Welcome to the Mainely Flyfishing website, your source for guiding, instruction, fly fishing information, books, videos, and more. My name is Lou Zambello and I am a guide, instructor, writer, speaker, and columnist. Please explore this site or email me to learn more.

End of Season 2024 Report

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August presented few fly-fishing opportunities for cold-water fish given the extremely hot July. Lindsey and I did take half a day and fish Cupsuptic Stream, a river that stays cold no matter what the season. The trout, while on the small side , are beautifully colored and usually willing.

Lindsey changing flies on rocky Cupsuptic Stream

These little beauties are native and rise readily to small caddis.

September brought the same kind of fall we seem to get now – a continuation of August. The month was warmer than normal throughout New England and the rest of the United States. Rainfall amounts varied dramatically depending on where you live. Most of Maine set a record for driest first three weeks of September with zero rainfall and the summer was dry. But Vermont received plenty, if not excessive rainfall.

In Maine, river fishing was tough. Rivers like Kennebago and the Roach River, just to name two that are representative of many, had low and warm water. Remember, July was the warmest on record for Maine. A few fish moved into the rivers here and there, but they didn’t stay long and moved into cooler tribs.

I ran into a fisheries biologist who was tracking tagged fish with radar, and she said her tracking fish were scattered throughout the Rangeley area river systems, but I saw only a few fresh larger fish the last week of September. Plenty of smaller fish though.

During the last week of September, I was amazed to see only a few anglers fishing the lower Kennebago River (except for Steep Bank Pool.) I think the fishing has been so tough (and crowded) the last half dozen years that anglers are becoming discouraged. I know that many who own camps on Kennebago Lake and used to fish the river every September, don’t anymore.

The key to success was to find where the fish were stacked up, waiting to migrate upstream. I know of one lake where the fish stage in an old river channel, and anglers in the know caught brook trout on almost every cast.

Most of my success came on fishing small stuff – tiny wet flies such as the Shakey Bealy, or unweighted size 20 princes, or size 18 or 20 foam caddis. I did have a wonderful last morning. I got up at 0-dark-thirty to claim my favorite pool, was mesmerized by peak colors of red, orange, and yellow, and caught a substantial landlocked salmon on a size 20 wet fly swinging in the current. A satisfying way to end the season.

A great way to end the Kennebago season – fishing with my daughter and admiring the fall foliage.

Mid Summer 2024 Fishing News

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Late June and July has been hot and humid for most of Maine and New England with occasional heavy downpours that caused localized flooding. I checked southern Maine’s daily temperature highs and humidity and it compared closely to a typical July in New Jersey or Washington, D.C. Maine’s climate is changing rapidly.

Ocean, lake, and river temperatures were already above normal. It used to be almost too cold to swim in Maine’s big lakes and Casco Bay but no longer -water temperatures are well into the 70s. Obviously, trout fishing ended in early July at least on the surface or in rivers. Temps are just too warm and any trout caught would be stressed to the point of death. The exceptions of course are bottom-release tailwaters, and spring-fed tributaries in the mountains. The Magalloway River below Azischos Dam fished well because the flow was extremely low, something like 130 cfs. At that level all of the river is accessible, and the fish have nowhere to hide from the anglers.


Based on the Instagram posts I receive from Maine anglers, many flyfishers switched over to smallmouth bass fishing – a great idea. I like fishing for smallies in rivers this time of year, along with casting for big bull sunfish with poppers in the evening on local ponds and lakes.

Nothing better on hot summer days than wading wet along pond shorelines or riverbanks and casting for bass just like my son, Gwynn did with me one day in July.

I love fishing small, cold mountain streams for 6 to 8 inches with my 3-weight, although this July, all my family was visiting, and I now have three small grandchildren, so fishing time was limited.

Even in the height of summer, spring-fed beaver bogs stay cold with brookies active all day.

Many of you know that I live on 200-acre Dundee Pond, an impoundment of the Presumpscot River, created by Dundee Dam (originally called Great Falls Dam). In late June, a lower gate failed and stuck in an open position and virtually all of the water drained out of the pond. I will spare you all the details for now, but it is devastating for the aquatic life in the pond including fish, amphibians, reptiles, mollusks, birds, insects, etc. The dam will be fixed and pond refilled September, but it will be years before the pond recovers. I liked fishing right outside my door but that might not be possible for quite some time. And I will miss all of the wildlife I used to see on a regular basis.

