Many of you are probably already looking forward to the early trout fishing season in Wisconsin. Some of you will be out on the first Saturday of January no matter the cold temperatures. Others of you will prudently wait for a day when the temperatures are moderate and the chill wind from the north is not a factor. Some of you will be happy to be out regardless of your anticipated success while a few of you will harbor visions of catching a significant fish on a tiny midge imitation or perhaps a Tiny Black Stonefly.
Let’s start with the premise that you dearly love dry fly fishing. You crave the artful presentation and the sight of a trout rising to your crafty floating fraud. But at this time of year if you catch anything at all it’s likely to be tiddlers. Reluctantly, you see the wisdom of switching to a nymph, after all it’s estimated that 90% of a trout’s meal ticket is subsurface fare. To save time you decide to continue fishing with the same leader, most likely a 9’ 5X with 20” of tippet attached, switching out the dry fly for a nymph and adding a strike indicator. That way, once a hatch beckons, you’ll only need to switch flies and remove the strike indicator to get back in the game. But after an hour or so of fruitless casting your enthusiasm wanes so you reel up and head for home.
While it’s possible to make that rig work for nymph fishing, there are other, better choices. The simplest method (Figure 1), is a 7&1/2’ 4X leader to which you add 20” of 5X tippet material. Tie on a nymph, any nymph, add split shot above the tippet knot and the strike indicator about half way up the leader. The obvious advantage of this rig is that the split shot can’t migrate past the knot. Oh, since it’s cold, straighten the leader before throwing your nymph in the water. Fish a deeper riffle or a run and the head of the pool. There might be trout feeding or holding in the deeper lies in the riffle, and if invertebrates are dislodged from the riffle trout might hold near the head of the pool to grab the aforementioned invertebrates.
Figure. 1
Here’s a modification that adds versatility to this basic rig (Figure 2). Start with the same 7&1/2’ 4X leader. About six or seven inches up from the end of the tippet, tie on your 20” of 4X or 5X tippet using a double overhand (surgeon’s) knot. When done correctly you should have a short tag, a stub, and the tippet. Trim the stub. The short tag is called the dropper and the tippet end is called the point. Tie a nymph on the dropper and another on the point. Place your shot above the knot and the indicator about half way up the leader. The advantages of this rig are that you can use smaller shot, the shot can’t migrate past the knot and you’ve doubled your chances by using two flies. The glaring disadvantage is that you are almost guaranteed to suffer increased tangles caused by these two flies. Cast smoothly, widen your loop and strike gently.
Figure. 2
If you can appreciate the efficacy of using two flies, this next rig is for you (Figure 3). Start with the same 7&1/2’ leader. Thread a nymph onto the tippet, then add your tippet material and another nymph. You can use split shot with this rig but it works better without it. Instead, if you thread a heavily weighted nymph onto the leader before adding tippet and another nymph, you can eschew the split shot. Put the strike indicator in the customary position. You’ll still have to be careful with your cast, your loop and your hook set. But, you’re now fishing two nymphs doubling your chances and doing so with fewer tangles. Isn’t that what you wanted?
Over fifty years ago a friend who was stationed in Montana while serving in the Air Force invited us out to go back-packing and trout fishing in the Rocky Mountains. Ron introduced me to fly fishing on that trip and Montana has been a preferred destination ever since. During the 1980’s he worked for US Fish and Wildlife and I went out once or twice a summer to camp and fish with him. We fished most of the storied waters in SW Montana but I became particularly infatuated with the Boulder River and Rock Creek.
Calling Rock a “creek” is an obvious misnomer. Its current discharge is four times that of the lower Kinni; when you look at it for the first time the word that pops into your brain is “river.” When I fish out west I prefer tent camping but this year for a couple of reasons we rented a cabin right on the river a few miles above its confluence with the Clark Fork of the Snake. As much as I like roughing it, I am moved to admit that the cabin experience was pretty comfortable. Breakfast and dinners indoors, lunch and happy hour on the front porch, a comfortable bed for a refreshing night’s rest, good friends to fish with and quick access to miles of one of Montana’s premier trout streams totaled up to a fine week’s experience.
Fishing, as we like to say, is always good. Catching, on the other hand, is frequently a different experience. Only two or three fish were caught in the first couple of days. I saw one trout rise on Sunday and another rise on Monday and not another the rest of the week. John at Rock Creek Mercantile said fishing has been tough this season due to a late spring and higher than normal water for late July. He recommended fishing nymphs in the morning and dry flies as late as you can in the evenings. We followed his advice. But we also fished afternoons. We fished nymphs, dries, streamers and wet flies, all without success.
