The Joy of Fly Fishing in New Brunswick

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This can make for strange and exciting days on the water.

My fly fishing buddies and I head to Renous New Brunswick every year for Atlantic salmon but one year my buddy Kerry invited me to a brook I had never fished before.

Justing getting to the brook was a chore as the underbrush was extremely thick. I am sure this would cause most to move on to another place to fish. I love it.

I had taken Kerry on a great day of brown trout fishing near Shediac New Brunswick and he was now returning the favor and he didn’t disappoint.

We both had our cars as I was coming from Moncton and he was coming from Fredericton. This worked out great because we parked one car as close to the point we could be leaving the brook, where it meets the Caines River and the other car was were camped and entered the brook.

We finally clawed our way through the underbrush and found the brook. The action was pretty much none stop all day and the scenery was eye popping at times.

I have gone back to this spot many times since that day and always have a great day.

It is far too thick to use a Fly rod so we always go with light spinning gear which is great while we are on the brook but when we reach where the book enters the Caines river we have to quit fishing because it’s mostly Fly rod only at that point.

I think it would make for an even better day if we could exchange our spinning gear for our fly gear once we reach that point. I am sure there is another road that we could park the second car at so we could be closer to the water and the car when we are done fishing the brook.

I haven’t taken Roland to that spot yet but I think this year would be a good year for introducing him to a new brook trout brook.

Image by mrcd@sbcglobal.net via Flickr

I was a foster kid from age 5 up and hated moving from home to home, trying to make new friends that didn’t want to be friends with a foster kid. Fishing was my way of getting away from all the crap life seemed to be dishing out to me. I could lose myself in happy thoughts for a short while.
I started fishing catfish and that was no challenge at all. It wasn’t until I started brook trout fishing that I started to learn that fish aren’t always everywhere in a stream.

I learned how to scan the water and see all the potential feeding lanes and structure. The fact that I caught brook trout in the places I thought they would be gave me confidence on new waters. I could read the water in just a few minutes which made the difference between catching and just fishing.

I learned that in the spring the fish were in different areas they weren’t in later in the year. I also learned that the trout like well oxygenated water that is cool. This lead me to learn where other streams and springs feed the streams and brooks I fished so that I knew where the coolest water was at any given time of the year.

When I take friends fishing I try to teach them a little of what I have learned over the years so they can enjoy sport fishing New Brunswick as much as I do.

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Unfortunately most people in our city were not ready and are in for a cruel surprise when they get up this morning to see all their junk still sitting at the curb.

In the next couple of days I have to get all my fishing gear in order. I still haven’t picked up my New Brunswick fishing lisence yet. Not having a car since my heart attack really does suck at times.

I am sure one of my fishing buddies will take me Lyon’s store tonight so we are ready and can leave as early as we want.

I don’t think we will be taking the float tubes yet as the water will still feel like ice water and sitting in it too long at this time of year can be painful.

I would like to go to the little pond/lake where I found a second beaver pond in behind.

I always take my Fly rod with me even if I don’t get to use it. I like to see how early in the season we can attract trout on a dry fly. I have caught my limit with the Fly rod in years past but those years are few and far between.

The last time I fished this little spot in the spring it was snowing and raining. The wind was blowing so hard it ripped our panchos right off but the fishing was so hot that we couldn’t just go home.

We froze that day but it was worth every shiver.

Brook trout along with Atlantic salmon is the main reason I stayed here in New Brunswick instead of returning to my home in Ontario. There are an amazing amount of fishing opportunities in Ontario but none that were just minutes from my home.

I live right in the middle of Moncton, New Brunswick and can still be fishing brook trout in less than 20-30 minutes. Atlantic salmon on the other hand takes me about an hour to the Caines River.

Here is a list of fishing license fees for New Brunswick in 2008 I found at Goverment New Brunswick Services. This is only the fees so you may want to follow the link and read the entire page:

Non-Resident - Salmon

Season (class 1)
$105 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $30 conservation fee 140.00
7 day (class 2)
$57 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $20 conservation fee 82.00
3 day (class 3)
$29 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $10 conservation fee 44.00

Season - Live Release (Class 13)
$105 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $30 conservation fee 140.00
7 day - Live Release (Class 14)
$57 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $20 conservation fee 82.00
3 days
$29 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $10 conservation fee 44.00

Non-Resident - All Species - Except Salmon

Season (class 4)
$30 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $20 conservation fee 55.00
7 day (class 5)
$20 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $10 conservation fee 35.00
3 day (Class 6)
$15 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $5 conservation fee 25.00