What drained Dundee Pond looks like. The stumps are from trees logged before the Dam was built in 1910. Wood decomposes very slowly underwater..

You can just see the orginal river channel on the rightside of the photo. The dam is still holding back some water.

“Til next time….

Spring 2024 Flyfishing Videos

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The following links to a video of playing a large salmon who took a dry fly during a brown drake hatch in mid-June. Anglers sometimes don’t think about dry-fly fishing for landlocks in a lake but even though in lakes salmon mostly hunt smelt, they will rise for drys on occasion. This happens usually when a significant hatch is occuring or when the surface is calm and they can cruise just under the surface and snatch up what they can find.

https://youtu.be/-V0GWjQT2Ec

Early June 2024 Fishing News

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The three-month gap between this blog post and my last is the longest hiatus I have taken since I started this blog years ago. That is what occurs when I have a new granddaughter living ten minutes away and my daughter needs grandparent daycare help as she tries to be a new mom and run her own business (reclaimedmaineco.com). I also came down with Covid for the first time and I was battling it for the entire month of May. Not fun. Whatever energy I had went to fishing, not writing.

Well, we will see if we can’t catch up a bit. Due to the warm winter, early ice-out, and warm spring, the seasonal timing of plant and insect emergence, spawning cycle and water temps ran several weeks early. The current hot weather will probably start to send the fish into deeper water and river and stream fish into their colder water refugia

As an example, the Kennebago Lake brown drake hatch historically runs from about June 23 to end of the month. This year it started June 11th and is already winding down. Still, I got out on the lake on the 13th had the hatch practically to myselfh

Despite battling Covid, I went after a wide variety of species with my fly rod. In one ten-day period, I caught pike, smallmouth, largemouth, black crappie, sunfish, brookies, brown trout, rainbows, and stripers. Here are a few videos of the action. I will post several blogs soon to catch up.

Stripers arrived in the middle of May. I like wading or kayaking small tidal rivers for these fish. Sometimes they are there, sometimes not. On this day, they were. The best time to fish for stripers in small coastal rivers is on a falling tide, just after high tide. The push of water to high tide drive bait and striped bass up into the higher reaches of the water where it is easier to wade and cast. Then as the water drops, the bass get active ambushing bait flushing downstream.
I have gotten into pike fishing recently. I go to Sabattus Pond. This predator certainly gets your attention when they attack your fly.

My go-to fly for pike so far is a white and red streamer that moves erratically in the water when stripped. I use a type of snap swivel and a wire tippet to prevent the pike from slicing my line and for ease in fly change. Pike are not leader shy.

This fly is about four inches long

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More British Columbia

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To get you through the last few weeks before fishing season opens, here are a few more videos of my trip to British Columbia last September on the Bow River, Livingston Creek, and the Crowsnest River. Also, a quick morning on the Little Red River in Arkansas while on tagging along a conference trip with my wife, Lindsey.

Just traveling between fishing spots in B.C. is mind blowing and well worth the trip.
We took a half day, DIY wander up the Crowsnest River by the town of Pilcher Creek

Lindsey and I fished the Bow River two consecutive days, but in different sections. This float took us through a section with many more rainbow trout than browns.



I don’t usually think of Arkansas for trout fishing, but the White River and other Ozark fisheries offer good fishing, albeit by heavily stocking. I was glad to catch a few trout in late November.
Livingston Creek is a trib of the Old Man River, not far from the Crowsnest River. It is full of native cutties, and although we had to work for them on this day, we ultimately caught enough. The creek was so interesting and remote that the entire experience resonates with us to this day.

The start of fly-fishing season?

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Late 2023 and early 2024 will go down in history as the year with no winter. In many parts of New England, we only experienced a few snowstorms and rain melted that snow quickly. In southern Maine, we only had snow cover for a few weeks. Temperatures stayed between the 20s and the 50s most of the time. I feel like I suddenly moved to Seattle.

February and early March normal highs are upper 30s but not this year.

I fished on January 1st from my kayak and then during the first week of March when the Presumpscot River was running at fishable levels with water temps in the low 40s. With no snowpack, the higher sun angle will heat the soil quickly and also the water. The official fishing season needs to start earlier and end later. Maine winters used to be four to five months long, and now it is closer to two to three months.

