The Best Fishing Trip I Never Went On

I consider myself a fortunate man. I'm blessed with a wonderfully understanding wife who does her very best to tolerate my obsession with bug chucking, three children who - at least in this early stage of their lives - both adore and respect their father, and a small but tight-knit circle of friends who share my passion for tight loops and an evening spinner fall. Within an easy drive of my home are myriad opportunities to cast a fly in warmwater, coldwater, or saltwater, and my career is such that I'm usually in position to take advantage of these opportunities whenever they arise. Again, I'm a lucky guy.

When I consider that I've been casting a fly, however poorly, for a little over thirty years ... well, I have to admit that the avalanche of memories brings a smile to my face. There are certainly far worse ways to spend the better part of three decades. I owe this and so much more to my father, who had the foresight to give me that first fly rod. I'm grateful, and while I don't know that I could ever repay the debt I owe my dad, I do try to pay it forward whenever the opportunity presents itself.

To that end, I've taught any number of people to tie flies and cast a long rod. I've watched as these folks grow to appreciate that water as I do. In some ways, the small part I've played in the development of each of these anglers affords me the opportunity to live vicariously through their experiences. It feels good to see someone catch a fish on a fly I've taught them to tie, to throw seventy feet of line after a casting lesson, or read the water and locate a fish without any suggestions from me. I suppose it's a teacher thing. The carpenter or mason can step back from his or her work, and know that he or she has done a job well. Teachers can only look to their students, and hope the successes those students achieve might just have something to do with the teacher's tutelage. This brings us to Ben.

Ben and I have fished together quite a bit over the last three or four years. I've helped him clean up his cast, taught him how to tie some knots, and to wrap a hook with fur and feathers. In return, he's helped me rediscover my passion for steelhead, and to think creatively when sitting at the vise. Ben has an artist's eye; I do not.

In the time we've shared stream side, I've watched Ben come into his own as a bug chucker; I'm almost sad to say that he no longer needs my instruction.

That he no longer needs my help was obvious on a recent trip Ben took to Idaho with his uncles. Everyone caught fish, and they did so in some of the most beautiful places in this country. I wasn't able to tag along - although I was invited - but I did get to enjoy the trip vicariously through Ben's photographs and stories. Some of those moments, he's most graciously agreed to share on The Rusty Spinner. With luck, you'll be able to live Ben's vacation as I have. I should tell you that it's probably the best fishing trip I never went on.


The road in...

The Hairy Ass Stone Fly @ the tailout.

No unicorns but a lot of these guys.

The snow had ended...applying desiccant to a blue wing olive.



You should see this place rock on Movie Nite.

First morning...

...neighbors

...more neighbors

Quick Fix...all waders leak.

Please Dislike ...

Was hoping my all too few readers might do me a favor, go to YouTube via the link below, and dislike the video you'll see. Watch it and you'll understand why it is that I ask. The Salmon River in New York could be a top notch fishery if only chuckleheads like the one in the video respected the resource. In the words of Bartles and James, "Thank you for your support."

Suicide Run

Sometimes, we bug chuckers need to fish. We do not care if it's convenient. We do not care if our schedules or day-planners agree. Ultimately, we do not even care if the fishing is particularly good. We need to fish, and wetting a line is all that matters.

Such was the case yesterday. We knew the river was low, and had been low since the summer. We read the reports, and knew that few steelhead were coming to hand. We knew that gear-slinging chuckleheads would likely line both banks of every likely hole and run along the river's entire length. We knew that if we were measuring our success by counting fish in the net, we would likely leave the water both exhausted and disappointed. We didn't care. We needed to fish. Our suicide run began at 2:30 a.m. with the two and a half hour drive to the river, and ended twelve hours later when we drank our victory beer.   

We thank the river gods for bestowing upon us their benevolence and largesse.

There are few experiences a bug chucker may have that are quite as sweet as that first (or second, or third, or ...) steelhead of the season.

Eagle-ish-ous-ness

Via Fat Gut Fly Fishing ...

More Perfect

"When I was young, a teacher had forbidden me to say "more perfect" because she said if a thing is perfect it can't be more so. But by now I had seen enough of life to have regained my confidence in it." - Norman Maclean, in the NOVEL, A River Runs Through It



There's a certain air of expectation that precedes any fishing trip. For days, perhaps even weeks or months, we'll think about the possibilities. We tie flies through the early morning hours, and crawl - bleary eyed - into bed alongside disapproving, less-than-understanding spouses. We check and recheck our rods and reels, cleaning lines, lubricating drags, and waxing ferrules. We buy topographic maps, examine routes, form plans and back-up plans. We could be traveling 20 miles by car or 2,000 miles by plane, the anticipation we feel is the same; the difference is only a matter of degree.

