River Report: It's Up, Alright

First there was a "Hydrological Outlook," but now we're officially under a Flood Watch. The fact is the hot spell is melting the mountain snows all at once, and the river is on the rise. The forecast is for the warm temps to persist through Saturday. So far no mountain precipitation to add to the runoff.

Monday at 1:15 PM the river was at 11.4 feet. Flood stage is 15.0 feet. The prediction is the river will hit flood stage sometime Thursday morning.

We're in no danger. We had a survey done when we were in the process of closing on this house, and the house stands officially 8 feet above the 100 year flood plain. I was standing at house level on Monday evening when I took this shot, so you can see it would take a flood of geological proportions to reach us.

And of course this happens every Spring. The difference for us is that we now have a ringside seat. So we'll watch and learn more about the yearly cycle of this historic river. I contrasted the photos I took on Monday evening with some I took last November right after we had moved in. Yep. It's up, alright.

Trout Lake Report: Winter's Really and Finally Over

Hot. Blessed heat. Blue, blue lake and sky. North lake this time.

Muddler again. Casting and stripping. Lots of new blow downs to probe.

A rise in water you just covered. Right up tight against a log. You go back, tease and taunt. Break down his resistance. He takes in spite of himself. Little. But game.

Then. You cast in, strip out. A tiny rise, behind the fly. You throw the fly right back, thinking another little rainbow. You let the fly sit. A heartbeat. A sipping take, you tighten, a yellow depth charge. You try to hold him, but he gets into the willows. Breaks off. Takes your muddler. You sit. Watch the ripples fade away.

You wait. Tie on another muddler. Wait some more. He'll be back. His shoreline. Then another pretty little rise tight against the bank. Could it be? You cast back in. It's him. He takes. You've got the angle this time. Work him in. First good Brown of the season.

You work around the shoreline. Fishing just for fun now. Having fun. Try the inlet. No fish today.

Fish rising. Then down. Then rising again. You stick with the muddler.

You get hits. Pick up another little gamer.

Then see a fish working. Jumping, porpoising. You work him. He whacks the muddler. 

You kick back across to the truck side. No hits on long tow. So you prospect along the bank.

One more fish wants a muddler.

Now you're sure of it: winter's really and finally over.

Youth Sports Post: A Celebration of a Great Season

I wasn't the only one to notice that we finally had good weather for baseball on the last day of the season.

It was a glorious day to go out on, sunny and 84 degrees.

It was a double header against a very good team. Jeremiah played center field both games.

We have a young team. We had only one senior to recognize today, and most of the rest, like Jeremiah, are Freshmen. So score-wise we didn't have too much to cheer about. They beat us both games, by lopsided margins. The first game was a shutout, but in the second game we rallied to score 3 runs. We all cheered like crazy for that moral victory.

Between games some of the parents of our team supplied a lunch--for both teams. Nice.

Isaiah was there, sort of, hanging out and wandering around with some of his soccer cronies.

Jeremiah didn't get that home run, nor did he get on base, but he got the bat on the ball a couple of times--also a moral victory against the excellent pitching of the other team.

And he covered center field pretty well, making some good catches. There were plenty of opportunities what with the big bats of the opponents. He almost made a circus catch, running full-tilt for a sky high fly and just getting his glove on the ball before rolling on the ground and coming up empty.

I think everybody had a great day, even the team that "lost." It was more than a game. It was a celebration of a great season of disappointments and triumphs, of working hard and making steady improvement, of going against the odds and never giving up, of overcoming obstacles and doing better than you thought you could, of coming to the end and feeling good, knowing that through it all you had done your best.

Way to go, guys.

SHARK ATTACK (by humans)

Saw this on Moldy Chum. A graphic reminder that humans are indeed the alpha predators. Check out the organizations at the end of this graphic if you want to know what "finning" is, and what's being done to stop it.

Youth Sports Post: Spring Sports Winding Down

Spring sports are winding down. Soccer is over and a double header today will close out the baseball season.

Jeremiah has had his moments on the baseball team. This was his first triple, rounding out a handful of singles and a couple of doubles.

