About Matt Chapple

Matt Chapple with Salmon River Rainbow

I grew up in Syracuse New York. Fishing has been a part of my life since I can remember. My Uncle started teaching me fly-casting on his pond in Ithaca when I was about eleven. Shortly after that my Grandfather started to take me on fishing trips. We fished for brookies in the southern Adirondacks in small streams, lakes and beaverponds. He taught me how to swing a wet fly on a downstream cast so it would travel under alder bushes, over boulders and through pocket water and started to teach me how to present dry flies. My Grandfather also began to teach me the art of fly tying. The first fly I remember tying was a red ant. It was just red yarn wrapped in two clumps. I used it to fish for brookies and It was very effective.

As I gained experience my father and grandfather started to take me to bigger water. My father would take me to tug hill plateau north of Syracuse New York to fish a variety of streams for browns and brookies. I used mainly just Adams and Light Cahills.

Through my teen years I continued to fly fish for trout north of Syracuse in the Tug Hill Plateau, in the East Branch of Fish Creek, Salmon River(above the Reservoirs), Mad River and many other smaller trout streams.

My family moved to the Utica area in 1985 and I began to explore the West Canada Creek and other local streams, where I learned more about Mayfly, Caddisfly, and Stone fly hatches. The West Canada has a variety of hatches of both Caddis flies and Mayflies and a hatch of giant stones after dark in the summer.

I attended college at SUNY Cortland were I obtained a BS in Biology. After graduating from college I began to learn nymphing techniques and streamer fishing for lake run rainbows, browns, and landlocked salmon in the Cayuga Lake tributary system. The Smelt run can be intense in the spring and the Salmon gorge.

In the past few years I began to explore the Lake Ontario tributary system, fishing the Salmon River, Oak Orchard Creek and some of the smaller creeks of the eastern basin fly-fishing for Steelhead mainly.

My scientific background has helped me in my fly-fishing endeavors. I am very interested in entomology and ecology and the life cycles of Trout, Salmon, and their food. Over the years I have tried many different patterns on the rivers and streams throughout central New York attempting to discover new ones that catch fish.

Fly-fishing has been such an enjoyable part of my life that I thought it would be fun to teach and help others to enjoy this wonderful sport. So, I obtained a license to guide in New York, which enables me to take people out to the streams and introduce them to some of New York's trout inhabited waterways.