But I don’t wear a watch.
This wonder of technology looks at the past 30 hours worth of data it collects on temperature and barometric pressure , it predicts the best time to go get your line wet. If you feel the need you can find more info here from Oh Gizmo.
With advances in leaders, lines, waders, and rods in the past 15 years I think I have enough technology on my body every time I set foot in the water, and while I know this isn’t geared towards flycasters, I know some folks will try and add yet another tool to help them catch one or two more fish every outing.
I have been thinking a lot about some of Steve Schmidt’s thoughts on how technology has had a terrible affect on our fisheries and made the modern fly angler into the equivalent of a highly trained sniper tasked with getting in, hitting as many targets as possible, and getting out unseen. While I still haven’t come around to the thoughts Steve has on fluorocarbon, I think he is a great voice in the community, and I hope more folks begin to listen to those harkening back to Thoreau’s great words: “Simplify, simplify, simplify”.
I have grown a lot as an angler over the past few years. When I started it was about catching a fish. Then I moved onto catching more fish. Now I am purely obsessed with just the act of fly fishing itself. I love catching fish, but I love becoming a better angler much more than having a 20 fish day and would much rather have had an epiphany on the water than brag to my friends about the huge numbers fish I bagged that day.
Granted, I will always brag about any big fish I caught.
October 24th, 2007
While a lot of fly anglers in the United States are packing up their trout rods for the year and promising to fill their boxes over the winter while dreaming about rising fish, we here in Oklahoma look forward to the opening of our winter trout fisheries. I have only fished for trout in 4 out of a possible 9 in Oklahoma. My wife and I were discussing the upcoming trout season and she mentioned that it would be interesting to catch fish on each of our state’s trout waters.
I don’t think I am out of the norm when I say that fishing for stockers, while always fun, is never quite as rewarding and perhaps true to the spirit of fly fishing. Of course my wife, being the perfect match for me, retorts saying that I could learn a lot and get to see a lot of different water. She is right, why did I marry such a smart woman? The fact is I don’t have much choice than to catch stockers here in Oklahoma if I want to ply the craft. When I have trout fished this year most of the time has been spent on our 2 year round trout fisheries the Lower Illinois and the Lower Mountain Fork. Both of this places have wild rainbows in small but encouraging numbers, but the big difference with our year round fisheries is that they have brown trout. Although they are stocked in less numbers, brown trout - be they stocked or not - aren’t found nearly as much as rainbows in Oklahoma. While it is not my favorite conclusion, the fact is I need to fish when I can and not bemoan the fact that I am catching torn up stockers that are used to eating pellets. Catching lots of fish is always a distinct possibility on either of these waters and I often do, but some of those pellet smashers always grow up into 20+ rainbows that can refuse a good drift just as well as any wild rainbow.
With my conscience cleared it is time to start planning for the season and figure out when I will make it to each of our nine waters knowing that at least two may need return visits. I am a little concerned about fishing for rainbows in the five stocked ponds/lakes we have. Last year we took our proud little girls, vests and all, out to fish the stocked pond here in Oklahoma City. My friend thought it was stupid to go and I can’t say I didn’t think twice about going, but it was for the kids. When we get there, there’s about a 30MPH wind and people are lined lawn chair to lawn chair casting PowerBait Eggs weighed down with a huge amount of lead about 75+feet. Needless to say this is not my element. I suppose the right course of action is to buy a sinking line. I needed one for my 6 weight anyway and its time I to break down and buy another spool and line. I hope I don’t have to resort to asking to dip my bugger in theeEgg juice of a guy who has a full stringer of fish. All of this seems doable, especially if hit multiple places in a weekend.
At the same time as all of this Okie fishing, I need to make it out out of the state some and hit my most favorite piece of water, the North Fork of the White River. This is perhaps the most rural place I have ever been, and the fishing can be tough. It is the nearest full-on wild fishery and a unique gem that has very little traffic during the peak fishing times. Also I keep getting bugged about not fishing the Beaver tailwaters in NW Arkansas, and I should probably go and hit the pay for play area in NW Arkansas that is thick with hogs. I am kind of mixed on the idea of going to a managed fishery where I have to pay $100.00 to fish. Yes I am going to catch probably my biggest trout to date, but there are always rumors about places, and I suppose rather than pummeling the very nice people there with emails about their practices I should just go fish the place and form my own opinion. There are lots of other places I could venture if I draw a 14 hour circle around Oklahoma City. My mind races with the possibilities and in the spring, in addition to going to ID to learn to throw a spey rod with my wife, I hope to do something very unique in the closest reaches of the west.
October 21st, 2007
I ended up getting 4 or 5 hours on the water this morning during a family visit. I was ill prepared for chasing warm water species in late October, but I was able to catch my first smallmouth. I am not a very astute warm water fisherman, at least in a river type environment, but I gave the smallmouth on Pennington Creek near Tishomingo, OK a try to see what all the fuss was about. I had hoped to try another nearby creek, but I was unsure of where the public access points are, and Pennington is well known for its smallmouth fishing (granted not many people will tell you where). I was happy with my choice of entry points as it is a beautiful area, but it was one of those days that, when driving away, I knew I missed out on some better fishing.