Maybe today he'll get a home run for the cycle. I'll keep my video camera handy just in case.

Trout Lake Report: Icing On the Cake

It has been a busy Spring, and things haven't slowed down for fishing season. Guess I'll need to slow down and make some dedicated fishing time.

Friday was busy up until about 5:00. That's late to be heading to the lake, but it was a window and I jumped through it.

The lake, it goes without saying, was beautiful. The day had been warm, but the constant wind at the lake had a cool edge to it, and it got cooler as the evening wore on. But there I was, and I was fishing. I went with a muddler again--and later with a little stimulator--because I'm finding the target casting and the anticipatory stripping very restful and generally therapeutic. A form of meditation, to be sure.

So I ranged around the spring lake, casting and stripping, and triggering the occasional explosive rise. Missed all of them. And I was OK with that.

Then I hooked this pretty little thing. It was icing on the cake.

Cutthroat Lake Preview

We've had a cool spell. Nights have been freezing and days a little raw. Wind has been whipping to make it a little more uncomfortable. But it looks like we're turning the corner, maybe for good. Rumor has it we'll hit the 90's this weekend. OK by me.

Thursday wasn't too bad weather wise. Still a bit cool, with a gusty breeze. I had work to do, but I was up near Cutthroat Lake, so I stopped by to see how things looked. Looked pretty good, with that unearthly blue that out-blued the sky.

I had my rod and vest in the truck so I took about an hour and threw woolly buggers from the bank. The water was milky, so I couldn't see any fish cruising by like I usually do. But they let me know they were there. Two times fish came up nearby to suck in a midge.

Still, I enjoyed my lake break. And I actually got two pulls. I'll take that. It's a start.

Next time it will be hot, and I'll have the tube, and we'll get down to business.

Happy May Day! With Bacon

So this all started as a Happy May Day post. No Occupy protests, no International Workers on the march, no parades of Soviet military hardware. Just the good old fashioned May Day where you look around and say, "Hey look, it's May, for crying out loud!"

When I was a kid we made simple baskets, filled them with simple flowers--dandelions, and maybe for good measure some more dandelions, hung them on the front door knob, rang the bell and ran away to hide, laughing like little maniacs. We'd watch breathlessly while our Mom would open the door, look surprised, and look all around to see who had left her such a marvelous gift, pretending that she couldn't see us. She'd close the door--and we'd do it all over again. And again and again until she finally told us that was enough. Now that was fun. Kids today don't know how to have fun like that.

So then I thought, wouldn't it be cool to find a photo of a basket of trout to hang on your cyber door knob. You know, May Day for a fly fishing blog. And I found one, a postcard from 1902. Cool.

But then I noticed another photo of a basket with trout, and when I checked it out it was from April 6 this year. I admit it, as primarily a catch and release guy I can forget that many folks still fish for food. That's certainly true around here, just as much as in New Jersey, where this photo is from. So that got me going off in a different direction.

I got interested in the story of David and Natalia, who fished on opening day--April 6--in Stokes State Park in New Jersey. The park website posted these photos.

They did alright. They got their limit on each of the two days they fished. The limit was 6 fish apiece per day. The caption on the photo above says this was their "partial catch" for day two. The website said that 6,000 trout of from 3 to 8 pounds had been stocked across 88 streams and 90 ponds.

And they knew how to get them. I've had more than one old timer tell me not to waste my time with fly fishing, that the number one trout-getter of all time is a juicy worm dead-drifted deep.

And Natalia knew how to cook them. Bacon-Wrapped Brookies. Yum! You know, I've never had trout fried up that way. How could that be? The sheltered existence of a catch and release fisherman, I guess.

So, it's always interesting to see how other people live, and fish. And to get a glimpse into what it's like to be a trout fisherman in New Jersey.

So where was I? Oh yeah, Happy May Day!

Now I'm going to look up the limit for Brookie Lake. No, I won't be bringing home basketfuls of fish, but I think it's high time I fried up some Bacon-Wrapped Brookies.