Tie me to the mast

The Siren singing her song

It’s likely that your earliest fishing memories are of staring into waters near road crossings. Bridges above brooks. Train trestles across rivers. Culverts at tidal marsh outlets.

Bridge pools are the sirens of trouts waters. One is drawn inexplicably towards them knowing that only doom awaits.

You stood at the railing. You saw the fish, they're right there. But, of course, they also saw you. Finning calmly in the deepest slot they dare you to waste your time.

The irrational angler-brain weaves a story about fish that aren't spookable because they're so close to regular traffic. As if on cue a logging truck rumbles across the bridge's wooden deck. Below the pool, the creek makes a turn that provides a perfect casting lane. And there's a rise! Oh, this is so sweet.

You come back later knowing they're there. They’re rested and a sporadic hatch brings them to the surface. At the edges minnows and other fell fish rise but you are not distracted. Near the middle, but just to the left, an occasional suck exposes the trout.

A motorcvcle roars across the bridge. Twin pipes with bored out baffles that make your teeth shake. Asshole. The trout still rise.

A delicate cast of a fly three sizes too big garners the attention of only the minnows and the trout are down as you real in a fish not much large that the Stimulator that caught him.

Patience is not rewarded.

When they come back up the trout are now rising among the minnows. The right fly, a small emerger, lands just where you want it on the third cast. A minnow pecks at it but you are not fooled until another minnow, perhaps smaller that the first, makes an outsized swirl on the fly and again you reel in a fish that cannot bend the fiberglass rod. The trout are down again.

The black flies are not around today. That’s odd given that early June is prime time for the blood suckers. The skeeters are trying to make up for it but after two weeks of black flies a mosquito bite is hardly noticeable.

In all your day dreaming about the potential of water above and below your current perch, you fail to notice that nothing is happening in the shadow of the bridge. The bugs are off and even the minnows have quieted down.

There’s a long drive ahead of you. During the next three hours you cross numerous waters at high speed. Your head swivels to hear the song despite the failure that can only await. Circe was right. You need to get some beeswax.

Someday....

North of Wild Trailer from Gray Ghost Productions on Vimeo.

My Favorite Small Stream*

If one were to sit down in a large sand box and design a perfect small stream -- plentiful cover, clear, cold waters, meandering bend pools, undercut runs -- it would probably end up looking a whole lot like the Gibbon River above Virginia Cascade.

This stream seems purpose made for trout though back in the late 1800s it was described as troutless. In fact, the only fish that had historically been present in this portion of the river was the mottled sculpin. Natural barriers like Virginia Cascade blocked the upstream migration of trout. Today it holds a vigorous population of Brook Trout that were stocked through the early part of the 20th century.

Over the coming years, the Yellowstone National Park Native Fish Conservation Plan indicates this water will be changed to a Westslope Cutthroat and Grayling fishery. This will require the elimination of non-native species via chemical poisoning and then the establishment of fish that are native to the area. While there is a vocal minority that opposes the establishment of more native fish in the park, I'm all for it.

For now, the Brookie fishing is excellent. It took me a while to dial in the secret fly: #14 Adams. Once that was sorted out, the fishing was close to easy.** Every likely spot and most of the unlikely spots held trout from 6-9 inches. I look forward to a time when this stream will be full of equally eager Cutthroat and Grayling.

Notes:
* In Yellowstone. From last week's trip.
** I've probably cursed myself by saying so and will not catch a trout for the remainder of the year.

Felt was never so sharp

Problem

I fished a small stream in the Dry River Valley of New Hampshire over the weekend. A brookie in every plunge pool. More on that tomorrow (or maybe the next day). I fished with no more than five feet of fly line out tip top guide. When I pulled some more line off the reel to secure the fly for a brief walk upstream the fly line snapped in two. Ten feet of weight forward fly line gathered at my feet.

Solved

This puzzled me for a moment until I recalled my last trip to the Housy when I was casting streamers and had a swirl of fly line at my feet in the shallow water. And I stepped on the line a bunch of times. And I must have clipped it with the metal studs on my boots. A perfection loop at the end of the fly line put me quickly back in action.

I still wear my Orvis Henry's Fork boots with felts soles when I fish the didymo infested Farmington. They're lightweight and seem grippier than the rubber/steel soles will ever be. And they never bit my fly line.

More on this soon.

I Heart Brook Trout

Reckless and Spunky. Wild Brook Trout. 5 p.m. June 30th. Yellow Sallie Dry, #14. Fished upstream with a little action.*

Note:
* Though likely unnecessary. We are talking about Brook Trout after all.

