Some thoughts on experts

Simply radiant.

“When you are younger you waste a great deal of time figuring out whether you are good or not. Later on you know perfectly well, good or bad or indifferent, and the problem drifts away.” 
                           - Jim Harrison, in Valdene’s “For a Handful of Feathers” 


Once upon a time, there was a king who lived with his queen in the castle upon the hill. The villagers liked their king because he would regularly regale them with tales of adventure and derring-do. In fact, he rarely shut the fuck up. He was particularly fond of talking about his lovely queen, whom he loved very much. She never left the castle so the villagers never actually saw her but they knew from his stories that she was the most beautiful woman in all the land. It was said that the stars shone through her eyes and that the Sun grew jealous at the sight of her radiant golden hair. They also knew, from his stories, that the two of them enjoyed amazing and frequent sex. There was little doubt among the villagers that the King was the most virile of men, and the most skilled in the ways of love. 

One day, a lone peasant was walking the small stream that flowed through the wood when he caught a glimpse of two people locked in love’s embrace upon the streamside’s mossy bed. He at once recognized the King and then deduced that his lover must be the pulchritudinous queen herself. He watched as long as he felt it was safe, then quietly slinked away. 

The next morning, the peasant and his friend were fishing for trout in the stream.

“I saw the Queen yesterday,” said the peasant.

“Really?” said his peasant friend.

“Yep. The King and Queen were right here, alongside the stream,” said the peasant.

“Well, is she as beautiful as they say?” asked the peasant friend. 

“No. She’s not real. She’s a blow-up doll,” he replied.

“A blow-up doll!? The villagers think she is real! The King is a liar!!” screamed the peasant friend.

“Well, not exactly,” said the peasant.

“What do you mean?” asked the peasant friend.

“He thinks she’s real too," answered the peasant. 

* * * *

At that moment, a very large brown trout rose and both anglers saw it. The peasant made a beautiful back cast, which quickly hung up in the branches behind him. The trout bolted downstream, far out of sight. 

The two peasants roared with laughter, the way some peasants do.

Minutes

This blog sucks.  They rarely update it, and half the posts have nothing to do with fishing.

In an attempt to rectify this, the members of the TAC (The Angler's Culvert) board convened a meeting.  We report the minutes below.

Meeting was called to order when EJ poured his Highland Park.  TJ answered the phone, and poured Dickel.

EJ moved to begin with a discussion of Scotland.  TJ seconded the motion.

Scotland was declared desirable and all things good.  Matter was closed.

TJ moved to propose a kayak purchase.  EJ offered advice.  Twelve feet was declared the optimal length.  All in attendance agreed that buying second-hand is the way to go.  Motion passed.

A discussion of depression and its various manifestations ensued.  Depression was declared undesirable and complicated.  Motion passed.

A move was made to determine, once and for all, the best Scotch whisky.

Discussion was tabled when consensus could not be reached.

If you're trying to get her drunk so she'll sleep with you, but she's also your wife, is there really an ethical dilemma?  TAC Executive Council says "No".

You can never really understand another person's perspective.  Not really.  So the best you can do is to recognize this fact.  That will get you as close to understanding as is possible, which is to say, not terribly close.  Issue is tabled for Eternity.

Plans were made to conduct future board meetings in person.  Motion passed.

Thanks, Soulpatch, for some of the great photos.

The Pitiful and Completely Uninspiring Story of Carl Henry

It’s understandable that Carl Henry would resent his older brother John.  Or, I should say, did resent him because of course, John has passed and has been forever immortalized in song and folklore.  It’s not that Carl didn’t love John.  He did, with all his heart, and for most of his childhood Carl wanted nothing more than to one day be a steel driver himself – just like John. But it’s hard for anybody to be a steel driving man, and it’s particularly hard if you’re small of stature and born with  slightly asymmetrical arms.  It throws off your timing, I guess.

But Carl was a good fly tier.  His flies weren’t fancy, but that didn’t matter because folks in Carl’s town didn’t want fancy flies.  They just wanted flies that would get the job done.  But more importantly, Carl’s flies were clean and he could tie them quickly.  Carl could crank out ten dozen flies and they would all be identical. If you’re a pro, that’s nothing to scoff at, and he made a passable living that way.  But still, nobody would let him forget that he was John Henry’s little brother.  It’s not that they were trying to shame him.  It was nothing like that.  It’s just that this is how folks treat those close to celebrity, when the celebrity isn’t available.