As I said I am not an astute moving warm water guy so when I stepped into the river I looked upstream and downstream. Upstream I see a riffle. I don’t know what I was thinking, but instead of heading downstream towards the slower moving 2ft deep water, I go to where a trout would be. Did I mention this was warm water and this is known as a smallmouth haunt? There wasn’t too much water to fish upstream, but the scenery was killer. Here is where a nice (well not nice from my fishing camera) picture of a waterfall should be. Instead of carrying a bulky DSLR on the water, at least water I have never fished, I opt for an old digital Elph that refuses to die. However, because I only use it on the water I rarely charge it. It’s generally a trooper, but this time the juice just wasn’t there.
I usually don’t like not having a camera, but i have a bit of a problem where if I bring the nice camera with me I never catch anything worth shooting. Knowing I didn’t have a camera at all meant I was sure to catch my first smallmouth. I made my way through lots of very skinny water to a large pool typical of large natural Oklahoma creeks and rivers in the south east part of the state, a 5 ft waterfall leading into a nice 2-3ft deep 25ftx25ft pool. I tossed my half-assed crayfish patterns and got a nice take, but I was unable to land it. After I lost my poorly tied crayfish pattern, I moved to a cone head bugger. A few casts later I was into a nice 2LB smallmouth which left me grinning ear to ear. I tried in vain to catch another, but only redear could be found. The fact that a 4” redear can take down a number 6 cone head bugger still amazes me. I figure only one nice sized fish could stake up residence in this pool so I moved up above the falls to a huge, endless, slow moving section of the “creek”. I don’t see why Pennington isn’t called a river, but I will look up the geographical semantics later. This particular stretch was at least 150ft across and it was nice to not have roll cast any more. I got in some casting practice and while it was too cold for top water smallmouth I wanted to see how I could toss a bass plug in the wind. With my time growing short I made my way back downstream trying again at the same small holes I fished on the way up, but only for 5 or 6 casts.
I really hate getting skunked, but when I try new things I am not too worried about it as long as I learn something. I finally know why people always talk up smallmouth. I thought I was into a much bigger fish and loved playing the fish more than any large mouth I have ever caught maybe twice the size of the fish I caught. The second thing I learned, unintended, is to think more about basics of what species I am fishing for before deciding which way to go. I am not really sure why I went upstream instead of down, but as I drove off I looked downstream and wished I had more time to spend fishing for smallmouth. I love trout fishing. I love the technicality of drifting and the overall art of trout fishing, but I there is something to this smallmouth thing that I really can see loving. I will be back to Pennington in the summer to confirm my suspicions.
While everyone in the Northern reaches bemoans the closing of trout season we here in Oklahoma welcome the opening of our winter trout fisheries in a week and a half.
October 20th, 2007
I had planned to head out and do my normal routine of fishing till noon on weekends. I planned to get in a good session this morning, but unfortunately when the alarm went off I turned it off.
I have never really been a morning person, anyone who knows me can attest to that. I like to stay up until 2 or 3 and sometimes 6 programming. Generally no matter how late I stay up, barring the occasional all nighter, I will always get up to fish. I had been pushing my self pretty hard this week at the office and at home on the computer so I needed a morning to sleep in. Granted in my house hold with my two girls its impossible to sleep past 8:30, but at least I got in more sleep than I have this past week. Despite having my daughters birthday in the afternoon if I could even get 2 or 3 hours on the water I would be happy as it would give me some time to think about tofish and work on my long distance roll casting. I would love to go to my normal spot, but the fishing there has been slow the last two times I went. I kind of got in a groove of always going there, but my last time there I found this:
I thought about returning to my normal spot and I have a pretty good entrance point that is maybe two hundred yards from my favorite carp flat (and through a barbed wire fence). I have never seen deer around my fishing spot, but I suppose I shouldn’t chance anything since the fishing has been slow my last 2 trips there. I just hope all those bow hunters don’t decide to tag some carp when the deer hunting is slow.
I thought today about what I need to work on and what sort of fishing I should do, and decided to challenge my self a little. There is a pretty good spot behind a dam on a local lake that has some nice flow. Hopefully a nice report will come back and add to the lore being developed by others who are redefining the sport. This flow was pretty tough to fish in the summer because unlike the last few years we finally got some good rain in Oklahoma . It looks like it has finally leveled off according to the data tofish has been collecting. I have spooked some nice sized carp in this outflow and I have caught some small large mouth so hopefully the new arsenal of flies and ideas will pay off.