Springing from the same place as our anticipation and hope, is the disappointment we feel when a trip falls through; for one reason or another, the river gods sometimes conspire against us, and rob of us those long anticipated moments. Such was the case this past weekend. I had thought to visit the Salmon River one last time before the real rush of king salmon - thousands of fish - dash upriver followed closely by ten sets of waders for every chinook's tail. Sadly, it just wasn't meant to be. The gods of water, fur and feathers conspired against me, and I spent Sunday afternoon mowing the lawn.

And maybe having missed a trip, having forever lost the promise of that moment, I've discovered a small part of the formula that makes our time on the water so precious. As much as anything else - as much as the rods and reels, flies and fish, rivers and lakes, mountains and meadows - fisherman need hope. We need the undiluted anticipation the precedes that first fish, that first cast, that first moment of revelation when we step into the river.

I think that hope may be the best part of any fishing trip. Hope gives us a reason to string up our rods, struggle into wading boots that are always just a bit too tight, stumble across the currents and the rocks, and set up in a run where we think there might, possibly be a fish. Hope is what keeps us coming back to that run when that fish does not necessarily follow the script. Hope is what makes every day we spend on the water just a little more perfect than the last.

R U Super Fly?

In fly fishing and fly tying circles, there are certain folks whose names have become synonymous with the quiet sport. These talented men and women have contributed to our piscatorial passions in such a way as to impact nearly every bug chucker who followed after them.

Lee Wulff, Carrie Stevens, Gary LaFontaine ... I could go on ad infinitum, and I'd be willing to bet you would know most every name I mention. In my time, I've been fortunate to meet some of the folks that continue to contribute to the lexicon of our sport. Of these, I've become friends with a select few. One such person is a young man whose emergence as a fly tyer of note has been nothing short of volcanic.

Pat Cohen and I have corresponded for well over a year. We've even had the good fortune to fish together on one of my favorite rivers. As you may know, Pat's work with deer hair is nothing short of extraordinary; he has an exceptional eye for color and proportion. What is most inspiring - or perhaps a better word may be, humbling - about Pat's work is the simple fact that he has only been tying for a short while.

Pat first picked up a bobbin just over two years ago, and already his work has been showcased on various bug chucking blogs (including my own), in the pages of fly fishing and tying magazines, and at The Fly Fishing Show in Somerset, New Jersey.

Most recently, Pat has taken his tying commercial. Some of Pat's most popular flies are now available through his website, R U SuperFly. Rest assured that while each of Pat's creations is suitable for framing, they're intended - each and every pattern listed - to be fished and fished hard. I've cast one of his deer hair mice for nearly an entire season, and the fly looks almost as good now as it did on the day he shared it with me.


Please take some time to check out SuperFly's site, and know that if you've a few dollars to spare they would be well spent on any of Cohen's bugs.

Feels Like The First Time

She probably weighed an honest 18 or 20 pounds, but I never brought the fish to hand so I guess I've the luxury of suggesting that she may have been heavier. Across the back, she was thick - at least as thick as my thigh, and I am 6' 3" tall and weigh in at 290 pounds. Her tail looked like a Geisha's fan as it danced through the air in wide circles above the shallow tailout of the pool. I remember thinking that fin would have been as wide as both my hands if I were to place them side by side with fingers spread.  I suspect she knew I was a rookie. At the very least, she took full advantage of the fact that I was a rookie. The first steelhead I ever hooked was likely the biggest steelhead I've ever hooked, and I never had her inside two rod lengths. 

What's amazing is that in the ten or twelve years between then and now, the memory hasn't dimmed or been otherwise distorted. Naturally, the details on the periphery of the moment have been blurred just a bit, but every heartbeat of my connection with that fish is crystal, as clear as a Montana spring creek. While I cannot imagine our connection lasted more than 20 heartbeats, it's hard to be sure. Time slows to a crawl when a steelhead takes a fly, the world moves frame by frame, and it's impossible to focus on anything but the fish.

I suppose it's safe to say that my too few readers might assume I've spent the past decade trying to recapture what I experienced in the fleeting moments of that first hookup. If I were reading this blog and not its author, I would probably think the same, but nothing could be further from the truth. Yes. Fishing steelhead does have a narcotic effect, but unlike cocaine, steelheading does not give up the ghost and leave an angler forever chasing that original high.

