Matching the Hatch

Trout Lake Report: How Can You Improve On Perfection?

It was in many ways a perfect evening.

It was hot, calm, quiet--road dust hung in the air.

The fish were...introspective.

It seemed that small was the new big. No fish would come to a muddler. When they came up at all it was to sip one of the swarming midges.

I clipped the muddler. This time I would go intuitive rather than counter to it. I cast up along the bank where a fish had come up once. I waited, and it finally came up again--and I had it, a red-cheeked beauty.

I fooled it. Who would have thought that the man in the familiar float tube who always throws big muddlers had matched the hatch with a fine little #18 griffith's gnat on 5X tippet?

The word went out. No more fish were fooled.

It didn't matter. How can you improve on perfection?