Big-Ugly: Could It Be A Brook Trout?

This guy nailed the #2 brown/yellow bugger right at sunset. I didn't catch a fish after that. There were a few follows, and I gave it up at midnight.

The moon is pretty close to full and I've noticed over the years that I run into fewer frogs, mice, and other prey species and notice that raccoons, skunks, mink, fishers, fox, and coyotes are more active. Coyotes were howlin' tonight.

It seems to be a pattern that when the moon is "new" that I hook a really big fish--the woods are also alive with mice, voles, etc.


Anyway, this is a personal best this year for a brookie. They seem to be increasing on this particular river and getting bigger as well--perhaps that monster I'm searching for with be a brook trout?

Flies for Big-Ugly

The first fly is the Moorish Mouse. This is based on a pattern I found at the MN Fly Angler and they use a pretty stiff elk hair which is very durable and floats well. The problem with that material is that it makes it harder to tie a larger fly. I use plain old deer hair and spin it on the hook like a bass bug. The top is good ole fly foam: a dense, closed cell material that floats well and won't water log. The tail is a brown rabbit strip sliced thin with an Exacto. Do not use the rabbit strip as it comes out of the package. It is too wide and it will water log and unbalance the fly. Strip all of the hair from the hide save for the very end of the strip. I highly recommend using kevlar thread for this fly especially if you are using the tougher elk hair. I use a #4 tiemco nymph hook. Fish this fly with a slow steady strip. Pause and repeat. Listen.

The second fly is the cone-headed crystal bugger. They twist is I also use translucent, black metal flake rubber legs. The cone is tungsten. Tie this in #2s or bigger.

The third fly is my go-to smallmouth fly. Another cone-head bugger. This one I use canary yellow marabou with a medium brown marabou (not dark). I use copper crystal flash in the tail and medium (size) brown chenille and a grizzly saddle. For durability I wind the saddle with copper wire simultaneously and that way I don't trap hackles underneath the wire. I tie this mostly in 4s and 2s. Lastly, I expoxy (5 minute) the cone-heads for durability. The third fly is responsible for the fish next to it.

When it comes to fishing the streamers, fish fast: two three casts tops at each likely spot. If a fish is present and in the mood he will likely grab it on the first or second cast. A downstream retrieve is better than the classic down-across-swing. Also, in spots where I know a big fish is present I will change flies--usually to the black--to see if I can trigger the fish. I use the mouse at night. Moon phases are important. There seems to be a lot of prey activity during the new moon. Consequently, I get the most action on new moon. Yes, it's really dark. Just get out there and deal. Also, it helps the scout a spot first. It also helps to know that a big fish is present before venturing out with the mouse.

The Search For Big-Ugly

Time is very limited. I have to go back to teaching on the 7th and that will basically be that, aside from the odd Saturday--though not likely. Teaching can be depressing. Yes, there is summer, but then there is 10 months of papers, planning, red tape, NCLB, parents, administrators, professional development (to give administrators a reason to exist), gangs, guns, jackasses, knives, drugs, fights, murders, and a twenty minute lunch break. There are the moments of learning--the break-throughs. Those moments are magical.

But, the fishing. The past three nights have been spent on the two very un-secret Wisconsin rivers close to the Twin Cities. I took tonight off because I've been wet wading for three days and I wanna let my feet dry--sometimes the toenails get a little waterlogged and loose. There have been successes. Some pretty big successes. I haven't measured any of the fish caught but they were respectable, 18'' or 19''--maybe a little larger. I dunno. I'm a poor guess. But, they were brown trout and that means something.

My first really nice fish came from the Yellowstone river below the lake in the park. It was a cutthroat of 20'' which is rare because these fish live mostly on bugs and they seem to top out at 18''. I caught the fish on a size 16 Adams. I was fifteen years old. I was ecstatic. In the photo I am wearing old (probably Hodgeman) waders and white leather tennis shoes for wading boots. I didn't have the money at the time for both. The first big rainbow I caught was a steelhead from the Brule in Wisconsin that measured 25''. I caught a 28'' the next day. Both fish came on a orange glo-bug drifted using the old mono and fly rod method. The first big brown came from the Rush River. It was an even 20''. That was a big day. I knew how hard it was to hook and land such a fish. I was a senior in high school. Oddly enough, I caught it on a size twenty hares ear nymph--my induction to the 20/20 club. In those days, the Rush was warmer, and it was hard to walk the stream bed near El Paso and not scrunch tons of crayfish. There were sculpins and dace and chubs everywhere. There weren't many trout then. Most fish were stocked and there seemed to be really big fish, often plainly visible. The Rush still has big fish. Though falling stream temps have resulted in wild fish and more fish. My largest brown ever came on a chartreuse Clouser minnow swung through a shady yet shallow riffle mid-afternoon. It measured 27 inches.

