Thursday, July 28, 2011

Big Water And The Wise Old Bull

After a few hours on small water we decided to end our day on the Escanaba River.  Tim Schultz of Madness and Magic was familiar with the river and knew the ins and outs of where to access and what we'd find.

The Escanaba River is certainly big water with quite a population of rainbow and brown trout.  The slow even current made for interesting fly fishing. 


Our night was similar to the old, and somewhat crass, joke of the wise old bull and the young bull standing at the top of the hill looking down at a field full of lady cows.  If you don't know the joke then Google it for a chuckle with a lesson to learn as well.
 

The wise old bull in this story is James since he spent his night quietly standing in one spot surrounded by rising trout and took the couple hours before dark going fly by fly through his fly boxes until he figured out which ones that would work.



The young bulls, being Adam, Tim, and I, spent those same hours wading hundreds of feet up river and more or less chased rise forms here and there with very limited success.

Though we each caught a few fish we certainly didn't have the same experience as our wise and older friend James who staked out a spot on the river and let the trout find him. 


The night ended with a tremendous spinner fall of mayflies that we didn't connect with like we should have and as we walked back to the truck scratching our heads, we found James standing in the river elated with his good fortune and still catching fish in the dark.  On hex flies of course. 

The hour drive back to Voelker's Pond gave James more than enough time to excitedly recount his night and show off a steady stream of photos on his digital camera as well.

Thanks James.  We all learned a lesson that night from our wise old bull.   

1 comment:

amazingwoody said...

Ah James. You make me heart feel good!
Woody