Flyfished on March 7th on the Presumpscot River. Very fishable levels with with water temps in the low 40s, air temps in low 50s. Searching for big browns but came up empty.

Ice fishing season started in mid-January and ended for many places by end of February if the pond or lake froze at all. Avid ice anglers had to travel to the northern half of Maine. I don’t know when to claim ice out on Dundee Pond or North Gorham Pond because neither pond ever completely froze.

My crocuses are up, other early bulbs are poking their heads through the earth, and today after the rain, my driveway was covered with worms. I have planted my early greens, radishes, and spinach. Nature is telling us that even though the calendar says early March, the landscape is saying it is mid-April. I am sure we will get at least one more snowstorm or stretch of cold weather, but onceI the thaw commences and flora and fauna emerge, you can’t put the genie back in the bottle.

Crocuses emerged on February 22nd!!!
You are supposed to be able to plant early crops when cocuses bloom so I did on February 27th.

I suggest you finish tying the rest of the flies you need, and make sure your gear is in working order because the season is starting now!

February 2024 New England Fly-Fishing Report

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Hello everyone,

Mid-January finally brought some wintery weather in the form of snow and cold, but it was interspersed with warmer weather and rain. Bottom Line: Very few lakes and ponds froze enough to be safe for ice-fishing or ice-skating, except in the traditionally coldest climes. Strong currents from all of the continuing rain left inlets and outlets and hundreds of yards of water nearby unfrozen.

The Presumpscot River in late January looked in perfect shape to fish with moderate flow and no ice.

Until you got up north to the Rangeley area and northern New Hampshire and Vermont, there was barely enough snow for skiing or snowmobiling unless snowmaking capabilities could cover the slopes. I managed to X-country for a few days.

Such a strange, non-existent winter. Only four sunny days in January, and I feel temps on many days were running ten degrees above normal. In southern Maine, we used to have double-digit numbers of nights below zero. This year? None. It hardly ever gets into the single digits.

I would predict for everyone a very early ice-out and an early start to fishing season, but can you call it ice-out when many stillwaters didn’t totally freeze? Near me, Dundee Pond only partially froze and North Gorham Pond as I write this is totally open water. A few bays of the major lakes are frozen enough to venture out, but that is it.

North Gorham Pond, an impoundment of the Presumpscot River is entirely open water as I write this because of strong currents from all of the rain.

I did get some ice fishing in, but it wasn’t very good, maybe the fish are confused given the strange weather. I know that turkeys were gobbling, songbirds were singing their spring songs, and male woodpeckers were drilling, marking their territories in late January.

Caught this 22-inch pickerel.

A couple of eagles, photographed at a distance, waiting for me to throw a fish on the ice. They left disappointed.

The Presumpscot River and its impoundments give up a few impressive brown trout every year. My son-in-law and myself have landed three brown trout between 3 and 4 plus pounds over the last several years. A gentlemen ice-fishing one of the impoundments at the beginning of February landed a monster. Why can’t I catch a fish like this ice fishing?

Hard to tell how large this fish is, but a monster for sure.

I am a member of the Sebago Chapter of Trout Unlimited, (sebagotu.org) a fine conservation and outreach organization. We host an Ice-fishing event every year on Chaffin Pond in Windham for families who want to learn about ice fishing. This year the weather was good, pond was frozen, and 70 or so hardy souls turned out. We even caught a few brook trout despite the commotion on the ice. Come join us next year,

A nice brookie caught by a few of the young men attendees.

I am always interested in hearing about your interesting fishing experiences. Email me. louzambello@gmail.com

2024 First Blog Post

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(Note: This blog was supposed to post in early January but didn’t for some reason, so I am posting it in early February.)

I started to write about the warm, stormy and rainy November, December, and early January, but then I looked back at my blog post from this time last year, and guess what – they are identical!!! Here is what I wrote last year:

Mid-winter for all of the Northeast felt like autumn. Temperatures for November, December, and early January ran between five and ten degrees above normal depending upon where you live. There has was no snow to speak of. At my house in Windham, we have had green grass for most of winter so far as I write this in mid-January.

Ditto for this year, except the storms this year have been stronger. The December 18th storm did so much damage. In Windham, we lost a 90-foot maple tree that blew over, its upper-most branches scraping the house.