On Wednesday morning, July 26, we drove downstream to fish some braided water that we hoped would be promising. After gearing up we spread out on the near bank keeping ourselves within sight of each other. After spending an hour or so fruitlessly fishing various dries upstream I reached one of our fishing partners who reported having the same success as I did. There were a couple of braids coming into this stretch from the opposite bank and it was abundantly clear that the water was too deep and fast to cross at that point. I cut through the underbrush to get above him thinking I might find safer water to attempt a crossing. So I was upstream and around a bend from him when I found a spot between a couple of riffles that looked wadeable. I started across and at about the half-way point realized that a) the water was deeper than it looked and b) the gradient was a whole lot steeper than I figured. On local streams I’ve waded knee deep, thigh deep and waist deep for decades, never having a problem with gradient, only that unseen rock that trips me up and causes me to curse. We have gradient; Rock Creek has Gradient.
Half way across in thigh deep water is an impossible place to turn around. When you’re in that deep you have no choice but to move forward. So I tried to keep going, trying to do my Tai Chi step by planting the downstream foot, shifting my weight to it and then pulling the upstream foot forward while angling downstream to mitigate the force of the water. Finally the rocks underneath my downstream foot gave way, I attempted an awkward pirouette and I went down, waders filling with water and my feet pointing downstream. I actually laughed, thinking to myself, “So this is what getting dunked is like? Huh.” I had visions of steering myself into calmer waters so I could crawl out.
Then I saw the log jam. In milliseconds I thought about the time my dog, Rickie, swam across this same river and got swept into a log jam, went under it and popped up on the other side. In the same milliseconds I thought about hanging on to that first log, a futile attempt since my waders were full and the force of the water was too powerful. I hit that log, went under it, surfaced ever so briefly, and then went under another pile of brush and logs before coming up for air. There was no time to be afraid. My eyes were open the whole time; I could see bubbles and parts of the log jam. I also swallowed some water. In those milliseconds under water I was thinking about how the hell I was going to avoid drowning. I wound up standing on a rock or a log, chest deep and wedged between a couple of logs, gasping for air. After several minutes I freed myself from the logs and after pulling myself upright on one of them, and with the help of the other angler, I was able to crawl across the log jam to the bank.
I lost my rod and reel, my hat and glasses, a couple of boxes of flies, some accessories and my wedding ring, a family heirloom since it was my grandfather’s and had my grandmother’s initials, A S, engraved inside. I don’t remember what we ate for supper that night, I was still tasting river water. John at Rock Creek Mercantile told us that in the prior couple of weeks three people had drowned: one on the Blackfoot, one on the Clark Fork, one on Rock Creek and his body was found several miles downstream. They say that only the good die young.
There are two species of Ephemerella mayflies in these parts, one of which is kind of a big deal on the lower Kinni. Or at least it was until the City released all that sand into the river. Anyway, because of its rather light color, people got into the habit of referring to it as the Light Hendrickson. Traditionally the Light Hendrickson was an angler’s term for E. Invaria but there were at least two other species that were lumped together under that angler’s term. It wasn’t until about 2005 when Clarke Garry, Ph.D, correctly identified it as E. Excrucians that we knew what it was. Now you’d think that anglers would welcome that news, but you’d be wrong. At least one of my customers was visibly upset by the news and shouted, “No! It’s the Light Hendrickson!” He got over it but it’s a clear illustration of another angler’s conceit. Is hanging on to an inaccurate term really more important than a positive ID from a scientist?
I used to go to the Fly Shop when Bob and Jean owned it to find out what was hatching on the Kinni. Bob always said the same thing, “Blue Wing Olives.” I was always kind of disappointed by that because I kept expecting to find something else to fish over. However, Bob was right because so many Baetis species are bivoltine means that they’re almost always available to the trout. But they are not all olive. The vast majority of the samples I’ve collected have been tan. Don’t believe it? Get yourself a little insect net and try it yourself. Baetis could be olive, but they’re more likely to be tan, brown or even grey. It’s hard to break a habit. And the one I hear most often is, “Are the Olives hatching?”
OK, one more and then I’ll stop. For decades people who tie imitations of the Trico spinner have tied them with three, widely separated tails. Back in the ‘70’s I watched Tom Andersen tie some of these flies for Bob and he artfully positioned his dubbing needle underneath the tail filaments, spread them apart and held them for a second or two until they stayed in that position. Look at the selection in any fly shop and you’ll see many examples of this style. Gary Borger once opined that a trout’s IQ was 6. Six. Do you really believe a trout would reject your Trico imitation if it only had two tails? With that robust thorax and spent wings why would the fish focus on the tails? They probably don’t, and to bolster my opinion there’s this; Perry Palin is one of the better tiers around here and he’s been tying a very effective Trico pattern for years using a few grizzly barbs for the tail. They’re not long, they’re not spread and they’re definitely more than three. And it works fine.
