Night fishing requires some sacrifice. High catch rates are exchanged for a couple fish large enough to fill out the net — a hopeful bargain. Visual excitement is traded for an adrenaline rush, sustained by roaming among the unseen. And sleeping hours are swapped for...
Backcast to this memory from two years ago. Camping, Dad, the boys, muddy water and big wild trout. ... Two hours of daylight left on the third day of Summer Camp 2015. Read: Â Muddy Meathead
Here's one from the Troutbitten archives, an on-the-water story with one of my favorite tips stuck in the middle. Take Five ... The lack of production today is killing me. I’ve looked forward to this trip for weeks: tying flies, scanning maps, reviewing old photos and...
There’s the fly box with a broken hinge. Half of the pin on the backside is missing, and I don’t know how that happened. I do know I’ll be standing in fast water someday; I’ll unfold the box, and the open leaf will fall off. I won’t even have a chance for a proper goodbye to the drowned flies and wasted hours — no, the days — of ordinary time spent focused on one square inch of space (that’s what fly tying is). So I’ll fix the hinge today. I could transfer all the flies to a new box, but that would probably take more time.
All the things. It’s what make us fishermen and not just guys who wet a line once in awhile. There’s a little bit of pleasure in these common chores and routines. It’s something we accept and then grow to love . . .
Halfway down the flat, on the fifty yard line and right where the players meet for a coin toss, a small unremarkable nymph tripped over a stone and then recovered. It danced deep into the belly of a bucket, home to the largest and baddest brown in the river, and then it paused . . .
Gonna let the pictures tell most of the story today. We've been enjoying the cooler weather in the last month or so, and the boys have been putting a twelve foot Tenkara rod to good use. My parents bought the rod for the boys' birthdays, and the length of the rod,...
So I was startled, but not surprised, when something heavy hit my legs in the dark around midnight. Fishing to the banks upstream while standing in the swift middle current, the hefty thump happened so fast that it was past me and downstream before I could move. That was too soft to be a log, I thought.
I flipped on my headlamp and looked downstream to see a porcupine returning my wide-eyed gaze. His head turned, and he glared back, as if the hit-and-run was somehow my fault. I almost expected him to flash a middle finger, but I guess he needed both paws for swimming . . .
You can't stand up to the night until you understand what's hiding in its shadows.  -- Charles De Lint Last June I made a commitment. I promised myself that I would go deep into the night game and learn to catch the wildest trout in the darkest hours. Having spent a...
Not many fish allow you to break off a fly on the hookset while they still take another fly just five minutes and three drifts later. It takes a special kind of stupid for that to happen.
Pat spread the mustard lightly this time. And the joy of all children, April fishermen, spinnies and hobbyists was firmly hooked.
And then . . . the line . . . broke. Silence filled the valley when echoes of his exasperation finished the chorus.
The fisherman’s hands were wet and shaking as he doubled over. He surrendered to the surface fog and knelt from the heavy punch to his gut.
. . . Things started to happen. I moved two really nice trout — the kind of fish that makes you yell four-letter words as the opportunity vanishes — and I picked up a couple average sized browns. I went over to visit with Dad, and I plopped a few casts next to the bank across from him. He was at the top of the river-left side of the island. I walked across to the far side and waded through the high water by myself, into position to fish a place that’s a little special to the Troutbitten guys. I moved a small fish, then chucked the next cast as close to the water-logged tree stump as I dared.  Strip … drift … strip, strip … drift … strip … BAM!
Momentum carried him to the top of the brown water, and I saw the fish I’ve been waiting for. He swam hard to the tree stump, but with strong 2X I changed his mind. These are the moments fishermen live for. It was the culmination of a new streamer pattern, a new rig that Burke showed me, and relentless hope against forceful, muddy water . . .