I am so glad that tree wasn’t thirty feet closer to the house.

In Kennebago, the lake water rose over the causeway and up onto our lawn, fortunately not washing away furniture, docks, or boats.

The Kennebago Causeway is usually a road next to a small beach, not a river.
A flood of Nash Stream near Stratton washed out the road to Rangeley.
One of my go-to fishing spots in September, where Bemis Stream empties into Mosoelookmeguntic Lake, had its bridge pushed into the lake, stranding camp owners on the other side. The actual road is out of sight to the left of this photo.

All of us who guide or fish often, and know our favorite Maine waters well, will have to start from scratch next spring because the rivers and streams will look quite different due to the flooding. Pools will be filled in, banks of gravel deposited, wider stream channels with longtime structure washed downstream, and new channels, undercut banks, and holes. We have had so many major floods in the last few years that the rivers have been constantly changing.

I worry that the eggs of fall spawning fish like brook trout, brown trout, and landlocked salmon will have been washed away by the flood waters. Usually, floods occur in spring and summer when the eggs have already hatched.

I could have done more fly fishing in November and December but decided to take a break and do other things (work on my next book). But it stayed so warm I fly-fished via canoe on January 1st, an experience I wouldn’t have thought possible. Next week is supposed to bring cold weather, so perhaps at least the ponds will freeze, and I can take out my ice fishing gear.

I didn’t hook a fish, but it felt like I could have. On January first!

British Columbia Fishing Adventure

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I started flying extensively again this summer after a two-year break during the worst of Covid. I am a cutthroat trout afficionado and I was eager to get out west and find some yellow-golden beauties. So excited in fact that I went twice! I traveled to the St. Joe’s River in Idaho during early August and then spent two weeks in British Columbia with my wife, Lindsey, in mid-September.

I captured so much fishing action and beautiful landscapes through photos, video, Go-Pro, and drone footage that I am just getting around to editing and posting the content. I just had my column published in the December issue of the Maine Sportsman in which I wrote about cutthroat trout and directed folks to my blog for further video. Yikes, I hadn’t posted any yet! So here goes a few videos.

Floated the Bow River for one day targeting browns with streamers along with sporadic nymphing and was fortunate enough to tangle with a few big boys. I broke the tip off a flyrod trying to land one of them.
We fished a tributary of the Elk River in Fernie and found large cutthroat trout migrating downstream for the winter. The largest fish grabbed my favorite Cosohammer Streamer.


End of Season Fishing Report-Part 2

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The second half of October has given us very warm temps for this time of year with highs reaching the 70s before returning to seasonal levels as Halloween approaches. I hope you have done a little fishing.

I closed my Kennebago Lake camp on the 17th and since it was warm and still, and the lake itself is still open until the end of the month, I ventured out in the kayak with my dry line and size 16 Puterbaugh Caddis. Low and behold, I landed a few fish including a good one that exceeded 12 inches. Good way to end things up there.


Also, had the opportunity to see the native brook trout spawning in the local streams, which is always a treat.

Closer to Windham, I took advantage of the warm weather and tried a variety of local waters. Due to high water and probably my own ineptitude, I didn’t fare well, except for the Pleasant River where I landed a number of holdover brown trout on my new favorite brown trout streamer, the Brownsylvania Special (a zonker-type pattern).

I must say, I have done more fishing this year than any other year in my life, and even I am ready to take a break and do other things for a little while, like a number of writing assignments that I have postponed. The warm weather has kept my vegetable garden going so I still have harvesting to do as well as preparing it for the winter.

Stick picking flowers, tomatos, swiss chard, greens, broccoli, etc. on October 27th

Second crop of the year pumpkins ripening, still no frost.

In other news, the TU event on the Mousam River went well; the weather cooperated, over thirty folks showed up, learned about the river ,and picked up a huge pile of trash along the banks including tossed greenhouse supplies and an old toilet.

The Mousam clean up crew discussing Mousam conservation.

My next speaking event will be November 13 at Maine Sport on Rt. 1 in Rockport during the Georges River TU chapter meeting. Visitors are welcome. Meeting starts at 6 and I present at 7. My presentation will be:
In Pursuit of Trophy Brook Trout: Where and How to Catch Them (and the flies to do it) – based on my book, “In Pursuit of Trophy Brook Trout”.