Troutline

Beaverkill River

New York·Catskills·41.94° N, 74.96° W
Flow
124 CFS
Beaver Kill at Cooks Falls
Water Temp
69°F
Beaver Kill at Cooks Falls
Condition
Below Normal
Weather
71°F
Mostly Sunny
near Roscoe

Insights

Flow
Low flows at 124 CFS
Fish are spooky. Lighten tippet and lengthen leaders.
Water Temp
Water 69°F — stress zone
Trout are oxygen-stressed. Fish dawn only, or pick a colder water — survival rates drop fast above 68°F.

The Beaverkill is where American fly fishing grew up. This is the freestone Theodore Gordon, the Dettes, the Darbees, and Lee Wulff fished and wrote about, and the pools below Roscoe — Junction, Cairns, Hendrickson, Barnhart's, Horse Brook Run — are named landmarks in the sport's history the way ballpark corners are in baseball. But the history only matters because the fishing backs it up: a wide, classic Catskill river of long riffles feeding into deep, glassy pools, with a hatch calendar that runs from the Quill Gordon in early April straight through the Sulphurs of July, and a legitimate Green Drake spinner fall at dusk in late May and early June that draws people from across the country. Roscoe calls itself "Trout Town, USA," and it earns it — the Beaverkill and its sister the Willowemoc meet right in the village at the world-famous Junction Pool, where the river almost doubles in size into what locals call "Big River."

In practice this is a wade fishery, not a float. The water is public and roadside for most of its lower length — old NY Route 17 and the county roads shadow it — and you fish it on foot. The upper river above Roscoe is small, tight pocket water holding wild browns and brook trout; the lower river below the Willowemoc junction is 50-100 feet wide with the marquee pools. The fishery leans on stocking in the lower reaches — DEC puts roughly 18,000 brown trout into the Beaverkill annually — layered over a wild brown population throughout, wild brook trout up high, and a growing run of wild rainbow trout that have pushed up out of the Delaware system. The famous no-kill water below Roscoe gets genuinely crowded on a good spring evening; Horse Brook Run in particular is known as much for its elbow-to-elbow pressure as for its quarter-mile of the finest pocket water on the river.

The honest catch is that it's a freestone, so it lives and dies by water. Spring is prime — cold flows and overlapping hatches from mid-April through mid-June, and if you hit the third week of May you may find the best dry-fly fishing in the East. But by July the lower river runs low and warms into the 70s (the Cooks Falls gauge read 75.6°F / 24.2°C in mid-July 2026), which is exactly why DEC closes the Horton catch-and-release reach July 1-August 31 to protect thermally stressed trout. Come in a drought August and you'll find warm, skinny water and stressed fish; the move in high summer is to fish dawn, drop up into the cooler upper river, or shift to the Willowemoc. Fall brings cooler water, Blue-Winged Olives, Isonychia, and pre-spawn browns, and two winter catch-and-release reaches (the Roscoe county-line water and Horton) hold midge anglers when nothing else moves.

Species

  • Brown Trout
    Primary · Apr-Jun, Sep-Oct · 9-18", to 20"+

    The backbone of the fishery — wild browns hold throughout and DEC stocks roughly 18,000 per year into the lower reaches. The biggest fish live in the deep pools of the no-kill water and come up during the Hendrickson and Green Drake, or to streamers in spring and fall.

  • Brook Trout
    Common · May-Jun, Sep · 5-10"

    Wild native char, most abundant in the small, cold headwater reaches of the upper Beaverkill above Roscoe. Their numbers increase the further upstream you go; incidental in the lower river.

  • Rainbow Trout
    Present · May-Jun · 9-16"

    A growing wild population that has moved up out of the Delaware system into the Beaverkill. Not stocked here — these are naturalized fish, most likely in the lower river.

Ideal wading flow150–500 CFS
Blow-out>1,300 CFS
Ideal water temp52–64°F

Late spring — mid-April through mid-June — is the reason to fish here: cold flows plus the full Catskill hatch parade, from Quill Gordons and Hendricksons into the March Brown, Sulphur, and the marquee dusk Green Drake spinner fall in late May. Fall (September-October) is the strong second window, with cooler water, Blue-Winged Olives, Isonychia, and pre-spawn browns. Winter fishing is limited to the two catch-and-release reaches (the Roscoe county-line stretch and Horton) for midges. Avoid the lower river in mid-summer unless you fish dawn — once water hits the low 70s°F the trout stress, and DEC closes the Horton reach July 1-August 31. The upper river and the Willowemoc run cooler and are the summer fallbacks. Flows are read at the Cooks Falls gauge (drainage 241 sq mi); the freestone spikes and drops fast on rain.