Resident - Salmon

Season (class 7)
$20 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $5 conservation fee 30.00
Kids 10-15 years or Seniors 65+ (class
$8 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $5 conservation fee 18.00
Live Release (class 16)
$20 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $5 conservation fee 30.00
Live Release - kids 10-15 years, 65+ (Class 17)
$8 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $5 conservation fee 18.00

Resident - All Species - Except Salmon

Season (class 9)
$10 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $5 conservation fee 20.00
Seniors 65+ (class 10)
$0 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $0 conservation fee 5.00

Ice Fishing

Non Resident (class 11)
$10 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $5 conservation fee 20.00
Resident (class 12)
$0 legislated fee + $5 fish stocking fee + $5 conservation fee 10.00

I am really glad they have included an extra $5.00 as a fish stocking fee. So much has happened over the past 100 years to do major damage to stock and habitat it’s good to see we are correcting our past mistakes.

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Atlantic Salmon - My favorite species to fish in New Brunswick has to be the Atlantic salmon and the salmon is the main reason I moved to New Brunswick from Ontario. I certainly had no shortage of species and locations to fish in Ontario but the Atlantic salmon is a powerful reason to move.

Trout - Even though I enjoy fly fishing for salmon I also enjoy a few other species, like brook trout, brown trout and rainbow trout. Most places here you can fish trout with a spinning rod or on the fly but if it’s fly fishing only don’t get caught with a spinning rod.

Nothing is more fun than using your favorite dry fly for trout.

Smallmouth Bass - I also fish smallmouth bass and for bass there isn’t much more fun that throwing a few top water lures that cause the bass to go bonkers. The explosions are heart stopping.

I love taking new friends bass fishing because we are almost never skunked no matter what the weather conditions so my friends are very seldom disappointed.

Chain Pickerel - From a float tube you can’t beat the fun a pickerel will give you, quite often spinning you in a few circles before you land it.

The pickerel is very similar to the pike I used to fish in Ontario but they don’t grow as big, they only fight like they are that big.

Sturgeon - The dad of big fish here in New Brunswick. The strugeon is so prehistoric looking that you will have to look around you once you see one to make sure you haven’t been transported back in time a few million years.

You don’t want to be fishing sturgeon from a float tube because they may just run you right out to sea.

We also have rock bass, sun-fish, perch and other species that don’t get fished a lot by me. When my son was little we fished more small species but when I am with my fishing buddies we fish the species mentioned above.

Fishing in New Brunswick has been exciting for the past 30 years or so and I don’t see it stopping any time soon, as long as we protect our waters.

Over the past thirty years of fly fishing in New Brunswick I have found may great hot spots for Brook Trout. I like to think these are my very own little secret hot spots. I even have a few that my closest fishing buddies aren’t aware of.

Excuse the poor quality of my photo I shake a lot. I do have a new digital camera this years so I hope to take better and less shakey pictures.

New Brunswick has a large number of Beaver ponds that make for great trout habitat. They are not always easy to get to, which is great for those willing to fight through a few bushes for a great day on the water. The spot in the picture however isn’t one of those hard to get to spot. It’s visible from the road and has an easy path right to the water. You can even drive down to the water to launch a canoe.

I had driven by this spot hundreds of times but this one particular day it was almost windy enough to push my car off the road so I was heading to a more protected spot to fish. As I was driving by I of couse glance through the trees to look at the water but something else caught my eye this day. I thought I saw water further back in the trees.

Well I hit the brakes, backed up and waited for another gust of wind and sure enough I did see water. I got a little excited but I have been fooled before after a good rain fall only to find a big water hole.

It was not easy to get through the trees. They are thick and the branches go almost to the ground making it tough to get through, but I didn’t mind as most people tend to be lazy and wouldn’t struggle to get to a fishing spot.

The little trek through the bush wasn’t a disappointment and it was worth every scratch across my face. It was another Beaver pond and it was only a couple of minutes further through the bush and yet in all the years I have fished this spot I never knew the other pond was here. Cool.

Later I found that if I followed the brook from the first pond for a few yards I could get to the new pond easier and I could come back the same way.

Even though this beaver pond was a bit smaller that the first pond it was all mine. I walked around the pond and never saw another human track which made me really excited.

I wonder how many other great fishing spots are just out of view?

Like I said at the start I have been fishing in New Brunswick for more than thirty years and I find at least one new spot to fish ever year.