Black Friday

It took me a few weeks to write the following story and by the time I got around to putting it in print the season has passed. So I saved it for today. Black Friday is coming.

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I think that most non-anglers would be startled by the amount of my brain capacity that is allocated to fly fishing rumination at any given moment. I suppose this fixation on trout, the stream and the experience, is largely due to how relatively rare a trip to the river is when compared to my opportunities to attend conference calls.

I imagine it's the same for most anglers, heck, for most anyone with a passion for anything. But like most hard core athletes it is the pre-game visualization that is the most critical -- What flies? Which pools? How will I play the "big one"? Will there be fruitcake?

I don't like fruitcake but Black Friday means fishing on the Housatonic with Don and Jon and that means that Jon will bring along his wife's fruitcake for us all to sample. My lack of love for fruitcake finds its genesis in a) dried fruit being the antithesis of fruit and b) my parent's wedding cake.

Deep in the dark recesses of my childhood home a freezer held a brick of fruitcake indelicately wrapped in tin foil. This remnant of a 1960 wedding was brought forth every couple of years and pieces of dark, freezer-burned cake were chiseled for us all to sample. I still get chills thinking about it.

At the risk of having more fruitcake foisted upon me, I admit that Jon's bride's cake is entirely edible, bordering on enjoyable. It's more of a bread than a cake and this may be its secret. Of course, spending a morning in the middle of a river being buffeted by a nor'easter’s winds make my palette far less discerning that it might otherwise be.

Prior the last year’s fruitcake trip I was in full visualization mode. The USGS streamflow charts and weather reports are bookmarked. If the combination of streamflow, weather and fishing reports were to be believed this could be the best Black Friday trip ever.

If there’s an emotion that is more fundamental to the sport of angling than hope, I don’t know it. That deep feeling of expectation drives the next cast, the next trip, the next season. And so I hoped Tuesday’s storm would be mild.

Wednesday brought a harsh reality.

We scattered to our various Plan Bs. Jon elected for fishing the salt on Friday. Don threw in the towel. My brain was set on trout so I called a guide I know up in Massachusetts. I booked a boat for my youngest, Sam, and I on Saturday. Hope was restored.

That is until Dan’s text message late Friday evening. "Technical Difficulties" and then "Call u in five". Short Story: Dan had to work a show on Saturday. If fishing trips were fairies Tinker Bell would be dead; I no longer believed they actually existed. I went to bed in a funk; but with a inkling of an idea in my head. Perhaps I could still will her back to life.

I had received some intel on fishing upstream from a certain bridge on a certain small stream that should have been running clear by morning. It was. Sam and I packed one rod and traveled light. We took turns casting to all the likely spots. The first Brook Trout came on a caddis pupa. We fished upstream through pockets and riffles. We hooked a couple and landed half a dozen; all Brookies.

We talked continuously about nothing in particular and everything in general. We investigated industrial and domestic wreckage along the river bank. We talked about fishing and rigging flies and lone moss colored rocks. We let the deep mud of marshes suck at our wading boots. We sat on rocks and watched. We grabbed hot chocolate on the way home.

I very much missed the Black Friday trip. The camaraderie and tradition are a treasure. But the weekend could not have turned out better. I was restored in a way that only flowing water can accomplish and I shared it with someone I deeply love. And through all the disappointments and surprises of the past week I discovered that what I desperately wanted wasn't what I really needed, which, I suppose, is the miracle of this season.

Summer Night

Night is coming sooner now. I know that the summer solstice is the beginning of the end but through late June and July as the weather warms you don't notice the minutes being shaved daily. There's still hope for better weather and vacations and time with family. And there are hatches to be fished.

Now the warmth no longer nurtures hope. It's just hot and you want it to go away. The quickening evening provides some solace from the days travails and relief from the scorch but it leaves precious little time for casting bushy attractors beneath leaf burdened trees.

Last evening the meetings ended late and the only stream I thought fishable was a twenty minute drive. And then there was a misplaced cellphone that needed finding and an aborted search for a camera and then stringing up a rod streamside. All tasks that conspired to deliver me at deep twilight to the banks of a reliable Brook Trout stream.

And it was as reliable as I remembered. Hoppers attracted attention but Stimulators hooked fish. They were where you expected them to be in sixty-four degree water; fast water and quick seams.

The brute of the night was twelve inches. Thick. White edged fins caught the low light. Dark in the body. Found at the confluence of two seams that merge below an L shaped plunge.

The Brookies in this stream are dark. The green swirls on their backs yield to deep, dark flanks where the halo'd spots are well hidden. I felt cheated when I first caught these fish. The blue and red markings are difficult to discern and that's one of the features I like most about the Brookie. But they're unique and knowing that you know of it kind of makes up for the disappointment.