Sections

4 sections on this river

Upper Beaverkill — Headwaters to Roscoe

WadeBrook Trout · Brown Trout · Rainbow Trout

The small, narrow, rocky upper river above Roscoe — 5 to 25 feet wide at the top near Balsam Lake, widening to 50-75 feet by Lew Beach, with small pools and pocket water through the covered bridge and campground. Cold, wild, and intimate, and a quieter alternative to the crowded no-kill pools — this is where you go when the lower river warms in summer. Ungauged, so there's no live overlay here, but the water is worth knowing.

Best for: Wild brown trout and native brook trout on short-line dry fly and light nymphing with small flies — beginner-friendly small water with forgiving casts.

Horton / Iron Bridge No-Kill (Year-Round C&R)

WadeBrown Trout · Rainbow Trout

The lower catch-and-release reach centered on the Iron Bridge at Horton — from 1 mile upstream of the bridge to 1.6 miles downstream — year-round artificials-only C&R and one of two winter-fishing stretches on the river. Larger, slower pool water. This is where the freestone's summer reality bites: angling is prohibited from the Iron Bridge downstream to the first Route 17 overpass July 1-August 31 to protect thermally stressed trout, because the lower river warms into the 70s°F by midsummer.

Best for: Brown trout on nymphs and streamers, dries during hatches, and winter midging; year-round C&R access outside the July-August thermal closure.

Cooks Falls

WadeBrown Trout · Rainbow Trout

The named pool-and-riffle reach at the hamlet of Cooks Falls, between the Cairns no-kill water and the Horton reach. This is the reference point everyone checks — the USGS gauge (01420500) here reports both flow and water temperature, which matters on a river with a summer thermal-closure regime. Good roadside pool-and-riffle water for brown trout on dries during hatches and nymphs the rest of the time.

Best for: Wild and stocked brown trout on dry flies during hatches and nymphs in the riffles; the primary flow and water-temperature reference for the whole lower river.

Junction Pool & the Cairns No-Kill Water (C&R)

WadeBrown Trout · Rainbow Trout

The catch-and-release, artificials-only water that begins at Junction Pool in Roscoe — where the Willowemoc enters and the Beaverkill almost doubles into "Big River" — and runs about 2.5 miles down to Cooks Falls. This is the water people mean when they say "the Beaverkill": the sport's most famous named pools in sequence — Ferdon's Eddy (wheelchair access), Barnhart's, Hendrickson, Horse Brook Run (a quarter-mile of the finest pocket water on the river), and Cairns Pool. Roadside and fully public, and the highest-pressure water on the river on a good spring evening.

Best for: Dry-fly fishing to hatching brown trout (Hendrickson, March Brown, Sulphur, Green Drake) and nymphing the riffles for wild and stocked browns.

Regulations

Current fishing rules and restrictions

A New York freshwater fishing license is required. The Beaverkill has four distinct managed reaches under NY DEC's inland trout stream special regulations, including two of the East's most famous no-kill stretches — the Cairns water below Roscoe and the Horton (Iron Bridge) reach. The Horton reach is year-round catch-and-release, and angling is prohibited there July 1-August 31 to protect thermally stressed trout. Confirm current-year boundaries and dates against the DEC guide before a trip; regulations change annually.

  • Cairns no-kill water (Delaware/Sullivan county line at Roscoe upstream to the Route 206 bridge): 3 trout/day (no more than 1 over 12"), April 1-October 15; catch-and-release, artificial lures only, October 16-March 31.
  • Horton / Iron Bridge reach (from 1.6 mi below the Iron Bridge upstream to 1 mi above it): year-round catch-and-release, artificial lures only.
  • Angling prohibited July 1-August 31 from the Iron Bridge downstream to the first Route 17 overpass — a thermal-protection closure for stressed trout.
  • Upper river no-kill (downstream end of the Beaver Kill Campground upstream to 0.5 mi above the covered bridge): same seasonal 3-trout / winter C&R pattern as the Cairns water.
  • Most special-regulation reaches require single-hook-point artificial lures or flies to minimize hooking mortality.
  • New York State freshwater fishing license required (age 16+).

