Slow Down the Fall

Exquisite.

Rocky Ford Creek Report: Un-Black Friday

It was an Un-Black Friday. After a relaxing Thanksgiving Day with family I was eager to get outside and fish.

On Thanksgiving Day the river was flowing free. On Friday morning it was iced over. Time to hit the road.

There were three people fishing near the parking area when I arrived at Rocky Ford Creek. I would see three more the rest of the day, all from a distance.

It was cold, but the sun was bright and the wind was mostly calm. I didn't feel the cold until the sun went down.

It was more of a Blue Friday: blue sky, blue water. The creek was up a little, limiting the shoreline access. I found a narrow spot to stand on. It felt a little like fishing from a diving board.

The fish were there, lined up and looking for something to strike their fancy.

I stripped a bead-head nymph, and drifted a few nymphs under an indicator. I got some bumps, but I also had a couple of fish come up and nose the indicator.

So I went dry, starting with a small muddler. The fish nosed it, and swirled under it, but they didn't grab it.

I went to an old, sparse Adams, maybe a #14. More swirls, and a brief hookup before the fly was soaked through.

I found a beautiful little #12 Callibaetis that I had tied up for the Henry's Fork. I tied it on. I gave it a drift, and after five feet a fish came up and ate it, no mistake. I missed it, feeling the grate of the hook against its jaw. I cast again, and after another five foot drift got another lunging take. This time I hooked up.

It felt good to have a fish on again. It fought hard, churning the shallows. I finally worked it in to the shoreline. I got down on my knees with the net, but I couldn't reach the fish. The tip top guide was frozen and I couldn't bring any more line in. So I grabbed the leader to slide the fish into the net--and it gave one more thrash and broke off. It was gone in the blink of an eye--and it took the fly with it.

The sun was down now and it was getting cold, dropping toward a forecast low of 15.

I tied on a #18 BWO, thinking I should probably have used it first. But the fish didn't like it as much as they had liked that Callibaetis. But after some patient casting to rises and wakes I managed another hookup. This time I got it in the net. Not the biggest that Rocky Ford Creek has to offer, but just what I was looking for, nonetheless.

I was feeling the bite of the cold, but I stayed longer than I thought I would, tempting the fish with a muddler again. They seemed to enjoy playing with the fly as much as I did, bumping it, chasing it, swirling under and around it, but never taking it.

I finally reeled in and walked back to the truck through the early dusk. Two cars pulled out before I got to the parking area. Another fisherman was putting things in his pickup when I got there. He wished me safe travels, I wished him the same, and he pulled out and was gone. I was the only one there.

I packed up and began the liesurely drive home under the un-black moon.

November: How Did We Get Here?

November. Already half over. How did we get here?

I haven't fished since Trout Lake closed. I needed some quiet time to process and adjust. What usually happens when you put something on hold for awhile is that other things step forward and demand attention. That happened.

That means I've been busy. Good stuff, enjoyable stuff. Just not fishing.

So I need to fish. The river is up, and it's gray and rainy. That could mean steelhead are moving, and more could be here now waiting for me.

At the same time weather reports call for temps dropping into the teens at night next week. I know that story. One day the river is there, the next day you get up and it's hiding under a foot of ice.

So this is called a "window" --that fleeting opening between now and when the ice comes.

I'll be trying to hit that opening. Soon.

This Is Fly, October/November 2015

Get it HERE.

Trout Lake Report: So Long, Lake

I head up the road for the last time this year.

The south end will be the setting for this final day of the season. Stellar's jays are making a racket all around the lake. Two rise up, land in the golden willows in front of me, flit away. Their midnight-blue iridescence is stunning.

I will work up along the eastern shoreline, cross over, and work back down the western side.

Around the first bend, and right against the waterline, a brown comes to the Halloween Muddler.

A little farther along another brown comes to the fly.

They are inside the weeds, patrolling the little patches of open water along the waterline.

I pass the beaver house and see that they are thinking about the change of seasons and the coming winter, as I am. Much on our minds is the question of what will sustain us during the cold months ahead.

I will find sustenance in stored memories of the multi-layered beauty of a season of days like this one.

I cast and the resting fly gets a nose bump. I raise up and miss the fish. Must be a rainbow. I go ahead and cast back to the spot and wait. I have time. I'm a little surprised when the fish comes back and takes the fly. Well done, Rainbow. It will be the last rainbow of the season.

Down the shoreline I go, finding release in the familiar rhythms of casting. It's good to see that I have not yet reached the dead end of perfection.

I cross over to the other side.

A brown comes out of the rocks.

I pass the Tiger's Lair, but raise nothing there this time. Maybe it will be the first place I try next Spring.

I come around to the far south end.

It still seems impossible that a good-sized fish would be up along the waterline here where the depth five feet out can be measured in inches. But there he is.

Inside the back channel, now too low to navigate in a float tube, I see a fish working. I crabwalk in along the weedy bottom to get close enough for a reasonable cast. The fish comes right to the fly and I raise too soon and miss.

I cast the fly in again. Wait a beat. The fish takes again. I time it right. Another brown.

I make a full circle and come to the take out, but I'm not ready to call it a day--or a season. I go on around the bend again.

There's one more fish for me there. The last fish of the season. A sleek little brown, shining like the dreams of days to come.

Now it's time. I kick back and step out of the water, drag the tube onto the shore. The ripples of my presence are soon gone. Time for rest.

So long, lake.