Deep under towering pines I realized that I was now fishing to sounds of a rise. I hadn't seen my fly in fifteen minutes. I was holding on desperately for another tug on the line though truth be told the fishing was already satisfying and unhooking fish in the dark is an anxiety building task I'd rather not perform.

The August night's voices were already loud. I hadn't noticed them start and wondered if they just picked up at full volume or rose gradually so I didn't notice them at first. Warbling tree frogs and their amphibian cousins were distinctive but the buzzing and chirping bugs all mixed together into the white noise that makes sleeping with an open window soothing at this time of year.

A headlamp helped me find the path south and I joined the beasts that scampered beneath the leaf litter moving to home. Moving to safety. Moving in the darkness and leaving the burden of the light behind.

A Bounty of Bugs

I recently discovered a trout that lives two trees up from the dead one. He's in a perfect lie protected on one side by overhanging brush and on the other by a fallen tree. It's a deep slot with a natural funnel for food. The only way to get him is with a downstream cast and to feed line for about thirty feet. I've missed him twice on other trips but swung by to have another go on my walk out last evening.

Two Trees Trout

I missed him this time too. Not even a sniff at my fly though he started rising to something else. It took me a moment to decode what was going on. While I was working out my approach, a very nice Sulphur hatch started coming off. It's my favorite hatch. I love those magical yellow flies. The trout do too.

Below the fallen tree, in the tail of the pool, trout were on the Sulphurs so I tied on a Quigley and walked down to the riffle separating this pool from the next.

Spinners everywhere!

When I got to the riffle not only was I pleased to see half a dozen trout on the surface but also the biggest spinner fall I've ever seen on this stream; probably a late batch of Hendricksons. And in the pool below there were another half dozen fish rising to the fallen spinners. Such a bounty of angling opportunity! I was momentarily stunned into inaction. And then I fished upstream for a bit.

I managed three trout pretty quickly, one a stunning little brookie who slipped away before the shutter clicked, and while I was unhooking the third trout, a stout Brown, the hatch shut off. No rising fish.

But there were still plenty of egg laden spinners in the air so I tied on a #14 Rusty Spinner and went downstream and enjoyed about ten minutes of good fishing before total darkness; three trout to hand.

It's rare that I'm on the stream when the bugs are just right. Like many of you I only fish when I can and when the call comes that "this is running" or "that is hatching" I'm usually too deep in something else that I can't break away.

Last night, on a whim, it all worked out. Magical.

Rusty Spinner Victim

On the pond

There's that bright green stuff in the background.

We now return to regularly scheduled programming.
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I found Spring last week.

I was sitting out on the deck after a particularly trying workday. I had a large glass of Cabernet nearby, an Arturo Fuente smoldered in hand and I was trying to push aside the frustrations via Gierach therapy, or maybe it was McGuane.

When I looked around I noticed that sometime during the day most of the trees had leafed out. There had been hints of leaves for about a week. Buds swelled, green tips built up hope but then, all of a sudden, I was surrounded by a the fresh greenness that can only be found in a new leaf during its first few days.

But then I lost it.

I drove up to New Hampshire that Friday evening to join my Brother, Dad and Uncle for some light home improvements.and to bond as men do. Up in New Hampshire spring is still all promise. During Sunday's paddle the only green was on the large hemlocks where ospreys perch.

I suppose that spring is wandering north somewhere between Hartford and Keene and while I don't recall seeing her on the drive home, no doubt she's got her thumb out somewhere along the I-91.

The source of all those gnats is discovered.
Shucks litter the pond surface in early morning.

I fished a bit on Sunday morning. I went out early in the new-to-me kayak and fished over in the trough that runs behind the big island. The boys call it Blueberry Island on account of bazillion blue morsels you'll find on it come July but I've always known it as the big island.

I've learned  most of what I know about angling from old guys and that's how I learned the pond. A dozen years ago Bob, an elderly neighbor, took me on a tour of the pond and shared some of the secrets he had plumbed from its depths in a lifetime of angling.

There's the deep spot where fish hold during the warm days of summer; best fished with weight and a worm suspended about fifty-nine feet down in a sixty foot deep hole. There are the two spots where the state stocking trucks back in about a week before the season starts; easy dry fly water if you catch it right. And there's the trough behind Blueberry Island; a transitional space that holds whatever the season brings you. When the water is cold you can catch trout around the drop-offs and when the waters warm you'll find dinky bass.