And so, the irony of what transpired in the fall of that fateful year was hardly lost on Carl Henry.  Word spread that there was, as they called it, a “whip finish tool”.  To Carl, this sounded as absurd as an “itch scratching tool”.  Could anything do this better than one’s own fingers? But it was impossible to ignore the talk.  Folks in town, but even outside of town (surrounding towns, too), were talking about the whip finish tool, and some said the tool would allow even a rank amateur to finish a fly faster than a man using just his hands.  Carl doubted this, but the truth is, he didn’t care.  Carl cared about little.  But it was inevitable that sooner or later, somebody was going to suggest a contest, and this is exactly what happened.

At first, Carl begged off.  He hemmed and hawed but the townsfolk were relentless. What else was there to do on a Saturday night? And so the night came and there was food and music and drink. Carl arrived on time, and saw that he’d be competing against Enos Pratt, the kid who tied flies for old man Clark’s hardware store. Enos was a good tier- Carl was the one who taught him, after all.  Frankly, Carl didn’t care if he won or lost, at least not at first. 

But he got the drink in him. And he heard the whispers.  And by the time the gun fired and the tiers started, he did care.  But he didn’t care if he won or lost.  What he cared about was his own legacy, and he knew that if he couldn’t win this contest, he had only one alternative. No – even this wouldn’t do.  Winning wouldn’t be enough, because even his big brother John won, but it wasn’t his win that immortalized him. So Carl tied like he’d never tied before.  Sweat flew from Carl’s forehead, and he was at least six flies ahead of Enos Pratt, but still, he tied faster and faster.  Observers later said that Carl’s fingers moved so fast, they were just a blur of thread, feathers and, eventually, blood. The blood, as it turns out, was because in his haste, Carl had tossed a few whip finishes around his index finger.  

But nobody, not even Carl, paid it any mind at the time. In fact, only one thing was on Carl’s mind and he muttered under his breath as he tied “Oh Lawd, please take me now.  Please take me now.”  It was, of course, Carl’s intent to tie himself to death. His only wish was that, at the very moment, his heart would explode and he would collapse, still six flies ahead.

In the end, however, Enos Pratt did catch up and when the postman, who had been selected to stop the clock because he was the only sober person among them, finally rang the bell, Enos Pratt had tied one more fly than had Carl Henry.  And Carl Henry, much to his chagrin, was alive and well.

But not quite.  Because in his efforts to tie himself to death, he had chosen Kevlar tying thread, the strongest thread known.  And, as I said earlier, he had inadvertently tied several whip finishes around his index finger.  By the time Carl and the doctor realized what had happened, it was too late.  The finger turned gangrenous and within a month’s time, Carl was four fingered.  In the end, Carl could not tie flies with his hands…and could never master the whip finish tool.  He was dead three years later, found destitute and drunk in his shack.

This story has no moral, but it’s been clear to me for years that if I didn’t tell it, nobody would.

A Fan of Rhode Island

Dear English Jonny,

I installed another ceiling fan today.  This one is bigger, very nice looking, and is in the master bedroom.  When you flip on the switch on the wall for the light, which is part of the fan, the light does not come on. When you flip the switch that is for the fan, it does not move.  But the fan really does look nice up there, on the ceiling…as still as a rock.

(Also: the fan remains still, and the house does not spin around it.  So, there's a problem with the fan or with my wiring.)

(And also: I took down a perfectly functioning fan with light before I put up the non-functional one in its place. I had to disassemble the working fan to get it down.  So now I have a fully intact immovable fan on my ceiling, and on the floor I have the 37 parts of what was formerly a functioning fan.)

My day has been not entirely unlike a trip to Rhode Island.

TJ

Forgive Me Father

Fly fishing sucks you in to the point where you avoid, often without sentiment, the other methods of catching fish. You might not even feel schnide to the others: to whit, I recently got snarky with a guy who called the cops on kids chucking worms in a put-and-take TMA. I mean, think about that.

Fly fishing has consumed you and you understand it for all the right reasons, but there's been something niggling you since your so-called friends introduced you to salt water. It's the one aspect of fly fishing that's been slow burning all this time and is as inevitable as the need to go fishing at all: that we know, in all likelihood, that we won't ever catch a really big fish, or even one of over 40" if we like to fish for striped bass.