Out west the rivers and the mountains seem to overshadow the fish, or the rumors of big fish. Maybe it is because if you put your time in on the Yellowstone between Livingston and Big Timber you will catch a huge fish. Big fish are an inevitability there. But, if you walk into the Yellowstone Angler in Livingston and look through their streamer collection you will see why: they have and fish huge flies--2, 1x, 2x. The sort of stuff some guys throw for pike and musky around here. There are some people who say that fly fishing and fly fisherman won't catch big fish. That is pure bullshit. It's tough to beat a big fly for big brown trout. I think per acre there are just as many huge fish in the Rush as there are in the Yellowstone, Madison, or Missouri. However, I think the difference is that in Montana a cadre of fly fishermen have developed that know how to fish them. They also have the luxury of fishing many miles of water by drift boat. Ones odds rise considerably when one can put their fly in front of many fish. The other thing is those methods are marketed readily to visiting anglers. Just look how long it took us to get around to fly fishing for Lake Superior steelhead. Many anglers said it just wasn't effective. "Gotta use mono or throw hardware." They were wrong.

Around here there is a mythology surrounding big brown trout. Since most people throw small flies they catch mostly smaller fish (though if you put any fly where a big brown lives appropriately he may eat it). In northern Wisconsin, rivers like the Brule, Namakagon, and White hold some truly enormous fish. I've been lucky to take a few from the Nam, and while I've experienced some success on the upper Brule and the Bibbon Marsh of the White I've never experienced the massive trout that are known to live there. On, both rivers, however, I've heard the toilet flushing-like sounds of big trout slurping Hex spinners in the dark. Some other time, perhaps. Be forewarned, the mosquitoes are horrible in both places.

The appeal in hunting large browns around here (Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan) is mostly the tradition: the image of someone like Dr. Albert Schweitzer (who fished northern Wisconsin) swinging a big Hornberg and catching eight pound browns (which he did) all in a late-evening scene that rivals any romantic, Albion inspired scene painted by Frederic Turner. But, also it is the secretive nature of the hunt. Rumor leads many demented anglers into the brush. However, electro-shocking surveys have made it a little easier. I know of a 29 inch brute living in a brush pile that I have been hunting for years--I'm gonna wait for the new moon and hurl a mouse pattern in there and see what happens. Rumor and secrets fit the landscape; our streams are small, brushy, claustrophobic. The some of the best seem to flow through dense coniferous forest in the north. Around here, a return to prairie grass seems to help narrow and increase flows while decreasing temperatures--not necessarily the best for growing big browns, but brook trout populations are exploding and they are the natives. Big brook trout hunting is even more secretive--the mythology of the lost beaver pond is another story.

So, I have two weeks then I'm back into the classroom with all of its glories and disasters. At least in the off-season there is First Avenue, 2-fer-1s at Lyle's, and a very understanding girlfriend.

What Big Browns Like: Obnoxious Flies

Again, headed for the creek at about 4:30pm and got there a little after 5pm. Just the six weight rod (really a 5wt, but loaded with a 6wt line) and the box of big flies (nothing else to tempt me away from chucking--like smaller, rising fish) and hiked and hiked pitching the fly at any woody debris, deep riffle-run, or preferably one of those deep green bend pools. This one came out of the bend pool on a brown bugger with a cone head and yellow rubber legs.

Note the kype. All of the larger fish have been big males and it may be that they are getting near the spawn and are feeling a little more fiesty.

This was another fish taken in low light, but not in the dark. I've been having trouble find fish in the dark. Part of the problem is that the rivers have changed so much and I haven't been scouting out the new spots before hand.

If You're Gonna Throw A Woolly Bugger, Throw A Big One

That is my advice tonight. Went out for the evening on the local river, six weight in hand and a box full of the #4 and #2 streamers, and just started chucking. This fish, of goodly length and girth hammered a big, black cone-headed bugger while hopping it back downstream through a really deep pool.

That was it.

I got a few follows, a slash or two, but nothing else, even after dark. It's too bad. It was a really perfect evening for huge brown trout. Cloudy, cool, flood waters receding.

I dunno.

The weirdest thing was on the last hole I kept getting buzzed by an owl. I took it as a sign and called it quits. I can deal with the bats, but a 12lb bird with talons that can crush my head? forget it.

