The Northern California Fly Fishing Board

Hi,

Finally got to 100 days fishing in a calendar year.

Wednesday, 9 December 2009. 0645. The alarm goes off, the light comes on, my feet hit the floor, and recoil from the cold. My knees end up inches from my ears. The Weather Channel says it is 8 degrees Fahrenheit outside, but the light breeze coming under the motel room door seems colder than that. Still, I am supposed to meet my guide for a day of floating on a nearby river, pursuing the wary steelhead, in 75 minutes. I am NOT missing this day, that's for sure.


I pull on three layers of winter garb, drink the last of the[cold] coffee from my thermos from the night before, begin to wake up, and head out to the local grill for a quick breakfast. A quart of coffee and a sausage sandwich later, I am back in the motel room. The heat was on full all night, so it's pretty toasty up around the ceiling, but still frigid at floor level. There's not enough nap left on the rug to hide a size 18 pheasant tail nymph, and the floor under the "rug" is pretty clearly concrete, unless it's actually ice.


After performing my morning ablutions, I pack on three more layers, all either wool, down, or Polartech except the waterproof wading jacket on top. I check my boots and waders, which spent the night indoors with me, and off the floor. They aren't dry, but they aren't frozen either. Check for gloves, check for spare gloves, check for a heavy wool knit cap, a Polartech baseball cap, a spare polartech shirt, third set of gloves [I hate cold hands] in my boat bag; pull on a merino wool beanie, and my standard Tilley fishing hat, and I am ready to go. Good thing too, it's 0800, and I hear the truck hauling a drift boat outside. As I turn off the TV, the Weather folks allow as how it's up to 13 degrees already!!


A bit later, we are at the put in. The trees are covered with fog ice, and the river appears to be steaming - it ought to look that way - the air temperature is 22.3 degrees at rivers edge, and the water is at 44.1 degrees. The rods are still set up from yesterday, so Craig parks his rig, and we head down river, after pouring a few gallons of water onto the anchor rope to thaw it out enough to get it into a bucket of river water. That thaws it out enough that it will run through the pulleys and jam cleat, and Craig can anchor the boat, just in case we need to. The Guide Log is filled out, my steelhead card has the fishery recorded and we are ready.


A few minutes later, we break out into the sun, and the temperature feels a lot higher. We fish the first run for about fifteen minutes [bobicator and two nymphs] but no signs of life appear. Craig rows across the river, and we drift the next run down. The refrain of yesterday's litany returns: " Upstream mend... rod tip back downstream.... hands together for a hookset, there'll be plenty of time to mend.... FISH! FISH!! FISH!!!!" For once, I set the hook quickly and correctly [actually, my hands were already moving when the first cry of "Fish!" rang out. ]

A short struggle follows, but the fish is a half pounder, and no match for the 7 weight rod. She comes to the net quickly, a lovely little 14 inch wild rainbow/early returner. A quick admiring glance, and she is back in the water, swimming off.

It was an auspicious start to my 100th day of fly fishing in 2009.

continued to avoid the white page.

Continued...

The rest of the day was just about as good, except that I lost two adult steelhead after very brief hookups. The second was blamed on a slightly bent hook on the bottom fly, but the first was strictly operator error. We had been through a run twice and each time, at about the same place, the strike indicator indicated, and I struck hard, only to have it be bottom. The third time through, same place, same indication, lazy hookset, three big head shakes, and a gone fish. Arghh!!!!! "Big fish, huh??" said Craig. "You should have kept believing." and down the river we went.

It turned out to be a good day, all in all. I got some casting and fishing practice with my new 10' 8" switch rod, it actually warmed up to above freezing, unlike Monday and Tuesday, and I caught several fish, including both adults and half pounders. To be honest, a couple of the half pounders were more like quarter pounders, no cheese. The adults were about half and half wild vs. hatchery.








Once the sun dropped below the hills, the temperature dropped like a lead weight, the bite turned very slow, the ice had to be flushed from the rod guides every cast, and my shoulder complained about three full days of slinging four to six weighted objects on thirty feet of fly line at the end of a ten foot pole over and over and over.

And so, as the dusk turned to dark, I reeled up my line, swished the ice out of the guides for the 200th time, and sat back in the boat. It was back down to 22.1 degrees [F], I was warm, and my 100th day of flyfishing in 2009 drew to a close. I was one happy camper.
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It's been too long since we had a good Ed Kelleher report--thanks for posting, Ed.

Great report. Been ages since I've fished up there (Klamath?) and been ages since I put in 100 days in a season. I'm lucky to get 40 now.

Congrats on the nice fish and the century mark.

B-

Nice report Ed. How I yearn for 100 days.....maybe soon.

Thanks for all the kind words.

Just to keep me humble, the guide told me that between guiding and fishing, he puts in about 280-290 days a year on the water.

PSSSSSSSSS as the air goes out of my balloon......

Ed Kelleher wrote:
Thanks for all the kind words.

Just to keep me humble, the guide told me that between guiding and fishing, he puts in about 280-290 days a year on the water.

PSSSSSSSSS as the air goes out of my balloon......



But he probably only get about 35 days actual fishing....the rest of the time he'
s working. But that doesn't eliminate the fact that you still suck!

Yahoo Ed!!!!
Good on ya.....for sure!
.....lee s.

Niiiice report, Ed! Now I see what Gitt was bitching about. YOU took the time to write a nice narrative, while I was short and non-descriptive. Only can use the excuse that I was on a borrowed PC and didn't want to hog it.

Hope we cross paths again on the water.