Rules of Thumb in Fly Fishing

When I arrive at the West Branch of the Croton River at about 4 o'clock in the afternoon, I expect to keep driving.  A recent two day heat wave and the only substantial summer weather we've had in weeks has me doubting that the water temperature will be safe for trout fishing...it's got be 70 or up I think.  I park the car at a pull off just over the Butlerville Road bridge and head toward the stream.  I can hear some commotion and it's not long before I spy a bent rod in the water held by a twenty something kid being coached by a fifty something angler.  Actually, there is one coach in the water and one on shore.  The shore man is impressed that I have nothing but a thermometer in my hands and the water coach comes stomping over as soon as the kid lands and releases the fish.  I can't get down to the water well enough to get a proper reading so the wet wiry guy grabs it and offers to do it for me.  I hand it over with thanks as the guy sitting on the bank, who wears slacks and a button down and drinks wine out of a red solo cup, compliments me on the forethought of taking a stream temp.  Not many guys know to do that, he says, it's good to see.

The lanky water man and the wine man shout back and forth at each other about water temps and insect hatches as the twenty something seems somewhat quietly relieved that he is being left to fish on his own.  He doesn't seem to know how to cast a dry fly very well but, hey, he did just land a fish and I wonder what he landed it on.

He stripping nymphs?  I ask.

Nope, says the solo cup, he's got a Steno on.  You know the Summer Stenos? They're coming off a bit now.

I pretend I do.  I don't know why I pretend to.  Maybe because I feel a lecture coming on if I claim not to or maybe because I want to appear to be a better fisherman than the kid in the water.  Let's face it; all fisherman pretend to know more than they do at one time or another.  It's the ones that always pretend they do that no one likes.  This is just one little slip up for me.  Eventually though, I lose the facade.  Probably because it appears that these two guys are extremely knowledgeable in between all of their loud and splashy ribbing of each other.  That and the fact that whatever this "Steno" is just caught the novice caster a fish.

In the meantime the wiry man in waders is back on the banks with my thermometer and a reading of 66 degrees.  That's up there but that's still good water to catch and release trout in without doing too much harm to them.  Whatever I don't know about stenos to these two older experts is made up by what I do know about water temperature.  It's stated again, "It's so nice to see someone come up to the stream with just a thermometer.  Good for you."

What can I tell you, solo cup, I know what I'm doing.  Now about those stenos...

It's basically a Light Cahill fly, a cream colored sort of yellow but not too yellow fly says the wet wiry man.  Jeez, I think, you couldn't have just said Light Cahill, huh?  I know what those are.  Gotta make a guy feel dumb.

They weren't trying to make me feel dumb.  As a matter of fact they were trying to help me.  Another thing fishermen can be besides pretending to be smarter than they are; too proud for their own good.  Well, I'll check both off the list for today.  The good news is that I caught myself and with one authentic glance from the solo cup man I knew I had to listen to what they had to say and that, as loud as they were being, they were genuinely trying to help me (the thermometer genius).

I tell the guys to enjoy the rest of their wine and that it is nice to meet them and thanks for the tips.  I head back to the car with wishes of good luck.  By the time I gear up, here they come again headed back to their own cars.  What the hell, I think as I shout, "So one of you guys mind looking in my fly box and tell me which fly to use?"  Here I went from too smart and proud to a common beggar all in the stroke of a few minutes.

They descend on me and my pathetic fly box with big chatty smiles, still ribbing at each other along the way.  The solo cup a more steadfast demeanor to compliment the wiry man's goof sense of humor.  These guys clearly make a good team.  They point at the Cahill or two I've got in the box but say it's just too big.  Solo cup ducks into his trunk and appears back in an instant with his own tied Steno fly.  Wiry comes up and wants to snip it to perfect it's shape and they now start in on their fly tying abilities.  Abbott and Costello would be proud.  Between the two of them, it is snipped to their liking and I am thankful and gracious and they are really on their way this time.  Hey, I yell, 6X?  Solo cup yells back to use 7X to which I say something that I'd rather not type but starts with an F and ends with a UCK.  Wiry looks back up and hollers over, don't you have any?  I answer that I do but that I hate the stuff.  He tells me to use a good 30 inches of it as he holds his bony hands apart.  He tips his proverbial cap and they are gone.

