This Trout Looks Different?
WOW!
It has not rained for over a week. Here are some quickie summaries and questions.
-Are smallmouth bass really wannabe trout?
– Flows continue to come down, fishing is returning to the new normal for this year.
-Subsurface presentation is the game. Short lived caddis activity at dusk continues to be the best dry fly action, it is not happening stream wide. Congrats if you have found one of these locations. Other anglers are hoping you will post GPS coordinates here.
-Trico rumors are running rampant. They should begin to show up…….. Spider web inventories and early morning outings have shown no signs of my favorite mayfly. I am remaining hopeful(for now) that they will,,,,, in some form or fashion, emerge in respectable numbers this year and did not fall victim to High Water Hell 2014.
-I have begun a few weeks back to wet wade. The water temps are perfect and comfortable. Make sure you wear some poly pro long johns under your quick dry pants. You will be safer from the nettles and prickly ash. Beware Wild Parsnip Is Everywhere.
-Gnats have been driving anglers to drink, smoke, loose focus and prematurely end outings. Deet seems to have little affect on them and vanilla extract draws in a bunch of other investigative undesirable insects to sample the taste of your meat. Uvular and Ocular encounters with gnats have been the worst. Choking, hacking, hocking, spitting or rubbing, poking and pulling on ones eye lid does effect presentation of the fly.
-To those with rubber soled wading boots; The rocks have been slipperier than than normal. Is anyone else noticing this? Felt is a bit better right now. Either something is growing on the rocks or they are covered in fine slippery clay silt particles from the settling.
-Was just about attacked by a roving band of river otters this week. The 4 pups continued to swim circles around my anglers, curiously investigating, while Mom barked orders at them to get away. It was awesome! The pups would wrestle on shore and then flop back into the water and come and see what we were doing. Mom Otter was pissed because they were not listening. Kids!!!!!
17 users commented in " What’s Up? "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a TrackbackOn a sidenote, that’s a really nice net. What brand is it, or where did you get it?
Good eye!
The net is from the best, hands down, crafter of angling nets. LDH
Here is a story I wrote about one of Lloyd’s nets and the fish it landed
Hi Andy – thanks for the great reporting as usual. The presence of smallys on either the Rush or Kinni is disconcerting. I worry their foraging could put a lot of pressure on trout fry and displace trout from crucial lies. I believe any smallys caught should be kept and NOT released.
What’s your take on this issue?
Thanks – George
I am undecided. Warm water fish species have made there way up the cold water rivers of Pierce County since the beginning, Trout have done the same wandering into the warm water environs looking for forage as well. The rivers are connected but separate in their characters. No real harm has been documented on these rivers to my knowledge.
As warming of ground water and surface water continues, there is a grim forecast for our trout streams in general. This data has been documented by DNR and earth scientists, if we continue to follow recent trends. Human beings continue to think in the short term at the expense of our resources. I am not so sure that trend can be reversed before irreparable damage has been done. I am hopeful that the youth are seeing this problem with more clarity than our forefathers and can mitigate the effects.
That fish was released after an awesome battle on the 3 weight without thinking about it. I was not far from the Mississippi where the trout habitat on this river begins to become quite marginal at best. However, in the lower stretches of these cold water resources, mostly too warm at this time of year to support healthy populations of trout, “Walter” size trout can and do exist. Does this make sense George?
Goat sense???
I encountered those otters last sunday at one of our favorite Lower hole. they were relentless, and cute. kinda.
Some old timers may have tried to club them referring to them as “Trout Killers”. The Biologists are asking for folks to take trout from the Kinni saying there are too many. Rarely in 30 some years do I see them often. The wonders of that river are her gift. We can exist together.
Trout are looking up.
Andy, that’s one heckuva fine smallie for a 3wt man!! My sort of fishing..*grins*
Just got back from the local far north lake, “teeth” with coffee grinders. New personal best 54″ muskie. (NO…not on a fly, silly!;-))
That was one amazing critter. Doubt I’ll ever better it! She swims.
Nate took some smallies on a sink tip/floating fly that I’d tied for the trip as I managed the trolling motor. Best was an 18 incher. Fun!! I love smallies on the long-rod. Watching your kids fish is a hoot – for a little while…;-))
Jeremy
I saw the Photo on FB, what a sweet heart she had for the photo. Congrats!!!!!! Keep up the hunt, I know you will
Andy, I agree with your comments re: smallmouth foraging up in the trout streams. On the upper Mississippi, we commonly see bass up in the tributary streams, especially in the summer months in high water years. Being a warm water species, I doubt the bass are plentiful up in the cooler trout streams, unless , as you allude to, water temps are excessively warming. If that’s the case, the trout have a much bigger problem than predation by smallmouth. Thanks for your fun website and great essays.-john
Hey John
Good to hear from you up in the land of the Smally giants. Not sure what’s in the water but I enjoy getting up to your neck of the woods
for the gnat problem, the only thing I’ve found that works is to cut a strip from an old towel and run a line of absorbine jr on it. then turn up your collar and tie it around your neck. you don’t want that on your skin all day long.
Andy
Just wanted to say I liked your writing in this post so much I sent it to my daughter for her delectation. That she is not a fisherperson should indicate my feelings for the pleasure your writing affords, the pure richness of reference to fighting gnats one example.
A friend told me he’d been fishing in the Boundary Waters recently and for 3 days he wore his mosquito net without removing it once, lifting for each bite of the walleye he’d cooked for dinner.
Best, and my the bugs die and the tricos rise.
Bruce
Bruce
Nice! The bugs have been bad although last night, not so bad. Hope that is the new rule for the rest of the season
Steve
I bet that might do the trick. The JR, is some strong stuff.
You had me at ‘uvular’
Bill
I have always been intrigued by that little punching bag at the back of my throat. When touched by anything, there is mostly always some kind of outstanding response.
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