Things That Go Bump In The Night...

Went out late tonight and fished the brookie creeks. Then I headed over to one of the big rivers and started chucking the same, tungsten cone-headed brown and yellow bugger I throw for smallmouth. The bigger browns like it too, especially in the dark. I suspect they are getting a little more territorial than usual with the oncoming fall. A good night.

Something Elegaic on the Country Churchyard

During my summers I drive many rural roads in Wisconsin, sometimes in Minnesota. But, I like Wisconsin. I like the 1930s farming practices, the diversifying of cropland, the hay ground, the contour tillage. I like the old "balloon" style houses. Houses that began as a box, cold as hell in the winter and then as the family grew, because the winters were cold and extra hands are good for farming, the house "ballooned" into extra sections. They are typically white or a pale yellow and have a porch and sometimes some modest woodworking in the corners under the eves, but not too much. Most of these houses were but by Swedish, Norwegian and German Lutherans. Some were built by German, Irish, and Bohemian Catholics too. Their houses tend to be a little bigger and a little more extravagant. Some of these houses are in good use and repair, some are not. Some stand utterly abandoned next to a prefabricated house or a double-wide. There are others that stand far from the road, wading in corn, without windows, monuments to what no one can remember.

Churches abound in the rural landscape. They are all over the city too, and the suburbs. But, the latter is a new sort of church. They more closely resemble stadiums or massive cineplexes and I get the feeling that one goes to these places for a show. Many of these churches, and I have been to a few, measure your faith in dollars donated. When I was younger, I attended a tiny Catholic church in Rosemount, Minnesota. I recall the music, the ostentation of the surroundings, and the priest asking only for a prayerful heart and offering only solace in Christ. I didn't really believe in it, but I understood it. I should state now that I don't believe in the Resurrection, but it does make more sense to me than today's Republican Party. As with the now demolished St. Joseph's Catholic Church of my youth, the rural church is generally the main-line church--Catholic, Anglican, Lutheran. I suspect that most are poorly attended since populations in these areas are more often than not dwindling. But, on Sunday mornings when people are heading to church and I am heading to the trout stream (we all have our church and the Apostles were fisherman weren't they?) I see the old people mostly and some younger folks and very young folks walking through the churchyard (graveyard to us city people) to access the entrance to the church. I find this very interesting.

I've been thinking about this for sometime. My grandmother died back in June. When we buried her it was not immediately outside the gorgeously aging Catholic church in Saint Paul, it was in some sprawling suburban "cemetery" (we don't like to say "graveyard" anymore because that implies death) that seemed to have more in common with a high fee, early tee-time golf course. It was immaculate. It was almost too pretty to mar by digging a hole and plopping a body into it. I don't think anyone visits here aside from a handful of the tragically lonely. As Frost says, "What is it men are shrinking from?" Yes, this is a massive misinterpretation but it works in this context. And, I think Frost's sharp farmer's mind would get my meaning. Anyway, we seem to be minimizing things: just as we put the old people in the old folk's home we put the dead people in the "cemetery" away from everything else, including the church. I think we have gotten to the point that when it comes to faith we don't want to be reminded of our mortality. Well, we are reaching for Heaven, aren't we?

I admit, I have a thing for Rick Steves' Europe Through The Backdoor. All the episodes are loaded up on Hulu and I sometimes watch the versions set in England and Ireland, and the Mediterranean episodes for obvious reasons in the winter. Last December, just before Christmas I watched the "Christmas Special" and was quite taken by the English children bouncing through the really, really ancient churchyard and all it's mossifying gravestones as though it were perfectly natural. Well, it should be. American children would likely be freaked out by the macabre scene, the church would be sued by "concerned" parents, so that years of therapy could be financed to help these poor deathless youths get the very visions of death and decay out of their drooling little brains. Did I mention that I am a teacher? Regardless, we have taken to heart, whether we know it or not, the materialistic city poet Frank O'Hara's line to it's most extreme, "No more dying." Such thinking, after all, has given us Joan Rivers.

I think this is one more thing that is dying (I'm using this word in all seriousness). The churchyard. That connection to our past, loved ones, and for those that believe, our faith. It's a trinity of sorts and the connection is that we will all be united again (hopefully) when we do rise from the grave on Judgement Day (that's the way it supposedly happens, check Revelations, we don't die and go immediately up or down like some like to believe. We Rest In Peace first.) and meet our maker, to use a horribly cliched phrase. Forgive me.

