Fly Tying: Final Offerings 3

Back to black. The third of the last flies of the season for the last week of the season.

Trout Lake Report: Slam

I headed back to the lake to try out muddler variation No. 2. It was another gorgeous October afternoon, and I wasn't the only one taking advantage of it.

I launched in the channel this time.

I worked one of my favorite shorelines with the new muddler. I didn't have the immediate success of the last trip. In fact I had two nose-bump refusals right off the bat. That could be the fly, or it could be a complex combination of a multitude of esoteric factors keeping the fish down. I kept plugging away.

I had this feeling that it was some fussy rainbows refusing the fly, but I didn't want to leap to conclusions. Then I dropped the fly at the waterline and had an immediate, no nonsense grab. Sure enough, it was a brown. I leaped to conclusions about those rainbows. I just can't picture a brown sniffing at a fly and turning up its nose at it. Seems like a brown will either hit the fly or totally ignore it.

Then again, when I brought this brown in, he was hooked in the tail. How did that happen? Maybe he had swirled at the fly and refused it. Or maybe he had hit the fly to stun it--it was definitely a hit, not a sniff. Or maybe, when he had swam right at me, and was on a slack line for a couple of seconds, he slipped the hook, and then was re-hooked when I regained control of the line. I don't know; but I was glad to have him in the net.

I came to the place where I usually turn away from the shoreline and cross the lake to the other side. This time I kept on going all the way down to the south end. Since the fishing had been slow I wanted to see if things might be better down there. I focused on the same place I had caught that first brown on the last trip. 

It was like deja vu all over again. I dropped the fly in close, and a wake started right for it from five feet away. I held my breath. The wake stopped under the fly and there was a swirl and a take. I wondered if it was the same brown as last time. Then I saw the fish roll. This was something different: a tiger, all dressed up in his fall colors. I celebrated with a few extra photos.

That was nice. I continued to fish around the south end, but I didn't find any more browns--or tigers.

As dusk was deepening, I began the long kick back to the truck. I drifted the fly behind me. and right away caught a rainbow.

I caught a few more rainbows before I got to the takeout. It was dark by the time I was packed up and ready to go. As I drove home I watched the full moon rise through the clouds and thought about muddler No. 2.

Even though the fishing had been slow, and the fly had gotten some refusals, it still managed a slam: three different species of trout. I'd call that a success.

Fly Tying: Final Offerings 2

The second of the last flies of the season for the last week of the season.

Trout Lake Report: Cheered Up

It rained in the morning but stopped by the time I was able to head for the lake. It was definitely feeling and looking more Octoberish.

I launched at the south end--the deer hunters' camp was gone--and started across to the other side. The water temperature was bracing.

I had tied on my latest muddler variation. It would be the only fly I used. I greased it good--I want it to float as high and long as possible. As I kicked along I cast it out to the side and let it drift until it straightened out behind me. Then did it again. And again. As I approached the shoreline, and just as the line straightened out, a fish grabbed the fly. An eager rainbow.

That was a nice beginning. I started working the shoreline now, casting the fly in as close to the bank as I could get it. That's pretty skinny water right now, and the weed beds have diminished, leaving little cover. But the fish have been in there. Especially browns.

I had made some progress when I glanced back to water I had just covered and saw a tail come up six inches from the bank. It waved at me once and disappeared. I put on the brakes and circled around to where I could get a cast in there again.

I don't know where this fish was when I made my first pass. This time, though, when I dropped the fly in, let it sit for a moment or two, then began a twitchy strip, the fish raced for it from five feet away, pushing a wide wake. The wake stopped right under the fly and I heard a loud clop. When I raised up I had him. It made me laugh out loud.

That's why I love browns.

I continued on down the shoreline, still chuckling and marveling at that fish, and eager to find the next one. The lake is down to bare bones now, but the fish are in there.

I was still casting the fly in as close as I could. I'd cast it in, let it sit for a few moments to see what would happen, and then strip it back. You can get a hit at any time doing that. That's what I call fun.

I cast the fly in. Plop went the fly. Instantly a big nose came up and took it. Sometimes you hit the bullseye. That also made me laugh out loud. No doubt about it, these browns really cheer me up.

I made my way around the south end to the back channel, which is now too low to navigate. The last time I was here I found several browns working the weeds where the lake shallows out into the channel. There was no rise going on; a single fish would come up once in awhile, here and there. So I laid the muddler out here and there to see what I could find.

It's the kind of fishing I love. Kind of like Christmas morning: you never know what you're going to get. Every few casts I'd hit it right and get a hit in return. I'd set, but couldn't get a solid hookup. I don't know if they were rainbows, but I do know that when this brown hit the fly there was no messing around--he hooked himself. Another present for me.

I kept it up for awhile, but the fishing was slowing down, and the light was rapidly waning.

I made one more cast. I watched to see where the fly landed, looked away for a split second, looked back and couldn't find the fly. So I raised the rod. What do you know? Another little brown.

OK, I made a few more casts as I kicked back to the take out, but that little brown was the last fish of a very entertaining evening.

I packed up and started for home. The almost-full moon was rising over the ridge as I rounded a bend. I got a shot before it was swallowed up by the clouds. The show was over. All that was left was the memories.

I was remembering that orange-bodied muddler in the jaws of those browns. It had worked well. I was already thinking about what I would tie up for the next trip.

Fly Tying: Final Offerings

Tying up some fresh muddler variations, the last flies of the season for the last week of the season.

"Looking for Water" by John Engels

Wild Turkeys in Flight -- Photo by Coy Hill

A river is supposed to be nearby, and reachable,

and since in a strange place the first thing

is to look for running water, I ask, and discover

that no one knows exactly

where the river is, though

there's plenty of speculation.

They think it might be somewhere back below

where the hiking trails used to run,

beyond the old bridle paths, probably

overgrown by now, as they recall, a difficult

tangle of distance over steep descents

through grapevine, blackberry, alder hells.

I have to make my own way, following

in the hardening red clay the beautiful tridental tracks

of what turn out to be a dozen

wild turkeys that a scant ten yards ahead

take wing in the watery dusk,

flap up and glide back over the road, slow

as big, bronze, iridescent fish,

the whole time wind like a minor surf,

and while I'm still breathing hard, six deer

exactly the color of hickory startle and crash off

through a sudden general reddening of the day,

and staring after them I see

a white gleam through the trees,

not the river, but a headstone--I've come

on an old graveyard,

where the turkeys must just

have been feeding, and the deer

running through, leaping headstones

of Cheatham and Goode, Asleep

in Jesus, and the Glasgow sisters, dead

at ten and two and eight,

reason enough to give up and head back,

and I'm home after dark

where a globed lamp in the farthest dip of the lawn

I mistake for the moon on water.

Excerpt from Big Water, Lyons & Burford, New York, N. Y., 1995.

River Report: October Light

I got back to the river on Friday. It was the same drill as last time. I covered as much water as I could, and tried to cover it with a fine-toothed comb. I moved nothing. But I enjoyed it immensely. What better way to spend a beautiful afternoon and evening than outside on the river in the rich October light.

This week is the last week of the trout season, so I will put the river on hold and spend as much time as I can at Trout Lake. Don't want those browns to feel neglected.