One of the definitions of conceit is a fanciful idea. Now let’s substitute flawed and apply it to our beloved preoccupation of fly fishing for trout. Has this ever happened to you?
Two anglers approach a pool on one of their favorite trout streams. They met in the parking lot and agreed that one angler would fish the upper half of the pool and the other angler would fish the lower half. Before entering the water they quietly observe the scene before them. While there are one or two desultory rises there are no Cedar Waxwings or Rough Wing Swallows feeding over the stream. They wade into casting position and begin to cast. After a while one angler catches a trout. The second angler, speaking just loud enough for the first angler to hear him says, “What did it take?” The first angler replies, “CDC Sulphur Emerger.” The second angler switches flies and resumes casting, fruitlessly it turns out, while the first angler catches another trout and then another and another. Finally, desperately, the second angler hollers, “What are they taking?”
Do we assume, because half a dozen trout grabbed that emerger, that all the trout are seeking an emerger? Really? An electrofishing project has indicated that there might be 100 fish in that pool. There might be three invertebrates emerging at the same time; sulphurs, Baetis, caddis or midges. Maybe the second angler is fishing over trout that have a preference for down wings? Or, maybe the second angler’s tippet is too short? To ascribe group thought to a pool of a hundred trout is what we can call a conceit, a fanciful or false idea.
Here’s another. Most of us old guys grew up practicing our blood knots under bright lights at the kitchen table. For you young people, a blood knot was the historical knot for joining tippet materials. Then about thirty years ago somebody published an article in a fly-fishing magazine about an easier knot for joining tippets. It was called the surgeon’s knot. It wasn’t long before everybody forgot about the blood knot because the new knot was so much easier to execute. A few years into my tenure at Bob Mitchell’s Fly Shop I had a conversation with a hand surgeon who was getting started in our sport and wanted to learn how to tie tippet onto leader. So I sez to the guy, I sez, “You’ll like this one; it’s called the surgeon’s knot.” After demonstrating the knot to him he said, “Huh. I’ve never seen that.”
I’ve had a few surgeries since that fateful day. And after observing several different surgeons I realized that the reason the aforementioned hand surgeon had never seen that knot was because that’s not what they’re taught in med school. What they learn to use in med school is a half hitch. I’m pretty confident that no surgeon has ever closed a wound with a “surgeon’s knot.” So what the heck is it? Practically speaking, it’s a multiple overhand knot, either a double overhand or a triple overhand. If the knot you’ve been using is a “surgeon’s knot,” call it a double overhand and you’ll at least be accurate.
Now that you’ve got your rods inspected, your reels cleaned, and your lines cleaned and dressed, it’s time to move on to your terminal equipment, your flies and leaders. Compared to rods, reels and lines, this stuff is a pleasant evening’s work at your tying bench or kitchen table. Let’s take a look at your leaders first.
There are two kinds of leaders, those you used and those you didn’t. Your examination of the leaders you didn’t use consists of stretching sections of the leader in an attempt to straighten it. Because leaders are made of nylon, they can easily develop memory. A leader that’s been on the reel too long or coiled in its package too long will retain its coiled shape. If it doesn’t straighten out it can’t be fished. Throw it out. If it straightens easily put it back on the reel or coil it loosely and slip it back into its package.
Next, your examination of leaders you used has one extra step, checking for nicks and cuts. After straightening the leaders run your thumb and index finger (if you’ve got one) down its length. If you feel a nick, cut, abrasion or knot examine the area closely. This is where a magnifier comes in handy. If you find any of these weaknesses, you have two choices: cut the leader and retie it or throw it away.
On to your flies. Just like leaders, there are flies your fished and flies you didn’t. The only ones you need to be concerned with are the ones you fished, identified by their straggly appearance. Let’s start with the nymphs and wet flies. Isolate the used flies by tossing them in a shoe box or bowl. Take a close look at each one. Are the hooks rusty? Are the points broken or dulled beyond repair? Wastebasket. Are the thread heads coming apart? If you tie, put a few turns of 8/0 thread on the, trim the tags and lacquer the heads. You don’t tie? Wastebasket. Put the remaining flies back in their fly box, promise yourself you’ll reorganize the box, then make a list of what you need to replace.
You can repeat the same process with your dry flies and then there’s one extra step. Dry flies get more mangled than nymphs; the hackle gets smashed and the wing gets crushed. Take the salvageable flies to the kitchen. Start some water in the tea kettle and then go get your hemostat or needle nose pliers. Once the steam is rolling, pick up each fly individually and hold it in the column of steam for just a second. The steam will return the hackle and wing to their original shape and make the fly look like new. You’ll be amazed. Drop these flies in the shoe box or bowl until they’re dry. Put these flies back in their fly box – promise to reorganize the box and make a list of replacements. Now pour yourself a cup of tea and pat yourself on the back, Put your feet up.
