Rocky Ford Creek Report: Life Is Good

Another mild Friday calls you to Rocky Ford. You make your way carefully through the fog in a southerly direction. When you get there you can tell the temp has hit it's predicted high in the upper 40's. That's better than the upper 30's, but with the damp and wind it just makes you long for that first really warm day. It will come.

You gear up and then take out that round packing tube. You ordered a new rod as a birthday present for yourself, and it got to the house just as you were ready to leave. Happy birthday to you.

Nothing fancy; in fact, a $49.95 special. But it looks good and feels good when you whip it in the parking lot. You string it up and hike down to the creek.

The chilly wind is making some lovely riffles. You tie on a muddler and begin to cast and strip, etching lines across the water's opaque surface.

A fish likes the look of that. It comes up from beneath and sucks in the fly.

Another fish likes it, too. This one lunges and comes down on the fly. It's a good, heavy rainbow that looks like it's been around the block a few times.

The muddler doesn't get any more attention, so you clip it off for another day. This is one of your muddler ties that survived the season at Trout Lake. It took its share of fish there. Good to see it still taking fish.

You try some dries. Bear's Paw and Callibaetis get a swirl or two with a brisk strip. But no hookups. You like the rod, though. It's stiff enough to easily shoot out the long line necessary for this Rocky Ford bank fishing, and it's 9 foot length keeps the backcast above the cattails--when the wind doesn't collapse the loop.

You go subsurface with a scud. There are days where the fish are on it instantly. This is not one of those days.

But you target rises and wakes and eventually fool an excitable teen.

You select the Red Tag wet, thinking you don't fish enough wet flies here. As if to confirm that thought, you get a quick take. Alan, at Small Stream Reflections, would be pleased. He said that would be the fly.

Then, in short order, another fish on the Red Tag. This one comes from the side, rolling to make the grab. It's one of those hits that make you exclaim with pleasure.

You think you've come up with the perfect system, but the house wins out again. No more hits on the Red Tag. You go back to a muddler.

It works twice. Both fish are wired. The second fish won't stay still for a headshot.

By then its getting dark. If they liked the muddler, they'd surely like a mouse. You tie one on and begin to work the water. Way out in mid river you get a series of bumps and misses. Little guys, you think, but they're hot. You keep going back to them, swimming that mouse under their noses, and get a hook up. Nice.

And again. Pretty.

You keep long-lining out to that channel, and number three hits and sticks. It's a mouse fest!

You work that mouse some more, probing the shorelines and the areas around the cattail islands, still hoping for that monster lying somewhere looking for a big meal. But that will do it.

You pack up and hit the road. The fog is still thick on the flats. You have plenty of time to reflect on a very good day at Rocky Ford.

It was a very good day, but it's going to get better. Twenty minutes from home you stop and pick up your grandson Sebastian.

He's coming to Grandpa and Grandma's house for another fun weekend.

Life is good.

Alaska Mouse Fishing - Mighty Mouse II

This says it all.

Alaska Mouse Fishing - Mighty Mouse II from Fly Out Media on Vimeo.
It's round two for Mighty Mouse and our fishing adventures in Western Alaska on the Aniak River. We were welcomed once again by accommodating guides at Aniak River Lodge, and an incredible Alaska fishery. Mousing really offers the best in trout fishing. You have amazing top water takes that vary from "dry fly" sips to voracious explosions. With barbless hooks, you really have to be on your toes to keep these Leopard Rainbows on. A head shake and the wrong angle can easily result in that sinking feeling when the line goes limp. Then ten minutes later, the elation rises again with another mouse take. It's the best kind of emotional roller coaster. Watch in HD, share, comment, and enjoy!

Rocky Ford Creek Report: Mouse Works But Stimulator Brings Home the Prize

You wend your way through the glacial rubble back down to Rocky Ford Creek.

It's another springy day on the spring creek. There are fish moving. The mouse is still on the line from last time, so you launch it out there where you saw some wakes converging.

A fish is on it instantly. It follows it all the way in. You flip it out again, sure that fish is still looking up, and get ready. This time, after a single strip, the fish whacks it. You set and it's hooked. It's just as you pictured it, except for the size of the fish. This isn't a big old trout, but it's a scrappy youngster who knows how to jump. And you do enjoy seeing that mouse hanging from its jaw.

You're the mouseman now, so you work it some more. But apparently that was the only trout at the moment willing to tackle a mouse. Way to go, fish. You clip the mouse off and stick it on your fly patch for later. You affix an indicator and begin to work the depths.

That's fun for awhile. You miss some tugs, and lose some hookups, but bring one in on a little san juan worm.

Time for a change of pace. There are more surface takes going on now, so you go on top with a light caddis. The fish take notice right away, and you get follows, but you have to work a little to coax a take. Another jumper. Not all the fish jump here, but the ones that do jump like crazy.

You get another good fish to take the caddis, but after a brief confrontation it gets off.

You switch the sodden caddis for a pretty little stimulator. It gets a quick take, a little fish that sucks it in on a twitchy strip.

You cast the stimulator out again, and, for some reason, let it sit. It's riding high out there, moving ever so slowly with the current, when a fish rises head and shoulders out of the water and calmly engulfs it. One of the prettiest dry fly takes you've ever witnessed. You wait just the right split of a second, raise the rod, and you've got a hookup.

It takes a few minutes, but you finally bring it close enough to lead it into the net. It takes another few breathless moments for it to stop thrashing and settle down into the basket. You just look at it for a moment. This is one of those long and strong twenty-plus Rocky Ford beauties that make all the miles and all the casts more than worthwhile.

You watch it swim away and know that this has been another one of those moments that define your fly fishing life, when everything comes together and the world makes sense. You stand for awhile and try to make the feeling last.

It's evening all of a sudden, and there's only one thing left to do. You tie the mouse back on and begin to work it. You stay until dark again. You get some follows--one fish leaves a chain of rings ten feet long as it bumps it over and over--but no takes.

 But that's OK. You're still smiling about that last fish.

An Interesting Afternoon At Rocky Ford

Had an interesting afternoon at Rocky Ford on Tuesday. Report on the way.

Skate or Die

Key words: "Catching cutthroat on a mouse."

Skate or Die from Blue Halo on Vimeo.
Catching cutthroat on a mouse is the equivalent of catching a wild unicorn while it is jumping over a rainbow.

Fun With Mice

This photo of a New Zealand trout is from 2009, one of the years considered to have been a "mouse year" down there.

Photo: Warren Plum

That same year saw the release of Once in a Blue Moon, chronicling the "mouse hatch" in New Zealand that season. Directed by Carl McNeil, that award-winning and ground-breaking video is considered a classic of fly fishing films.

Here is a truncated and bootleg cut. The original runs for 40 minutes and can be obtained at Amazon and other outlets.

Fly Tying: My Mouse Fixation

This one has foam ears. What next?

Bucknasty Browns -- Full Film from the 2015 F3T

Take a break and watch if you haven't seen this before--it's well worth the time. Some beautiful shots and great action including some mousing toward the end. 

BUCKNASTY BROWNS // Full Film from Montana Wild on Vimeo.