Recently, the fishing on the Red Deer R went through a particularly bad spell. Not unusual for the river, just following the hot, dry weather pattern of late summer and well into Sept. When the weather turns down a notch, things pick up. At the peak of the heat, forget any great shakes. So it was that I hosted a fellow on the river - he'd come previously and worked some very good fish on the river before it blew out in the annual equinox storm - the very storm we didn't get this year (the first time in 15 years). The first two days were hot, sunny, horrible fishing. We landed fish - almost accomplishing the dreaded Red Deer R grand slam - the troutless one. Tough days with nothing rising, trout hunkered down. Day three, we abandoned the river and set forth in search of browns in other places. We hit a water out west, one that I had literally fished with Amelia the day before my guest's arrival and had a stellar day of good fish. Day three was marginally better than 1 & 2 of this fellow's trip, the conditions much tougher for his day on this water than it was for AJ & I. We caught several fish, but nothing more than 15".
I dropped him off at the hotel and headed home, exhausted from the hours of looking, hiking, rowing, etc the 3 days. He went for Chinese food. This would be a bit of an innocuous happening, if it weren't for him showing up the last morning. He held out his hand and shook it, then slipped this into my hand:
So, there we were, Chinese fortune cookie in our hip pocket. Why hadn't I thought of that? As he handed the fortune to me, he simply said,"No pressure, but I've been up for hours".
That day I had been planning since his first day. The forecast on day 2 and 3 of his trip were of frost overnight, leading to cooler afternoons. The last day, it was the day I hoped for. The night was warmer, the sun was beating down, no wind, no clouds. That day was the day I hoped for - and took him to one of our favorite spring creeks that we discovered last fall.
We walked the tiny spring creek, sight fishing as we went. The browns weren't all co-operative but they were certainly more active than anything the previous days. We slowly walked along the edge, looking into the water New Zealand style. Were we rewarded? The fortune cookie was simply the ultimate foreshadowing, with several of these trout...
followed by three fish in one wonderful run that were all in this size range:
It was a massive change in fortune. All from a spring creek that runs 3 feet wide and 5" deep in its riffles. All resident fish that we've visited and gotten to know quite well. Incredible. It makes me want to eat at more Chinese joints.
No comments:
Post a Comment