This fishing season has been wet, and full of fish, by wet, I mean rainy with plenty of water in our entire Delaware river system. But as I tell my clients, “the fish are already wet” they don't care, so as long as you're able to fish in the rain, let's go. Overall I'd say that from April 1-July 7th of this year the overall size class of trout, stripers, bass, walleye and shad are possibly better than ever. Or it at least seems that way in my observations of my day to day guiding. I do have pictures to prove it, most of which are on my blog and website. But basically it has been a great season so far of fishing and spending quality days with good people on the river.

July 6th, 2025 Fishing story

Now, onto the best 10 minutes of fishing this season. On July 6th we planned an early morning float on a frequented stretch of river that is well known as brown trout fishery and the occasional migratory striped bass opportunities. Paul, Matty and I met up at 6 am and were fishing by 6:15 am, natural colored streamers on fly rods “moved” some fish, while a silver single hook blue fox spinner landed one rainbow trout in the first two hours of the day. Pretty slow morning by my standards, then the sun came out and the low clear water and high sun did not bode well for the fishing activity to increase. My best fishing buddy Matty landed a nice 17” acrobatic brown trout and he asked if it was picture worthy. Mutual agreements said no, not really…

So after a morning of fly fishing and light tackle spin fishing for trout, we moved down to the deepest hole on that particular stretch of river. “And now for something completely different”, we targeted stripers we knew had been there in the weeks prior. But the river had dropped significantly over the past few days and the low clear water yielded arguably tough conditions. I had saved a few dead fallfish in my freezer from a previous trip where clients were interested in Channel Catfish and Striper fishing. So when we got to this pool Matty and I both set up circle hooks with chunk bait out to soak in the deep water.

Matty and I have fished together for about ten years, and to say the least we have no shortage of epic fishing stories. From 23” dry fly brown trout, to back to back 33” and 36” muskies, and 30” walleye’s. We’ve caught a lot of big fish together. Now personally, as a guide and fishermen, I have seen good luck, bad luck, beginners luck, those with skill and no luck, and those with skill and luck. Matty is the kind of fisherman with skill and luck. I’d consider myself in in a similar category, knowing however, that I will rarely catch the largest fish of the day. I may catch the most, or a really nice one, but someone else is bound to catch one larger than me, trust me.

So, as Matty says, it's about a 3 minute rule in our typical striper spots, that if you throw a bait out and don't get it eaten within about 3 minutes, they're probably not there. With some exceptions of course. So about 3 minutes after my bait hit the water, I saw the line moving and pulling out of my reel. I cranked my reel handle forward to engage the drag system, and I was hooked up. As I fought the fish at first, I was near certain it was a striper, I was right. I have caught over 100 stripers in this river, but never one over 28”, so I have been wanting a 28+inch striper for years now. As it came up to the surface, I saw its size, and thought "it looks bigger than a schoolie”, and after about a 5 minute battle, I brought the measured 30.5” striper into the net. It met legal requirements within the 28-31” slot limit, and I planned on cooking it for my wife and family.

I don't think we had even taken a picture of the Striper yet, and I hear Matty say he's getting bit. I look up at his rod, and see him set the hook. Now the fish on his line immediately took off on a crazy long distance run. Unlike what most stripers do, I internally thought, “I wonder what that is” . I didn't think much of it as I was dealing with the fish I had just caught and revelling in my own sense of glory. Matty is a guy with a jovial demeanor, and an insane amount of excitement when it comes to successful fishing operations. So as he catches a glance of the fish he confirms it is quite large, but still thought it was a Striped bass, our target species. Upon second glance, he sees spots on its side, and yells, “It’s a trout! This is the biggest trout we’ve ever seen” Paul and I still hadn't seen it, and were now intrigued, so we stood up to watch the battle. As the seasoned veteran angler Matty is, he fought this fish on a medium action Ugly Stik, with 8lb test line, and handled it like a professional angler. Anchor rope and boat angles can be detrimental to battling a big fish on a light line, but knowing how to do it can yield success. As the fish came back around, we were all losing our minds at the size of this river trout. The average size brown trout in this river is 16-19” with many in the 19-23” range but seemingly very few in the 25-30” size class, as is typical in most river fisheries.

Paul has been working on his netting skills and made it look easy this time, thank the fish gods. The brute brown made it to the net, we all were freaking out at the size of this fish, as it was way larger than most trout we’ve ever seen. My personal best is a 26" brown. That fish was nowhere near the length or girth of this particular fish. This fish measured exactly 30”. Matty’s fish wasn't longer than my striper, but it was most definitely heavier and more of a unicorn. Both fish were awesome, and the whole moment in time was incredible.

As we were targeting stripers, I did not expect to hook into brown trout on cut bait. I've never caught a single trout on cut bait in my entire life, but I always call the Delaware, a river “with no rules”. The fish unfortunately swallowed the hook pretty deep. Upon first glance we tried removing the hook, but blood was spurting out of the fish's mouth. We agreed that this fish would likely not pass the hook through its digestive tract and that it had fought its last battle. We did not want to kill the fish, but we knew that it was not likely to survive if let go, so we opted to ethically harvest the fish to feed our families. The brown trout is bound for the smoker along with some landlocked salmon I have in the freezer.

In about fifteen minutes two 30” fish were netted on my older original drift boat, Paul on the oars and net, Evan with the striper, and Matty with the brown trout. Both personal bests for Matty and I, and that brown trout was a true river monster for the fishery here. It broke the previous Sweetwater Guide Service record for brown trout by 3” held since 2007. This fishing day will go down in history as one of the best.

Summer has been incredible

Patrick Shehan