October 13th, 2007
This summer was a pretty good one for me as I was able to get out more than ever and work on my casting accuracy as well as my presentation from 30 feet and beyond. I still have a long way to go, but setting a few goals at the beginning of the summer has brought me to the point where I am always fishing with an agenda. I don’t mean to sound like fishing isn’t fun or that I am trying to prove something, but every time I pick up a rod now I have firm goals that I want to accomplish.
Last Friday I decided it was the time for trout with my kids leaving for the night to stay with in-laws. I begged the wife to come, but alas she wanted to get some sleep after a long week. So I called my mother and told her I was heading to her cabin in the morning and to be ready to go at 7AM. I am lucky to have parents that have a place within spitting distance of one of our two year round trout streams in Oklahoma. Even if I am not going to stay the night I will drive for 2 hours and pick up my mom as I love fishing with her and love help putting her on fish.
Mom catching a trout on a fly was first on the agenda. She has caught some fish on a fly, even a Fresh Water Drum, but for some reason the trout had escaped her olive bugger. The outing previous to this one she had some bites, but was really getting the feel for nymphing and wasn’t able to put it all together. This weekend she did great. She got her drifts just right and while she can’t cast to the runs from 40 feet away like I tend to do she can work her way up to a good run and fish it pretty well now. The result was several missed fish, a few that got off, and finally her first trout on a fly:
I can’t wait until I make it out there in a few weeks. I think she might start to catch as many fish as I do on the Lower Illinois. I love the section of river we were fishing and it is easy for my mom to get around on without much fuss or difficult wading. The one thing that she doesn’t like is the immense amount of these beasts in the water:
You have to watch where you step in this section of the river or you might find yourself slipping on a 40”+ long nose gar. Unfortunately fishing for the gar hasn’t been the agenda as the biggest stick I have is a 6wt. That and I really want to have a waterproof Optio so I get some of those swanky underwater shots all the cool kids post these days. I plan to target the gar very soon and will report back with the results, but until then I need to decide if I can going to go with rope flies or not. On each of my last two trips I have hooked a gar with a nymph. My precious 4wt bends hard and the line starts to zip out giving my trigger finger a bit of line burn. The first time I got about a one minute fight out of the fish and I saw its huge spotted tail break surface a few times. It was a pretty big fish, but I am not an IGFA guy so landing a long nose gar that weighed 10+ pounds on 6x tippet isn’t really a skill I have down. This last outing I got the familiar short fight, but this time the gar was nice enough to give me back my fly. Of course I didn’t check my rig at all before casting again and I promptly broke off what must have been the largest rainbow I had hooked on the Lower Illinois.
Since I had gotten my most important agenda item off the list, getting my mom on a trout, I was able to really focus in on my personal goals for the trip. I recently read Active Nymphing by Rich Ostoff and have been trying to take a few things from the book to the water every time I fish (thanks to The Tennesee Valley Angler for mentioning this great book). While I am not employing Ostoff’s techniques on every cast I am branching out from my standard flies and dead drifting techniques. I have a go-to nymph I have been using this past year that has been a great producer on our Oklahoma tailwaters, but I went ahead tied up some of Ostoff’s Soft Hackle Woolly Worms and rigged it up per Osthoff’s suggestions. I began fishing spots a little bit differently trying to move the fly around rocks and objects both upstream and downstream. I still have a lot to learn about actually executing well on the water, but what I really got from the book more than anything is a different way of looking at the water and fishing it more effectively. Next time I go out I will be trying an even more Ostoff approach by going out on my own and really trying to cover 3+ miles of water in a day throwing a woolly worm in lots of interesting lies looking for big fish. I know there are some nice browns in the Lower Illinois and hopefully the hack and slash mentality Ostoff brings to fishing will serve me well.
Last on my agenda was to capture a picture of a wild rainbow in the Lower Illinois. I have never read anything about spawning in the Lower Illinois, but on the trip before this last one I am sure I caught a wild rainbow trout that was around 5” long. There is no hatchery on the river so we don’t have fish escaping and I have heard no fish with parr marks are released. It’s not unheard of for there to be spawning rainbows in Oklahoma, the wild trout in the Lower Mountain Fork are well known and I have lots of great pictures showing off their stunning colors. I wasn’t able to hook up with any young ones this trip to the Lower Illinois, but hopefully on my next trip I will find one hiding behind the same rock as I did a few weeks ago.
Fishing with an agenda isn’t about catching numbers of fish or even large fish. Going to the river with a plan in mind and trying to accomplish a few things such as improving your tuck cast, catching fish on a few different flies, or fishing some lies you wouldn’t normally try, and imparting a little action on the flies are great ways to improve your skills. This last summer I was able to set some concrete goals and while it will be some time before I reach my goals, I think I have become a much better fisherman. In the past I was always concerned about catching fish and I never really contemplated my attack on the water. It would have been a crappy day had I been skunked, but being able to go out, put my mom on a fish, and further my fishing abilities made this trip really rewarding.
October 8th, 2007