I like to fish for stripers. Since I got the boat I've had my gaze averted by the ocean. May I compare thee to a trout stream? Aside from its other-worldly allure - those gentle waves removing sand beneath your boots in a way that resonates beyond the average - the sea is an attractively risky place. Safety equipment is required, and I've already made a simple Death Prevention Rule to never paddle in open ocean alone. Saturday the swell was big enough to make me think of Dramamine as I chased the dark blotches of bunker-colored ocean. And I do so because, just two weeks ago, a fish of 75lb was captured off the Connecticut coast - a truly magnificent animal with white scales the size of nickels, its head as big as mine. And that's a pretty big measure. Until the genetic chicken farmers start growing fish (and Heaven forfend), you're as likely to catch a 20 or 30 or 75lb trout as you are a 20lb bass if you restrict yourself to the fly rod.

Restrict Yourself to The Fly Rod. There is the truth we all know. It's a feather and a hook. We romance that it isn't meant to work, because when it does it's better than most other things we'll do in a lifetime of trying. I love catching 6" brook trout as I love catching schoolies on the fly - perhaps even a brace that run to the mid thirties of inches over a long season, if we're lucky. It's the exact same satisfaction from fishing the right fly to trout on the Upper Housie. But they said I should fish for stripers in the same way they sold me steelhead. The steel are big and fight like confined bluefish, but they are uniform in size, give or take. Stripers grow very big and we cannot catch them on a fly, and many of us accept this truth and keep casting our flies. But isn't it inevitable that a fly-fisher will deviate in the presence of bigger fish to be caught?

Forgive me readers, for it is bitter/sweet that I have been trying to catch a bigger fish. The method is as far from fly fishing as I think possible [if you're easily offended you should stop reading right here.] Like those guys in Scotland who hunt ferox trout with wired dead-baits, hunting is what you do for big stripers. You use what they eat, with no imitation, which means either a live eel (pierce a large hook through its eye, cast out, twitch back) or live-lined menhaden or part thereof.

Ball of Confusion: Match the hatch and attend Confession, cast a worthless fly, or don't go fishing? 

The gathering of menhaden as bait is everything that I'm meant to dislike. Basically, cast into their mass and impale one. Let it swim around as an injured and attractively easy meal for the predators below.

A size 22 BWO just wasn't the ticket.

The reasons why I disagree with my actions are too many to list, but perhaps most of all I find my consideration of one fine and essential species as a great deal less worthy than the prize it might bring to be challenging. Don't get me wrong, I think little about animals I deem less worthy - I'm not a vegetarian - but neither do I perform the ritual pictured above in most cases (on a recent trip to the tackle shop I actually had to ask if the snagging of bunker was legal, and I'm still perplexed that it is). At 15" long, the bunker in the picture is the size of a Farmington brown I'd photograph aside the creel and Rosebay Willowherb and call it a special day. You see this whole thing is somewhat difficult to understand, and as is right, I take some kind of comfort from my ethical discomfort.

But in the end, or at least today, I'm enjoying casting the bait rod again, just as I did in the first place. Carrying the long and short rods on the boat makes me feel like a better fly fisherman; my goal, and there is only one to my mind, to innovate to the best of my ken in order to outsmart a fine fish. I've simply been doing what needs to be done to go fishing instead of packing the gear away. I've taken the feather off the hook, and used it to affix a bait made entirely of natural materials. I've completed the illusion of life for the sake of the prize.

Ultimately, I'll be fucked if any of this has made me feel any better, as was my intent.  And I still haven't caught a big striped bass.

Jonny

Don't Even Think About It

No hope is what we give ourselves every time, at least if we have sound control of our egos (Culvert readers are proper adults who shun Angling Expert Status and thus are comfortable in this bracket). But they fuck us up, these trout streams, and we tend to lie, you see. Even when we say we're Just Going for a Few Casts, what we're predisposed to want and thus expect is rising trout/stripers/carp, and big ones too. I have found (I am now convinced) that when I actually believe - in a very, very pure way - that the fishing/weather will suck, it's as likely to be really, really good.    

