Call ‘em caddis, sedges, dancers, grannoms, shadflies, peters, makers, millers, micros, travelers or whatever your local dialect has adopted. Just don’t overlook them.
The bugs pelt the water in sheets, like winged sleet on every fresh breeze, prompting a feed that feels lewd to me, somehow indecent.
Fishing isn’t necessarily about numbers but when the sun sets and you’ve brought maybe three fish to hand compared to thirty that were caught by the eight year old fishing in the boat next to you, on what you consider one of your home waters, you can’t help but take notice.
I’ve kept pretty quiet about my favorite winter pursuit. But as the mercury rises, rainbows start to move, and larger groups of anglers begin to awake from winter slumber, I’m ready to fess up. For the last couple of months I’ve spent my spare time swinging a two handed rod in relative solitude.
The forecast called for high winds, but we thought they would be moderate. The high for the day was supposed to be unseasonably warm. If the Wind didn’t live up to expectations we would be in for a great day on the water. So we loaded up all the kids, hitched up the boat, and headed, Read More
My heart wasn’t in it. After ten days on the road I wanted to point my rented Subaru north and call it a trip. But I was committed. I was scheduled to rendezvous with three of my friends for a cutt-slam-in-a-day adventure, a reunion of sorts for a similar adventure we had done the year before., Read More
The line stopped in the tea colored water. A quick head shake and the trout headed up stream. Minutes later we had a gorgeous brown at our feet. The sun was just coming over the horizon, we began fishing only moments earlier. Swollen and slightly off color, we thought the stream would be tough, Read More
“How are the fish doing?” a small voice piped up from the back seat. “Huh?” I replied. “You know…how are their homes doing?” “Oh…you mean where we helped on that project last summer?” “Uh huh” Seven months had passed, but it is remarkable what sticks in a five year old’s mind. My daughter and, Read More
It all starts innocently enough. Sundrenched summer afternoons wiled away beside childhood rivers. A stringer of bluegill here, maybe a bass from the frog water there. Sometimes you crawl through the rhododendrons looking for brookies. You’re with friends; everyone gripped by the same hopeful sense of adventure. Who knows what lurks below the surface?, Read More