Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Blue River Trout

...and he had gone eighty-four days now without taking a fish. For me, with regard to trout, it had been much longer, since March, but Hemingway understood. Fall 2010 trout season began for me around 2:00. First thing I decided to take a page from Donny Carter's playbook...not the EHC, but wading wet. It was approaching 80 and my thoughts were to travel light: two tiny flyboxes, two tippet spools, an extra leader, nippers and a Ketchum Release tethered to my shirt.

Snapshots don't always turn out well at 65 mph, but I thought these weren't so bad.
Passed up the western-most parking area that leads to the C&R area...
Wheeled into the west parking area nearest the river. There were two vehicles here and two more in the parking area directly south. Didn't bother crossing the bridge to see what was happening on the east side of the river.
Passed up several occupied spots before arriving here. Water clarity seemed very good and the water temp was a suprising 63 degrees...that will surely change with the coming weather, but it was very nice wading today. No takers. Kept moving.
Arrived at another spot and soon tangled with my first bow of the season. Lame, I know, but I really thought I had several better shots than this one. WRONG!
Continued on and fished a lot of pockets. Missed far too many fish, but hey, what did I expect? Released 18 B-E-A-utiful bows in about 1.5 hours of fishing. I was especially glad to see that the fish had managed to disperse as well as they had despite the low water level.Anyway, a great day. Thanksgiving came early...