This was Saturday. I was to be kayak fishing with the boys on the Sabbath, not on Saturday (the first sign that the fishing would be really, really good, on Saturday); so even when the chance arose, I didn't know where I'd go and thus gave no advance warning for my small brain to start cultivating a switch-back scenario where expectations of greatness are longed for in a played down, English-Jonny-doth-lie-to-himself, sort of way. So I threw a half-arsed text to Zakur about the recent performance of Stream X, sure in the knowledge that I'd be following his lead assuredly into the valley of Other Things that are not fishing. It was entirely unexpected, then, when I met young Z at 2pm, primed with short fly rods, cigars and The Flask.

But we had no hope because this was all impossibly ad hoc, see. And this is almost certainly why there were caddis and stoneflies and midges everywhere. And trout risings, pretty much, everywhere. The stream hadn't been stocked. These weren't stockies. (I don't know if this matters, but when you first find a slew of rising fish and realize what you might be in for, and then realize they're wild, it just gets that bit better.) The stream is big enough to be tough, but small enough to be personable and familiar. Medium sized, basically. And running a perfect height of finest London Dry Gin, this day that does not exist. No other anglers were visible, and I was in shirt-sleeves, but of course.

The first fish was a beautiful little brown trout.  

The reel conveys to the reader that English Jonny is a fly fisherman, not a worm hunter.

Bugs were everywhere, but I had a cigar.

Orange trout backs were porpoising to stone flies in clear, deep water; the scenario that is so lovely we think it cliched only because we lie that it can never happen when we want it so badly. Anyway, it's pretty much the finest thing I will ever see. Two large trout working a log jam midstream. My cast is some kind of nymph leading to a caddis dry on the dropper (yes, I know that's all wrong, but I'd rigged for nymphs and lazily clipped off the tail nymph when confronted with rises). At Z's insistence, I knelt on the cobble at the pool's head, and when the caddis went under, it was eaten by this: 

This is a beautiful creature, and quite possibly the nicest looking specimen I've wrestled with.

Up-date: Here I am playing that fish. It was rising next to the jam on the right. I'm grateful that this picture captures the bend in my little 7' 4wt, which is smaller than my ears.

The next up-stream riffle and bend was alive with rising brown trout, and by now I'm remembering - through a haze of muddy fumblings with stripers and carp - just how supremely satisfying it is to be privy to such a thing. Again Z played the perfect host, all but letting me have best vantage from above the riffle, where three casts later, this delightful trout is running hard to the foot of the pool, giving me rare pause to actually think about the drag on my trout reel.

Best Trout River In The world.

We fished on, walking the banks, poking hither and yon. Zakur missed a few takes (he clearly needs to adopt my new Dry Fly Below Nymph Rig; article coming soon!) and I fished in that half-arsed way you do when you've had plenty of cream already. It was a superb day. 

Medium sized. Zakur knows this stream like his study.

Oh, and Sunday's trip went just like we planned it.

My back is in spasm. No fish did we catch.

-Jonny

From the Vault: Anadromy

Herring are already showing up on the Cape, and this event reminded me of young Brayshaw's very first article on The Angler's Culvert. It's been a number* of years since these early works, and I wanted to recount this one, about the cycle and about herring. I'm sure readers will agree -- it's a bobby dazzler.

Herring Fly

*Exactly 2. 

We are beasties too (The Annual February Post)

Crocus are well on their way. Things are photosynthesizing. I have a cold but even in mid-February - this mid-February - I'm suspecting pollen. Last year we were under 3' of snow. I was hard at it with a chisel and the snow blower saved my job and physical wellness. In 2012 it's already spring in Connecticut. Forsythia is green and ready. It was warm enough today that Bill and I are contemplating kayaking tomorrow, a whole month before the frogs and some weeks (I bury forget the exact date) before ya'll get too excited about having celtic roots. We won't go, but that's not the point.

I'm not from here. I'm from over there, where the grass is green in winter. So just trust me that this is all quite weird - last year, then this year. Today I imagined that most beasties, like plants, are starting up early, encouraged by the warming trend; or at least they're confused, like me. I wonder if the Beasties on Hudson and those hundreds of miles south are thinking the same thing, and thinking of setting out early.

Like the man said, the seasons really are an endless distraction. At least, this is what I was thinking in the loop of 2nd grade basketball, Stop and Shop, the dump and the wine store today.


Jonny

(Please don't) Take me to your leader.

It's sometimes fun to ponder what Mozart, or others of his ilk, would think of the music of, say, Led Zeppelin or Muddy Waters, or even English Jonny and T.J. Brayshaw.  What I suspect, in at least two of these cases, is that he would at the very least recognize it as music.  He might even like it.

