South Platte — Deckers and Cheesman

The river

The South Platte below Cheesman Dam is the closest serious tailwater to Denver, which makes it both excellent and crowded. Cheesman Canyon is pocket water in a granite gorge, fished with short casts and heavy nymphs. Below Deckers Bridge the valley opens into a braided flat where the fishing is more about reading current seams than about scrambling. Both reaches hold genuinely large fish, and both are catch-and-release, flies-only in the canyon.

On this river

Pocket water in the canyon

Cheesman is a series of small, deep pockets behind boulders, each about the size of a bathtub and each holding one or two fish. Fish them one at a time: two-metre cast, two-second drift, step. The whole canyon is fished at a range shorter than most people's back cast.

Trico mornings at Deckers

From late July the Trico spinner fall starts around 07:30 and lasts until the sun hits the water, sometimes only 40 minutes. Use a 5-metre leader tapering to 7X, a single #22 spinner, and position yourself upstream of the pods so the fly arrives before the leader. When it ends it ends completely — do not keep casting at dead water.

Winter nymphing without an indicator

In January the fish are in the slowest, deepest third of each pocket and they will not move for a fly. Sink a single small midge larva on a Euro rig, keep the rod tip within 30 cm of the water, and feel for the take rather than watching for it. Cold-water takes feel like the fly stopping, nothing more.