Down on what looks like a good stretch of water I begin the arduous task of adding tippet to my 9 foot 5X leader.  My magnifiers are on but the glare is brutal and the wind is not helping.  The 6 gets added to the 5 with general ease but now it is time for the 7.  I've already spent a half hour with my new comical and fly fish pro friends so I'm really down to an hours worth of fishing time, an hour and a half at most.  My patience for knots is directly related to my window of fishing opportunity and if you add a couple of rising fish, you have a recipe for some interesting stream side language.  This is just what happens too.  I must've cursed that 7X the same amount that the old tennis pro, John McEnroe, would curse a line judge.  Every once in a while I would look up from my profanities to see if anyone was witness to my madness.  At least, I figured, they wouldn't dare ask to fish up or down stream of the pool with me.  Silver linings, ya know?

Finally the set up is good to go and the little home made Steno begins to fly.  It is a nice long leader and the fly lands ever so gently each time it touches down.  I can see fish fin up to it and refuse a couple of times to my bewilderment.  They are interested though and I am once again appreciative of this gesture of knowledge from the shore line stand up routine.  One fish tries to take the fly and I am too soon on the set and miss the fish.  I see a good splashy rise down stream between two downed trees that create a "V" of water.  It will be a tricky task but I prove up to the challenge.  I put the fly where I want it and I am feeling good about myself when I decide to let out even more line.  Hitting the spot again with a good drift but no takes I strip even more line out.  Wow, I think, this is the best I have placed a cast since--what the??  DAMN BACKCAST!!! And just like that I am in a tree behind me, and my fly and my 7X are gone.  The 6X is frayed as well so I will have to cut it back to 5 and start all over.

If only my nippers didn't fall into the stream and drop into four feet of cloudy water.  Yup.  That just happened.  More expletives.

I am down to an eight and a half foot 5X tippet for spooky trout.  Not good.  I have no nippers.  I knew I should have gotten a new retractable nipper holder after the last one broke instead of having to keep bringing it in and out of my vest pocket.  Hindsight being what it is...

Fish are rising around me.  My teeth are not cutting the line.  The only fly I have left is a large Cahill, the one that they said was just too big.  Do I have anything that can help me make any of this work??  I dig through the vest...

A lighter.

Hmmm...I tie up the large fly on the 5X shorty leader.  I burn off the tag very carefully.  I then proceed to burn the hairs back on each side of the fly and just a bit burns off the tail.  The smell of singed hair in the air and on my fingers.  The fly, although fairly balanced in it's burnt state, looks ridiculous with it's blackened outline.  Hey, at least it's the right size I think as I start to chuckle at the idiocy of it all.  I could have just packed it in and went home.  It's just about time anyway.

I actually say out loud, "Imagine this is the damn fly I get a take on", and wouldn't you know it, I do.  I hook a beautiful 10 inch brown trout on the ugliest and smelliest fly I've ever used on a leader that a small-mouth bass might have passed up.

It is hammered home again to me today that there are always unknowns in this wonderful sport and that there are no "rules of thumb".  That, and a couple of funny new friends on a 66 degree stream are just a few of the many reasons that I love this sport so much.

Tight lines.

Neil Young and Fishing in "A" minor

Cue music:

A flannel shirt covers me for the first time since April as I stepped out into the dark of this crisp August morning.  The coolness of the summer season this year brings with it a curiosity as to whether the past damning winter ever fully let go of her grasp on things.  At least, as they say, it's been good for the fishing.  It has.

My last trip to this stream was in late July when the river seemed as "turned off" as I guess it might have been all season long.  To see the stream top being slurped at by trout was refreshing this day.  I decide to watch a good while before the boots hit the water.  A gray slate sky hangs high above the trees.  The odd brown leaf, another sign of things at the crest of change, blows down and sweeps by.

