Fishing Journal Week 4

March 2
I fished a tough slow stretch of river today. Fish are all over in there but the river moves so slow it is a struggle to get a good cast without spooking them. To top it off the wind was blowing pretty good straight down the river making casting upstream almost impossible. Especially with my three weight. I think I will have to break out the 5wt again as the wind is pretty much a given in the spring. Punching a #10 pattern through the wind with my 3wt is not easy. I made several good presentations downstream to feeding fish and had a couple takes on the midge but could not connect. Also had one big nose take down the Skwala but I missed on the hook set.

Finally I moved upstream to a big eddy where fish often lie and sip midge pupa to their hearts content. They where in there and on my first good cast I had another big fish gulp up the Skwala, but again I missed it. I was beginning to wonder if it just wasn't my day and I tried one more cast up into the top of the eddy and sure enough another nice snout poked up and took down the Skwala. I set the hook and had it. Finally. I was quite surprised though when I brought the fish in close to see that it had the Zebra Midge in it's mouth, not the Skwala. My only explanation is that the big fish ate the midge on the way up to the Skwala. When I set the hook, I missed with the Skwala but the hook on the Zebra Midge found pay dirt. Fish are definitely starting to key in on the adult Skwalas though. It was frustrating to miss on those other two. Very nice outing though.



March 3

The lunch hour started innocently. I caught this spunky 16 inch fish on one of my first casts. The sun was shinning the wind was minimal, and the temps were in the range where t-shirts are comfortable. After I released the fish I noticed one small black cloud in the sky but thought it couldn't be very menacing for how small it was. Then it started to sprinkle as I made my way upstream to fish to some risers below a riffle I had never fished before. When I got there I was excited as the fish were going crazy, but before I could even make my first cast the rain picked up from a light drizzle to a steady pour. Again I looked at the cloud and thought "this will be quick, that cloud is still not very big." I fished the run but once the rain picked up all surface feeding stopped. I picked up one very active 15" fish there and noticed as I released it that the rain had made a steady progression at this point to torrential down pour status. It was virtually impossible to pick my fly out on the water with all the rain pelting down on the rivers surface so I headed back to the truck. Halfway there a few of the raindrops began feeling a little solid as they pelted my face. I got in the truck just as a pretty good hail storm hit full force. As I drove out of the canyon the hail had already built up and was covering the road. When I broke out of the canyon walls the storm disappeared and the sun was back out. Interesting turn of events but I will take a drenching any day if I can pick up a couple fish in the process.