The weather two weekends ago was pretty amazing. It was about 60 degrees and there wasn’t much snow in sight. I wanted to get out and fish but I was afraid the water would be really off color and super high. I decided to head out to my favorite brook trout stream that I thought would clear the fastest of any nearby. I was right, the water was clear but not as clear as it has been. I have seen it so clear you might re-think what a clear gin might look like. I could still make out the blue spots on the side of brooks in the calm pools. Stealth is key on this stream but since there are fish pretty much everywhere it is almost impossible to walk up to the stream and not spook something. The best bet it to find the plunge pools or faster riffles and start as far back as you can. I thought nymphing would be my best bet so I didn’t even bring my custom 6’6” Lamiglass small stream rod. Besides, there were intermittent wind gusts that would really test my patience later. I had a 3wt loaded with my new Shark Skin line and a 6x 9' leader. I tied on 18” of 6x tippet and thought I would give a Royal Wulff a try. My first cast landed about 2 feet from the really rough water in a plunge pool and instantly the water erupted around it. Wow, it must have been a long winter for these little guys. I pulled in a nice 7 incher.
It was a little tricky getting used to the new line. All this shooting slickness and floating was a little strange after fishing with my 3 year old Mastery SA line with the first 3’ converted to and intermediate sink tip due to excessive use.
I fished a few more spots up stream and circled back to a spot I never really had any luck in. It looks really good but I never really hooked a lot of fish there.
I switched to a Parachute Adams #18 and got a hit right away. I ended up landing about 10 fish from that spot and a few nice sized 10” fish.
There was no consistent hatch but I did see quite a few fish feed on the surface over the course of the day. There were midges and something else bigger I didn’t get a look at but was likely a Baetis (Blue Winged Olive). Maybe even a size 16. Pretty big for March but it was 60 degrees outside which is pretty unlike March. Funny thing was, I never even had to switch to something specific on top to get strikes. I love brook trout. You know it’s a good day when you stop setting the hook on fish you think are too small. The wind finally got the best of me and I was struggling to even hit the stream when gusts would pick up. I took down my rod and headed up stream to a section I haven’t fished to scout it out for next time. There were a few cars parked and maybe three guys fishing up there. I hadn’t seen anyone besides hikers all day. I kept my distance and watched for a minute. The first guy I saw was launching perfect loops and seemed to be in compete control. I hope that is what I look like out there but doubt it. They guys walked back my way and one of them looked a lot like Andy from the graygoat.com. It was him, we talked for a minute. What a nice guy. I thanked him for updating conditions and providing such great info about Minnesota and Wisconsin fly fishing. Cheers Andy!
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