Bob died a few years back of Leukemia. It ate him up over the course of a year though he fought like hell. I can't think of a crappier way to go though there are likely a few I don't know about. Ann and I both agree that it's far preferable to go quietly in our sleep or to instantly vaporize while walking with the dog.

The pond is small fish water. It's too acidic to have good bug life or to provide good spawning so you never find large fish here. The biggest will come off the back of a stocking truck. The largest Smallmouth I've caught was about twelve inches long; its measurement in inches versus pounds a clear giveaway.

I'm all for renewables, just not in my back yard.

I spent most of my brief time on the water paddling about and, once the wind got up, more than a bit just drifting in the wind. When the wind is up on the mountain the pond's water gets kicking in a manner and that gentle rocking coupled with the drift on a wind's whim is restful. But there was fishing to be had and a small Mepps spinner was already tied on my rod.

I worked my way into the slot behind the island casting and reeling. I tried the anchor rig I had installed and it worked well. I spun around its axis as the winds shifted but that just gave me new water to cast to. Once I had gotten into the shallows I started to get a few strikes and eventually a nice freshly stocked Brookie came to hand. He was chased by some friends as I reeled him in so that was my good clue that the stocking truck had recently visited the pond.

I cast about a bit more and went through the standard arsenal of spinners and crank bait but after that first Brookie, no more made themselves known. I paddled the shaded eastern shore chasing an Osprey from one hemlock to the next. He seemed to want to stay about two trees ahead of me; I guess large birds don't get large by being fools.

A flotilla of small motor boats soon began puttering around the pond. This was a second sign that the stocking trucks had been here recently. They mostly congregated around the deep spot near the house though my catch clearly indicated that some of the fish were schooled up in shallower water. But with 3,000 fish in a 100 acre pond there were bound to be trout everywhere.

I'm looking forward to more time on the water in the kayak and a week or two this summer up on the pond. The house is small and not as comfortable as home. The pond fishes poorly. But time away is restorative and disconnecting with the family will be restorative in a manner to which I'd like to become accustomed.

The early morning is usually windless though it picks up soon enough. Paddle blades disturb the water. Ripples
extend to the farthest shore.

They should call the trout stocking program "Loon Welfare"

One tree, two tree, three tree, four.

Route 111 joins my house with a beautiful little trout stream. Along the way it passes through forests and brown fields and all the trappings of suburbia and it crosses another small river that never seems to fish as well as it promises. Driving back Saturday evening from Brook Char water I began to see them. It's after Thanksgiving so I don't begrudge them their joy, but I still feel it's a bit too early to see Christmas trees on top of minivans and SUVs.

We have a one tree house; one real tree goes in the dining room. The other rooms can't accommodate a Christmas tree* without some piece of furniture being moved into some other space. And then the other space will be too damn crowded for humans. I suppose that's our own fault; we happen to like furniture.

We're not decorators. You won't find icicle lights on our eaves or a glowing Rudolph on our roof. The only decorations visible from the street are white window lights and a small fake tree out on the porch. We got that dwarf tree a decade ago when we arrived home from a trip on Christmas Eve and couldn't find a real tree anywhere. I bought that fake tree, fully decorated, from the window of a local shop. We put a garbage bag over it, put it in the trunk, and it made a fine home for presents the next morning. I've often thought of replacing that fake tree with a small real tree but that's just one more thing to buy and to care for and to dispose of after the holiday.

Saturday, while Sam and I drove back from the char stream on Route 111 we passed many vehicles driving home with conifers lashed to their roofs. Again, I have no problem with this as long as it's after turkey day.  I expect some folks likely have tree erection traditions that practically require the purchase of evergreen products within forty-eight hours of Tryptophan poisoning.

What surprised me was the frequency of vehicles with multiple trees. At first I suspected that they were picking trees up for a disabled relative or a recluse neighbor. Then I considered that perhaps, like me, they were replacing that small fake tree on their porch with a proper tree. But then I began to see vehicles with three, and even four, trees.

WTF.

How many trees does one need to slay in order to properly celebrate the birth of Christ?

And then it struck me.

If one purchased a 6,000 square foot house mansion inferiority complex on a half acre of property with a sub-prime mortgage funded by taxpayers you have plenty of room in which to put more than one tree. And owning such a behemoth you probably aren't giving too much thought to conservation or any of that other drivel.

Consumption has gotten out of hand. I had hoped that the global economic crisis and unemployment and a general good look in the mirror might have caused one or more of us to decide that more of everything wasn't the goal of our existence. That maybe we'd give some thought to how we got here, what it means for our future, and how we might do things differently. But that's just Pollyanna bullshit. Consumption is King baby.

