Although in many ways I am back home, being now just a few hours from where I grew up and fishing streams that look like those of my childhood, nothing really feels familiar. I fished small midwestern streams with worm and bobber then and rarely caught anything other than small sunfish and creek chubs. Approaching my new and current "homewaters" with a fly rod in hand and an eye out for carp and smallmouth bass is as new as can be. I've traded plenty of back cast room and a ten weight rod for tight quarters and a four weight.
New is humbling, but new is fun. I haven't yet figured out why one spot gives up multiple fish and another produces nothing, and I may never figure this out. But I've been playing the odds with enough success to keep me coming back.
Thursday I fished thirty minutes at lunch time and got nothing, then went back that evening, to the same location, and watched as smallmouth bass and rock bass pushed wakes in an effort to eat my flies.
On Sunday I badly needed to clear my head of something, so I spent several hours stalking carp. Jim Harrison once said something to the effect that few of us shoot ourselves during an evening hatch. An afternoon slurp turns out to be equally effective medicine. I highly recommend it. Many carp refused my flies, but one did not and I am a happy camper.
Sorry old chap, this is all very nice I suppose, but I much prefer pictures with chubby little hands in them. Gives a chap better scale and context, what.
ReplyDelete[These are shots are f-ing stunning, by the way]
Nice post & welcome home, Andrew. Email me if you want to fish. However, a potential 3-inches of rain might throw a wrench in things.
ReplyDeleteLike the new perspective. Even if it doesn't include chubby little hands.
ReplyDelete