The thing about steelhead fishing - whether it's done with sucker spawn, classic speys, or even egg sacks I suppose - is that every time is new. Every time is original. Every time is exciting. Every time is unfiltered, undiluted adrenaline.

Every time a steelhead takes a fly is just like that first time. There's nothing else in the world quite like it. Steelhead never lose their appeal; they never fail to impress. There is little I would rather do than throw a line in the hopeful anticipation of that first hookup.

It was a long, hot summer. Thank God steelhead season is finally here.

   

Chronic Absenteeism

If you're one of the few followers of The Rusty Spinner then I owe you a most sincere apology. I have been going through something of a fallow season, one in which the words stay just out of reach. I average one or two such periods a year, but this sucker has been a real doozy. On top of my short attention span and general lack of creativity, I haven't had very much time to tie or fish. The collision of these two forces - writer's block and fishless, fly free weekends - results in my chronic absenteeism from the blog. Rest assured that I haven't forgotten my passion for fly fishing. Rest assured that I haven't forgotten my little corner of cyber space. I may chase some salmon and steelhead this weekend, and with any luck I'll bust out of the funk. Until then ...

Na-noo ... Na-noo ...

By the power of Greyskull ...

May the force be with you ...

A Face that Only a Mother ...

Or a bug-chucker ... could love ...

And in that monstrous aspect I see reflected a much more beautiful visage ... steelhead, following close behind the salmon, will soon arrive in numbers that inspire dreams and tremors alike.  

Too Much Like Work

There are those days when we need things to happen. If you've been a bug chucker for any length of time, you know exactly what I mean. We need everything in the universe to come together, and to do so with a minimum of fuss. The weather, fish, wading and casting must blend into a seamless harmony. Of course, if you've been a bug chucker for any length of time then you know that the river gods rarely see fit to grant us such moments. Far too often, the universe conspires against us. The wind is too strong. The hatch comes off late, or not at all. Our knots fail. Waders leak.

In these moments, we do what long rodders have always done. Faced with variables that exist outside of our ability to predict or control - we soldier on, and try to make magic happen in spite of the river gods. We clench our jaws, and push double-hauls into the wind. We run loaded rigs of split shot and heavy bead-head nymphs when all we really want to do is cast a delicate no-hackle dry to browns feeding on top. We leave the flats, fish off the shelf, and have little to show for our efforts other than sunburn and sea churned nausea welling in our guts. These are the moments when fly fishing starts to feel too much like work, and needless to say, fly fishing should never feel like work.

What do we do? How do we bug chuckers avoid the malaise that sometimes accompanies a fruitless day on the water? How do we turn the page on our frustration, and find satisfaction when fly fishing is ... well ... just a little less than satisfying? The answer - I suppose - lies in the periphery, along the edges of our poorly timed casts and slightly beyond the fish that is snubbing its nose at our poorly tied flies. We need to appreciate the small things, those little victories that can mean the difference between having a good day and sulking on the drive home.    

I'm suddenly reminded of my years working in a fly shop, and a gentleman that came into the store on one otherwise nondescript evening. He looked haggard, much more so than the legion of other bug chuckers who've been soundly throttled by the Battenkill. Sheepishly, he approached the sales counter; I noticed his hands were shaking, and he cleared his throat several times before speaking.

"Uhh ... is there a free clinic in town?"

"Pardon me? How can I help you sir?

"A clinic. Is there a clinic in town?"

With a grimace he turned his head to the side, and it was all I could do to stifle a laugh. There, in the cartilaginous flesh behind the man's ear - in that nebulous bit of space between the jaw and skull - was a #6 beadhead Prince Nymph. The fly was buried to the hilt, well past the barb, and would require the skilled hands of a physician to remove without further injury. Sure I could have done it, and had it been my ear I probably would have had at it while standing in the middle of the river, but I wasn't going to be responsible for this fella' needing a Miracle Ear the rest of his days. I pointed him in the right direction, and had my laugh once he was out of earshot.

And that's the one. That's the image I keep in mind whenever the day isn't going the way I'd like. No matter how badly the river treats me, no matter how poorly I perform (piscatorially ... I mean), I am not the Prince Nymph guy. My ear drum isn't impaled by half an inch of chemically sharpened steel, and I've never had to suffer the humiliation of asking another bug chucker for directions to nearby medical assistance (although I have come close).  This little nugget usually makes for a pretty good day when everything else seems a distraction.

When that one doesn't do the trick ... I just think about the upcoming steelhead season. Soon ... soon ...