Alas, to bed. There is fishing in the morning. I know no matter how big the brookies I catch are it is as Thomas Gray writes, "The paths of glory lead but to the grave."

Clear Water?

This is the sort of creek that is clear. You gotta go way up to the tiny tribs to find some fishable water in Western Wisconsin. Today the Rush was a mess, as was the Trimbelle. I saw a fisherman on the Kinni above river falls and the water level looked good (I was going about 60mph when I looked) and I can't vouch for clarity.

I caught fish--though appropriately sized for this size of a creek.

No More Toursim, Just Brook Trout

I'm becoming that guy. You know the one. The one that takes photos of fish just to get his left hand and perhaps a little wrist in the picture.

Well, anyway, after the puzzling experience of no trout fishing while on the freaking North Shore (though I did venture north with my lovely girlfriend so it was worth it) I awoke with the urge to get it done over in Western Wisconsin. The downside? It rained six goddamned inches two nights before and then another three inches on Thursday night.

Western Wisconsin was swallowed by the Mississippi Monster.

Seriously.

Portions of the Rush were closed. The Kinni actually drowned and was found floating face down near La Crosse.

But, I had a hunch that one of the teeny weeny brook trout streams with a short drainage would be clear and I could do my trout fishing desires justice. I had two streams in mind. One I know is absolutely impervious to flooding, but it gets completely eaten by prairie grass around the middle of July and doesn't get burped back up until October when the season is over anyway. The other floods but clears within hours. I chose the floodable creek in hopes that a slight stain wouldn't result in the usual pinball-like freak-out of 9000 brook trout ricocheting around the hole every time my whisper quiet 3wt line kisses the surface of the creek. Or, maybe I shouldn't fish at high noon when it's 98 degrees in August? Yes, I'm sometimes that guy too.

Well, I arrived at the creek. There was a stain. A lovely, chai-tea latte stain. I slipped on a little strike indicator since they weren't gonna go for the stimulator/dropper scenario and tied on a size 14 orange scud.

I caught more twelve inch brook trout than I have ever thought existed. Including a couple that were a bit bigger that a foot. The only downside was a few of these German brown trout got in the way of my greeting the natives. Funny thing. This creek is supposed to be exclusively brookie, but there is a theory that when the nearby Rush blows out like it has done several times this year browns get washed out into Lake Pepin and then wander up this creek which is not too far away. I've also had a pike follow my brook trout out from under a lunker structure. That's less distressing. Pike and brookies coexist naturally, natively.

It's funny. When I was in my late teens, early twenties I only wanted huge browns. I found them in the Rush using huge flies and fishing well into the night. I also found a skunk--that's another story. But, since then I've become more interested in brookies. I don't mind their small size--though bigger ones make it interesting.

The Naked Shore...

I'm not much of a tourist guy, but I did it all on Wednesday. I have to admit this is the first time in my life I have been on the Shore and not had a fly rod ready to go at all times. I'm 33 years old. Never happened before. I feel dirty.

Early Morning, Pig Farm Stretch of the Rush River

I found these on my computer. They were taken last year by a pretty good amateur photographer. I thought I would post them for view.

What We Should Be Listening To...Dawes

This is the last one of these for a while, I promise. Here is L.A. band Dawes at the Troubadour covering the Beatles-via-Joe Cocker, 'With a Little Help From My Friends."

I suspect their 'friends' off to side are members of Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zeroes. You gotta dig the Woodstocky, split screen shots of the stage. Enjoy.



Please excuse the kick drum on this one, blame the soundboard man, but here is some of their own material."Peace in the Valley" the final cut from their debut North Hills

What We Should Be Listening To...Justin Townes Earle

Yes, he is the son of Steve Earle and yes he is legit. I'm not going to write a whole lot about this guy. It's better to just let him sing. Here is 'Mama Said' from what I suppose will be on his forthcoming Harlem River Blues.



Here is the title track and video from 2009's Midnight at the Movies:




Lastly, here is JTE with a cover of Gram Parson's 'Song for You.'



I don't know about you but it is nice to see some music that is sincere and not ironic and snarky like much of everything produced by the hipster bands as of late.

What We Should Be Listening To...Jeffrey Foucault

Wisconsin, as of late has been producing some pretty nice trout, when it is not raining, which may come as a surprise to troutier parts of the country, like Montana or Pennsylvania. Surprisingly, it has also been producing a slew of country/folk singer-song writers. There are Peter Mulvey and Hayward Williams, but Jeffrey Foucault, originally of Whitewater, seems to me to be a couple levels above either of these talented gentlemen.