I'm sticking with one tree.

* At least of the "correct" proportions.

Arriving early. Staying late.

I arrived early for dinner on Saturday. In fact, that's not entirely correct. I arrived in the neighborhood, early. Now I wish I could say that I struggled with the social indelicacies of the early arrival of a guest and to what imposition I may put my host. But instead, I wondered, immediately, where the nearest trout stream was located and whether it was possible, in 30 minutes, to drive to, fish and return from said trout stream.

The navigation system told me I could get to the nearest stream in 15 minutes. With a return trip that meant I could fish for 15 minutes. Being 15 minutes late to a dinner appointment being, of course, socially acceptable.

I know you're all wondering how one fishes for fifteen minutes. The answer is that one does not.

I had not fished this stream before but had been told of its riches. In fact, it was rumored that poachers fished its banks out of season risking ticketing and worse just to sample its goodness.

Upon arrival at a bridge crossing I discovered the stream was every bit as lovely as I had been told. Downstream a large slow bend pool cut deeply into the forested banks with the requisite shallow, sandy slope on the inside. At the foot of this stream-side beach a father and son sat chucking wads of "trout dough" deeply into the run. They said the fishing was good. A fish made a splashy rise as if to accent the point.

Upstream the was a series of pockets and riffles that were too tempting not to fish and so I did. For late spring, this was a perfect summer evening. Short sleeves. Wading wet in water that was only cold enough to refresh and not cold enough to numb. Enough bugs to let you know the fish were on them but not those annoying #24 BWO hatches that would soon be driving dry fly guys nuts.

I nymphed a bit until a fish taking a swat at my indicator told me to switch. The nymph had brought fish to the hand and now the dry yielded nothing. Perhaps those fish are craftier than I originally thought.

Knowing my fifteen minutes were long up I wandered back to the road in time to see the father and son packing it in. Between them they had six fish which was two over the limit for this water. I even glimpsed a taking of pictures with the boy posing in heroic fashion with a string of fish. I'm so glad I witnessed this passing of the poaching ritual from father to son. Such a tender moment worthy of Rockwell and the Saturday Evening Post. And a Conservation Enforcement Officer.

Now I had the truest of quandaries. I was easily 30 minutes late to dinner at this point. My cell phone was in the car. The light was starting to go. A sweet piece of water was devoid of fisherpersons. The fish were splashing in the pool in that "chasing caddis" sort of way and there was a large spinner swarm of mayflies in the air. And, I was dining with a fellow piscator.

I knew he would understand.

So I crossed over the guardrail and slipped down the path to the water.

The fish in the bend pool refused my dry fly presentations in myriad ways. I then switched to a Caddis Pupa and picked up a few including a beautiful, eight inch, wild Brook Trout.

The spinners were now swarming closer to the water getting ready to deposit themselves upon its surface. With barely enough light to see the fly and the tippet I spent five minutes tying on a large Rusty Spinner and then cast for another ten minutes to fish that clearly were not interested in spinner but instead were still keyed on the caddis.

And then the light was gone.

And I needed to get to this very late dinner appointment.

And the flicker of a bonfire called to me.

And I went to it.

Bonfire of The Inanities

I saw a fish the other night...at a tapas bar

New York City. Foreign Land. Tapas isn't real food. It's appetizers. And drinks. In fact, it's probably just a trick to make you drink more. Two glasses of Pinot Noir, $40. Glad for expense accounts.

Last week I was trapped indoors for a few days in a strategy session with the sales guys. Much fun. No fishing. No fly tying. Plenty of food and drink (so it's not all bad).

And it snowed. Lots.

The same forecast, again and again.

I've plotted a trip in March to Pulaski with Loren Williams and my friend Jon. The intended purpose of the meeting is to learn to cast a switch rod. Of course, I'm also not averse to catching a few shiny, large fish. Until then I'll be a drooling piscator trapped in ice.

Back in Connecticut this week and it's snowing again. For the past few days I've been battling the ice dams on the roof. I was just getting on top of this when the new storm rolled in. It's going to be weaker than expected so perhaps by the weekend the threat of dripping ceilings will be behind us.

In case you need to build hand and forearm strength for the fishing season ahead, I recommend a five pound mallet and a cold chisel. Chisel ice for a couple of hours each day. It's amazing how many muscles you'll find in your hands that you don't normally use in daily life or at the gym. If this continues much longer I'll have one Popeye Arm.

So, with Cabin Fever fully raging, I found a gem of a video on Youtube relating to Brookie Fishing. It's a perfect antidote to falling snow and iced up streams.

Enjoy.