A decision.  The Blue Winged Olive comes out of the fly box and I tie it on and quickly spook the nearest fish, one that I had spotted and watched from my perch, just by walking along the bank where the fish was feeding.  So much for my stealth approach.  I wade in and decide to cast at another trout in the middle of the stream.  On the first drift the healthy sized trout fins up to my offering and then turns coldly.  My heart skips then settles.  Another decision; smaller fly.  I waste no time in changing down a couple of sizes and the brown wastes no time in cooperating.  One of those things I've learned along the way, changing the fly is mostly about size and not pattern, especially when the fish show interest.  The take was aggressive, the reel peeled off instantly, and the short fits and high energy of the fight had me soaring with smiles and that kind of goofy laugh that fishermen have when all alone on a river and a trout on the line.  Like the two of you are playing some kind of school yard game of tag together.

The next hour or so proves to me that my casting abilities are lacking.  To what degree I am unsure.  There are fishermen who can cast better and fishermen who cast worse but the fish that I didn't catch on this fine morning tell the real story to me.  I swear I heard one fish say, "Seriously, man??" as I sloppily dragged a size 20 across his zone.

I did have a chance to dance with another nice fish, this time on an Elk Hair Caddis in the fast water.  Again I produced a large attractor version of this fly only to find a fish that showed interest but darted back down.  As soon as I changed to the small fly the trout nailed it.  Fast water and small fish...I'll take it.

Things slowed.  The time showing about 9:30 A.M. and the low sun now sheening off of the currents.  The dimples of rises all but gone and I step out of the stream.  Once again I find my perch above the stream and let the boots drip over the edge as I watch.  The coolness of the breeze off of the water has my inner thoughts converging over to fall.  This whole morning has been a sure sign that the edge of autumn is here.

Soon enough I will take my annual trip with a group of fly fishing misfits up to the hallowed town and waterways of Roscoe, NY.   We will emerge ourselves into the orange hues of the world where that harsh but sweet chord with its earthen tone will marinate the fishing and camaraderie.  Purple wafts of cigar smoke will wash with the smoke of the fire pit and the laughter.  And that laughter will bellow into the dark where the last of the crickets will absorb the sound of it and of Neil Young's guitar.  

Soon enough, I'll be fishing in A minor.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcwKXltUvFo

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words

Can You Take Me Fly Fishing?

Photo by: Nick Boehme

Eight slips away slowly as nine is brand new on him, just since early July, and I'll miss this age forever, I think.  He draws closer to an age that is much clearer in my mind from my own life's memories but he's not quite there yet.  I keep hope that childhood lasts on him.

I took him to the stream a couple of weeks ago, I had asked if he wanted to come.  Sure, I'll come, he says.  I don't know if it was on his list as a priority of fun or of not wanting to disappoint with a different answer.  There is always that with sons, I think, and it is always appreciated by dads.

He hadn't been since last year, maybe last April, and now he was putting on waders more easily.  Asking questions about the fish, a couple about the bugs and such.  The interest, it seemed, was sparking.  Standing on the banks with two other fisherman upon arrival, shooting the old "here's what I'm throwing" and, "you should try this fly", and "I know Mike from...", Dean is already down on the stream..."Dad!  Come on, let's go!"  I chuckle proudly and excuse myself.

We start with nymphs because he's done that before and I can easily put the rod in his hands with this method.  Flip it up and across...keep the rod just in front of that fly line...and now...flip it back up and across...He does this pretty well but nothing strikes.

A couple of fish come to the nets of the other fishermen.  We stomp over, we look, he is enamored.  Daylight is fading fast and I'm feeling it.  I'd sure like him to hook up.  We went to the dry fifteen or so minutes ago and I've switched patterns two or three times.  I told you I was feeling it.  Gotta get this kid on a fish.  He's nine.  He'll remember.

We need to leave soon to pick up his sister.  In fact, we maybe should have left already.  It's feeling like "it is what it is" and his interest is turning to how deep he can get in the water before his boots start to fill.  I keep at him, "Nope.  Stop.  You're gonna get soaked" (he does), and finally, "we gotta go...last cast here..."