He put out his first album Miles From the Lightning in 2001. He has since put out two more solo records, Stripping Cane and Ghost Repeater. The former contains a song called 'Mayfly' which makes me wonder about Foucault's possible fly fishing pastime. But, it is the song 'Northbound 35' which caught my attention. Here it is (I think his resemblance to Brett Favre would have at one time brought him great fanfare in WI. Maybe that is why he now lives in Austin, Texas?)




Here is Foucault in his home venue in Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin:



Every time I listen to Foucault and then hear him speak, I wonder where that singing voice comes from. He has also done an album of John Prine covers called Shoot the Moon and an album of murder ballads with Mark Erelli called Seven Curses. Here is Foucault covering John Prine's 'Billy The Bum'

Rain, Rain Go Away...

According to the graygoatflyfishing.com, last night Western Wisconsin got six inches of rain. Some of the roads were washed out. Streams are chocolate and largely unfishable. On top of that it is 95 degrees today in Saint Paul and the dew point is 70 degrees.

I feel like getting Thai for dinner.

When is gets like this I go over to the corner coffee shop, take in THEIR air conditioning (so I don't run up expenses burning out my own window unit--I live on the top floor of a three story walk up and it's equally hot in the winter when everyone has their radiator wide open.

I've been re-reading the complete catalog of novels and novellas by Jim Harrison, at least the writings that contain copious amounts of trout fishing. Here's the list:

The English Major
True North
Returning to Earth
The Woman Lit By Fireflies
Julip
The Beast God Forgot to Invent
The Summer He Didn't Die
The Farmer's Daughter

If you are also a fan of food and drinking and carousing with women then he is a good author to read. He's filthy and funny. Though his settings and material seem to point to Hemingway, Harrison seems to have more in common with Faulkner, Welty, and Flannery O'Connor. Sense of place is important as it is with those Southern authors, but unlike Hemingway whose characters seem to have deeply hidden scars, the damage in the characters of Harrison's work is plainly evident and in fact the crux of his writing seems to be more about the effects of the scars on those close to key characters rather than the scars themselves. A good comparison would be to read Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises, Harrison's True North, and O'Connor's Wise Blood. All the books deal with characters damaged by WWI and WWII. But, the way those scars manifest themselves is quite different. Plus, two of the three texts deal beautifully with the healing powerss of fly fishing for trout.

There you have it. Go to the library and read. Then when the sun gets low go fishing!

Here is Jim Harrison as profiled by the PBS News Hour Last Year.

Or watch it here:

Fat Bronze Is Still To Be Found

Check out the large arachnid on the bottom right. I'm not sure if it's a wolf spider or a fishing spider--I think it is the latter. I nearly walked right into it.

I love this river but it has been running really high, and since I am on foot, it's been tough to reach the really good holding water at times and even cross back and forth to fish an entire stretch effectively. No, brutes thus far this year. Just some solid fish.

Where I've Been...

It's been a closterphobic summer. My 6'6'' fly rod has been getting most of the work. The years of focusing mostly on smallmouth have spoiled me and I don't like fishing with other anglers present, and when it comes to trout fishing near the cities it's hard to find a creek without a well worn trail along it--even on those so called quiet little streams.

Heat , Small Bugs, and Sight Fishing

I've been fishing mostly teeny tiny brookie creeks and getting small brook trout with the odd twelve incher near dark. Though, every once in a while one of these things (look left) turns up. I'm a snob. I much prefer the natives. But, a guy like this does put a bend in my short 3 weight.

That's what there is to report. That is what this summer has been like--beyond a series of family related disasters.

Though the rivers north of the cities that I fish for smallmouth have either been running perilously high and skeeter infested, or low and the big fish have dropped back to larger systems, and a few have been fished out. I mean this literally. The economy in the middle of Minnesota resembles the 1930's and people are hungry. People have turned to fishing and shining deer to get by. One creek that runs crystal clear and holds, held some enormous smallmouth now has well-worn trails along its banks and nightcrawler cartons and beer cans strewn along its length. The pools where smallies were clearly visible are largely vacant. It seems that fifty years of economic prosperity (and easy credit) had brought about big boats, trolling motors, and fish finders. And, if that didn't work the seafood section at the supermarket. These rivers were largely untouched, except by a few weirdos like me.

Trout streams with their fussy browns and high densities seem to survive. That and it has been so damn hot that people don't seem to want to don their breathable Sims waders and sweat it out on the stream. Seems, nay is... The Driftless is a planty, itchy place and the heat can be miserable.