The Beaverkill's four special-regulation reaches each carry their own boundaries and dates, and DEC updates the inland trout stream regulations annually — the sign at the access point and the current-year guide set the rules, not the river as a whole. The July 1-August 31 Horton closure is the one to know: it exists because the lower freestone genuinely warms into the 70s°F in summer. Confirm reach boundaries and current-year regulation text at the DEC source before publishing a trip plan.

Source: New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. Regulations change annually — verify before fishing.

Access & Logistics

Getting there, fly shops, and lodging

Getting There

Roscoe, NY

~2.5-3 hrs NW of New York City via NY-17/I-86 (Roscoe is Exit 94); ~1.5 hrs from Stewart/Newburgh (SWF) airport.

Fly Shops

Camping & Lodging

New York State's Beaver Kill Campground (52 tent/trailer sites at the covered bridge on the upper river) anchors the corridor, with numerous B&Bs, cabins, and streamside lodging around Roscoe. The Beaverkill Valley Inn near Lew Beach holds about a mile of private access on the upper river.

Roscoe — "Trout Town, USA" — is the hub, with fly shops, diners, and lodging right at Junction Pool. Nearly the entire lower river is public and roadside, so it's easy to reach (no fees or permits beyond the NY license), but the Cairns no-kill water gets crowded on prime spring evenings, Horse Brook Run especially. Livingston Manor (10 minutes east) has Dette Flies and the Catskill Fly Fishing Center & Museum, a must-visit landmark for anyone fishing here. Some private water exists on the upper river.

Conditions data is live from public monitoring networks. Regulations change annually — always verify current rules with your state fish & wildlife agency before fishing.

More in New York

View all 9 rivers

Catskills

Esopus CreekNY

The working-man's Catskill river — a dense wild rainbow fishery that keeps fishing when the Beaverkill and the Delaware branches run the color of chocolate milk, because the Shandaken Portal pipes cold reservoir water into the upper creek and turns the Phoenicia reach into a de-facto tailwater. The flip side: Portal releases and turbid Stony Clove Creek can cloud it up on their own schedule.

Willowemoc CreekNY

One of the two streams the Catskill dry-fly tradition was built on — it meets the Beaver Kill at Junction Pool in Roscoe, "Trout Town USA." A classic medium freestone of tea-stained riffles and pools, mostly stocked browns and rainbows in the lower river with wild brookies up in the small headwaters, best fished during the famous hatch parade from Quill Gordons in April through summer Sulphurs. A wading stream end to end, anchored by a year-round catch-and-release no-kill stretch above Roscoe.

Other regions

Delaware RiverNY

The "Big D" — the largest wild-trout river in the East, formed where the cold West and East Branch tailwaters meet at Junction Pool in Hancock. Powerful, technical flat-water pools full of stream-bred wild rainbows and browns, a rare Catskill spring shad run, and legendary Hendrickson, sulphur, and green drake hatches. Summer water temperature, not low flow, is the limiting factor.

East Branch Delaware RiverNY

The Catskills' quieter tailwater — cold releases from Pepacton Reservoir hold the upper river in the 50s through summer, growing wild, selective browns on long flat pools when the freestones nearby run too warm. Below the Beaverkill it doubles in size, warms, and turns to drift-boat water with more rainbows down to Hancock.

Neversink RiverNY

The river where American dry-fly fishing was born — Theodore Gordon worked out the first American-tied dries here in the 1890s. Today it's really two rivers split by a dam: a cold, technical no-kill catch-and-release brown-trout tailwater below Neversink Reservoir that stays fishable through August heat, and a warmer wild freestone above the reservoir near Claryville holding brook and brown trout.

Salmon RiverNY

New York's marquee Great Lakes tributary: a short, dam-controlled Lake Ontario river that fills with Chinook and coho salmon every fall and holds fresh steelhead and lake-run brown trout all winter. A run-timing, egg-and-swing fishery from the Altmar hatchery down to the Pulaski town pools and the private Douglaston Salmon Run, with flow set by the Lighthouse Hill hydro dam, not the weather.

West Branch Ausable RiverNY

The most famous trout stream in the Adirondacks: a boulder-strewn freestone of plunge pools and pocket water tumbling past Whiteface Mountain, where Fran Betters tied the Ausable Wulff. Wild browns and brook trout, easy roadside access off Route 86, and two year-round catch-and-release stretches.

West Branch Delaware RiverNY

The East's premier cold dry-fly tailwater, running below Cannonsville Dam to Junction Pool at Hancock. Bottom-release water keeps wild browns and rainbows on flat, gin-clear pools where selective fish and long, fine leaders are the price of admission.