Slurp.

"Dean?"

"Yeah?", he answers as he looks across.

"Did you see that?  Did you see that fish rise out in front of that rock?"  It was just opposite us, right up close to the far bank.

"Yup."

"Watch this", I say as I strip the line and start the false casting.  "If he takes it, get ready..."

On the second drift the kid sees the take.  Fish on.  I hand him the rod instantly and the fun begins.

Photo by: Nick Boehme

He does a lot wrong.  He reels the wrong way at times.  His hands get crossed up.  At one point he reels the fly line right up to the end of the rod when the fish isn't ready.  I am tempted to take the rod more than once but, instead, I coach.  "Keep the rod tip up.  Easy.  Easy.  Let him run a bit.  Let him run."

He listens and responds and the fish comes to net.  Three grown men all around him, smiling.  Hey, kid, what a fish.  His smile outdoes us all.  He is thrilled.

I've taken him fishing before and I'll certainly take him again but this trip was a game changer.

About four or five days later while running family errands, my wife tells me that she and my daughter are going to be busy that evening and that the boys would have to fend for themselves.  He sits in the back of the car as the girls run into the store.  He taps on the back of my right shoulder...Hey dad?...Can you take me fly fishing?

Hooked.

Photo by: Nick Boehme

Fishing is like sex...

Fishing is like sex...even if you're not doing it, it's still fun to think about.

Tight lines,

Mike

Summer

I dipped the mesh back of the ball cap into the fast current and shook the excess cold water from it and slid it back on over my head. The brilliantly shining hot sun flashed and danced off of the stream. The green around me was lush and in seasonal abundance.  The coolness of the late June breeze that swept downstream, coupled with the wet cap sent a welcoming chill through me. I was wading up well past my knees, swaddled in the fast cold flow. I held the rod in my right hand as I stretched both arms out wide and looked straight up at the kind of blue I remember from childhood. Stared straight upward, stretched deeply, and gave thanks for all that this moment had to offer.

Evening Hatch

Sunlight slips down, its amber glow through patchy woods across the stream, filtering the perfect light of dusk onto the water.  Time is slowly going, or standing still, I cannot tell which and I don't think about it too hard.  This business about it "flying when you're having fun" is only true when you are thinking about the fun you are having rather than actually just going about the business of having it.  And I am.  A calm, thoughtless, one with nature, kind of fun.  Close to God's fun if I had to place it.  But, hey, I don't have to place anything. I just have to stand here in this river and fish.  

Ploink.  A rise.  I had hoped for that.  Ploink.  Behind.  To the left.  Another.  Ploink.  Ploink.  The white, yellowish sheen of the large fluttering bugs that dance up and over the stream must be what I have come here for.  Sulphurs?  Ploink.  Yup, sulphurs.

I lose my breath, just for a second.  Swallow hard.  Calm now, man, choose the right fly.  Ploink, ploink, ploink.  They all look so similar in the fly box all of the sudden.  Concentrate.  Ploink.  How could all of these pale flies even be in here??  Settle.  Settle...  

Choose.  Now tie a good knot.  Getting tough to see.  Ploink, ploink, ploink...you get the idea.

There, across the stream under that overhanging limb, is the most consistent rise.  It'll demand a good drift across a couple of these currents.  Easy now...easy...and...Thwack.  Shhhuuup.  And the fly line is ripped up off of the water.  Novice.  Stupid.  

I shrug it off.  Breathe.  I address another rise.  A take.  Fish on.  Okay...I can do this.  Another cast, another fish.  Here we go.  Good choice on that fly, hey?  Little guys but they stoke the confidence.  

The last of the light is fading.  The chill in the air on the back of my neck after the first hot day of the season.  The place really comes alive now with an abundance of sound as sight slips softly away with the day.  The environment becomes something that I am no longer separate from. It shrouds my existence and welcomes me into it as an equal part.  I stand, watching.  Listening.  Calm.  

Back under the tree, the rise is back.  I try again.  The cast effortless, thoughtless.    

PLOINK!

Photo By: Nick Boehme