Lone Wulff
01-02-2012, 05:31 PM
I tried to start the year off right by heading into a favorite wild trout stream. I rigged up with a pair of #22 midge emergers beneath an indicator because of the type of water I would be fishing early on - a series of deep pools with gentle currents and lazy eddies. After that, I switched over to a standard dry/dropper setup to fish the shallower water ahead. 2 ½ hours later without a strike I was starting to think I should have drank a little more the night before and just slept in.
It was almost 1:00 before I got my first strike. An 8 or 9 inch rainbow rose from a scoured out indentation in the bottom adjacent to a gentle run. It slammed the dry, but an overzealous hookset sent my flies into the bushes behind me and I remained fishless. A few minutes later I had another take, this one more subtle. A slight twitch of the dry indicated that something nudged the nymph. I lifted my rod, more gently this time, and a fish too small to offer any resistance came flying out of the water. It was a rainbow less than four inches long – one of those dinks that flutters nonstop once out of the water and turns your leader, tippet and dropper into a mess that can’t be untangled. Luckily it flipped off the hook before it caused any damage. It was hardly a memorable first fish of the year. A short while later, a more respectable one came to hand - a hard fighting, 8 inch rainbow.
http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv19/kdurrett_photos/1-1-20126007.jpg
The fish were most active during a short window between 1:00 and 2:00 when a few more were caught, including a feisty, nine inch brown. After that they quieted down again.
http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv19/kdurrett_photos/1-1-20126008.jpg
http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv19/kdurrett_photos/1-1-20126011.jpg
Awhile later, the final fish came on a woolly bugger stripped along a large rock formation adjacent to some slow, deep water. I missed a first strike, but a few casts later I connected with a hard fighting, nine inch rainbow.
http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv19/kdurrett_photos/1-1-20126014.jpg
http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv19/kdurrett_photos/1-1-20126015.jpg
It wasn’t a stellar day, but I really can’t complain. If I had it to do it all over again I would. Things could have been worse. I could have spent the day hung over.
http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv19/kdurrett_photos/1-1-20126016.jpg
It was almost 1:00 before I got my first strike. An 8 or 9 inch rainbow rose from a scoured out indentation in the bottom adjacent to a gentle run. It slammed the dry, but an overzealous hookset sent my flies into the bushes behind me and I remained fishless. A few minutes later I had another take, this one more subtle. A slight twitch of the dry indicated that something nudged the nymph. I lifted my rod, more gently this time, and a fish too small to offer any resistance came flying out of the water. It was a rainbow less than four inches long – one of those dinks that flutters nonstop once out of the water and turns your leader, tippet and dropper into a mess that can’t be untangled. Luckily it flipped off the hook before it caused any damage. It was hardly a memorable first fish of the year. A short while later, a more respectable one came to hand - a hard fighting, 8 inch rainbow.
http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv19/kdurrett_photos/1-1-20126007.jpg
The fish were most active during a short window between 1:00 and 2:00 when a few more were caught, including a feisty, nine inch brown. After that they quieted down again.
http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv19/kdurrett_photos/1-1-20126008.jpg
http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv19/kdurrett_photos/1-1-20126011.jpg
Awhile later, the final fish came on a woolly bugger stripped along a large rock formation adjacent to some slow, deep water. I missed a first strike, but a few casts later I connected with a hard fighting, nine inch rainbow.
http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv19/kdurrett_photos/1-1-20126014.jpg
http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv19/kdurrett_photos/1-1-20126015.jpg
It wasn’t a stellar day, but I really can’t complain. If I had it to do it all over again I would. Things could have been worse. I could have spent the day hung over.
http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv19/kdurrett_photos/1-1-20126016.jpg