It's baffling to me, then, that folks who all might be lumped under the label of "fishermen" could have such different ideas about what fishing is, or at least ought to be.  Recently, in my internet travels, I came upon two different discussions that gave me pause for some reflection.  In most ways, they have very little in common, with the exception of two things.  First, both have something to do with fishing (If I'm feeling generous.  Let's just say, they have to do with fish.)  Second, my reaction to both was the same, which is to say immediate, visceral, and negative.  I thought about this afterwards, particularly about why my reaction was so negative and whether this was even fair.  In the end, I think I'm more confused than disturbed.

The first had to do with a well-known tarpon tournament that occurs each year in Florida's Boca Grande Pass.  Large numbers of very big tarpon pass through here, and absurdly large numbers of anglers gather to catch them.  This isn't the backcountry, flats fishing some of you might be familiar with, because here the water is too deep to fly fish (or even sight fish) for the tarpon.  Instead, the competitors jig the fish up from the depths.  The entire scene is borderline chaos, and many believe that the numbers of anglers, the fishing techniques, and the fish-handling practices are unnecessarily hard on the fish, such that mortality of these fish far exceeds what many tarpon anglers would consider acceptable.  It's hard to watch video of this event and not suspect the same.  A fellow on The Drake's message board was roped into fishing "The Pass" with his boss, and describes the episode this way: "Sure, we hooked fish, quite a few in fact. Got four to the boat, lost two of them to sharks. I don't know if they were particularly thick that day, but I'd say about a third of the poons met "Jaws" from what I could see. For the guys on my boat, that was particularly cool. We broke off a few times weaving in and out of the amateurs who "didn't know how to fish the pass" as my guide told them. I enjoyed a few of the "What the fuck are you doing?", "Move your fucking boat, don't you know what you're fuckin' doing?" that were exchanged between boats that are all of a few feet apart at times."

Hold your thoughts for a moment, please.

The second discussion came from a local fishing board, and had to do with a fellow's account of a large musky he accidentally snagged while fishing. He acknowledged that the fish was snagged (in the tail), and released the fish after landing it.  These things happen.  My immediate, visceral and negative reaction was to what followed his account of the event.  After describing the long fight, the fisherman described why he decided to go home, rather than continue to fish: "It doesn't get any better than this!!" 

It seems there was simply no improving upon this fishing experience.   In any event, he was then warmly congratulated by several other fishermen for a "Great catch!!", and several also congratulated him for releasing the tail-snagged musky.

This angler released the musky, and I suspect little harm was done.  I don't know the effects of the Boca Grande Pass tarpon tournament on those tarpon, but let's assume for the moment that it has little if any negative effects on the tarpon.  My gut reaction is to be deeply offended by the tarpon tournament on many levels, but perhaps this isn't fair.  The fact that it doesn't appeal to me doesn't necessarily mean that it's distasteful.  What has me so distressed is that I am at a complete loss to understand what is going on in the heads of any of these fishermen.  I am thoroughly confused as to why anybody would want to participate in that circus.

And the musky snagger? He can't imagine anything better than snagging a gamefish by the tail? Nothing?  Nothing at all? To try to get a fish to actually take a lure would be, I guess, anticlimactic. Hit a pheasant with your car while driving down the highway? The same as a great quartering-away wingshot, apparently.  Fucking a corpse?  "Best sex I can possibly imagine!!"

And what of those who congratulated him?  I was particularly bemused by those who congratulated him for releasing the snagged fish, as if he deserves extra accolades for doing what is so clearly the only proper option.  Jonny recently congratulated me on my ten-year wedding anniversary, but he never bothered to also congratulate me for not beating my wife or fucking the babysitter.

It makes me wonder if, despite that we all call ourselves "fisherman", we're even from the same planet.  My first thought, upon meeting some of these folks, might be to instruct them to "Take me to your leader", but I suspect even mastermind behind this colony of alien fishermen wouldn't be able to make me understand.

Most Peculiar Mama

This

It was 55 deg on the CT shoreline today

Led me to get excited, which led to these

Which led me to throw up when I received this.


Strange days indeed.


