened granite looks like the silhouette of a prehistoric bear standing up to his belly in the stream, fishing. The branches of a Douglas fur hang over the bear’s massive shoulders and reach out over the head of the pool. Upstream the leaves of dainty poplar and beach wave in the light over the riffle water on the long flat channel into the deep pool that begins under the bear’s snout.On hot summer days, wading in jeans and felt soled wading shoes and keeping your casts quick and short and just beneath the overhang, you can take trout after trout in the slick nipple of water that peaks behind each rounded stone in the riffle water above the big fishing bear granite. Small grizzly hackle flies tied with a white deer hair tuft for visibility and buoyancy work best.One sunny, breezy June day. you wade into center stream and settle yourself on a long, wide flat rock. Small trout sip gnats in the deep hole beneath the bear’s head. Excited you tie on a tiny black…