Jonny

The strange case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde

Next Monday I can drive a 12 hour round trip to stand in 22 degree snow-filled air for a waffer thin chance that I might hook and lose a single steelhead. This pittance we'll call a good day, and for a while, perhaps enough time to carry me half-way home, the drug will keep me "up". The iced guides and sweaty neoprenes will just have to be. I'll have hand and feet warmers provided I remember to add them to the long list of shit my life will depend on in frozen hell. Bring on the combat with other anglers for the right to chuck'n’ duck - rinse, repeat, rinse, repeat, ex creta, ex creta, ad infinitum - through the precious few holes where a steelhead might lie this time of year on the upper reaches of the Salmon River, Pulaski. If I take a single pee break during the only five minutes the fish are biting, I will certainly hook nothing and I just don’t know how to work this out. Highway burgers and the feeling of less than good, wholesome, fly-fishing fun. Gas. More gas. Expenses. Physical fatigue for the following two weeks will compete with a persuasive clinical low for my selection of medication. I'll recall the first few months of my first born child (in lucid moments I can do this voluntarily) and the painful memories that I know, with certain fear, will be magically obscured as my genetics compel me to do this again and again. Rinse, repeat.

Hell, on a mild day.

Or, I can tootle merrily along in the style of Ms. Marple (I drive an old Subaru wagon) to a wild brook trout stream and fish the warmer CT woods. Very pretty. Secluded. A good chance I'll bring a fish or three to hand, this day. They will be laughingly small in a very respectful way; and they will be wild and small, so I'll cast myself as the dandy Artisan that I really am. I'll luncheon on home-prepared fare and soda pop - I'm so cozy in my car I'll take humorous picnic pictures for future publication! The cost will be nothing more than the price of a delicious stoagie, the white smoke from which I see now, wafting Prozekly on the silent winter air as I give brief pause to dry my No.12 Dave's Hopper and presently greet the bluebird that has just settled on my left wading boot. It will be lovely and I'll return home, accomplished, in time for tea with my radiant wife and beautiful children.

Heaven

Split-shot: check.
Stanley's ice-off paste: check.
Hand-warmers: check

......I'll see you in Hell.


Jonny

Redds, Southern-Style

Until recently, I never gave much thought, either way, to fishing over redds.  A redd (pronounced “reh-du-du”, I guess) is that hollow depression in the river bottom made by a spawning trout or salmon where later the eggs will be laid and subsequently fertilized. Recently, Gary pointed out the irony inherent in Great Lakes steelheaders, i.e. that they violently oppose fishing over steelhead redds, despite that steelhead are not native to the Great Lakes, and in most cases, no natural reproduction occurs anyway.  Well, the truth is that, as far as I can tell, most Lake Erie steelheaders have no such qualms about fishing over redds, or about anything, for that matter.  For example, on my last trip, I watched an angler snag all of these fish from one very small pool. Lacking a stringer, he simply threaded a nylon tie-down strap through their gills, and then placed them in this puddle to keep them alive.

Good eats

And this brings me to today’s recipe, just in time for the holidays. This recipe is courtesy of Ironic Gary, as he is known, and I have to admit, it’s a real winner.  I was skeptical, initially, but this has become a staple in the Brayshaw household.

You can adjust the batter to suit your tastes, but it is absolutely essential that you keep the redds very cold until they’re dipped in the batter.  This helps the batter to stick to the redd. Fortunately, the redds are naturally cold, since steelhead, trout and salmon are cold-water fish. In addition, the recipe’s proportions can be adjusted to accommodate brook trout redds, which are usually much smaller than steelhead redds. (In fact, at home we sometimes simply sauté a batch of brook trout redds in a stove-top skillet, thus obviating the need for a deep fryer altogether.)

•    6 steelhead redds (trout, salmon redds may be substituted)

•    1/2 cup evaporated milk

•    1 tablespoon salt

•    dash pepper

•    1 cup flour

•    1/2 cup yellow cornmeal

•    2 teaspoons paprika

•    Deep fryer, with oil

Clean, wash and dry the redds. It is essential to keep the redds very cold if the batter is going to stick to them. Combine milk, salt and pepper in a bowl. In a pie plate or shallow dish, combine flour, cornmeal and paprika. Dip redds in milk mixture then roll in flour and cornmeal mixture. Fry redds in hot oil for about 4 minutes. Test carefully with a fork or felt-studded wader boot and fry for 4 to 6 minutes longer, or until the redds flake easily with a fork and are browned. Drain on paper towels. Serve with bacon and hush puppies and coleslaw, if desired. Serves 6.

Carefully lower the battered redds into the fryer