Those familiar with the saga of Wally the Wonderdog know the Trout Underground’s Official Sausage-Shaped Blog Mascot is not so much burdened with cunning animal intelligence as he is plain lucky.

He was rescued from the pound the day he was to be euthanized and found his way to our house (Life #1).

In the last six months, he narrowly escaped death from a 600-foot plunge down a rocky mountainside, then barely avoided drowning at the paws of a pair of pissed-off raccoons (Lives #2 and #3).

Today he took an ill-advised swim on a rapid part of the Upper Sacramento River, narrowly missing being swept into the rapids.

(For those still counting, that’s Life #4).

One can only guess what’s next. Near miss from a meteor?

Fishing When the Fishing’s Not Great

Despite the fact that the weather was clear, cold and windy – and the fishing likely poor – I felt the need to get out of the house and renew my acquaintance with nature.

With the L&T Nancy working all day (on a holiday no less), I thought I’d take the Wonderdog with me, tiring him out so he’d sleep all night.

I don’t fish with the Wonderdog that often; like most dogs, he’s not entirely clear on the concept of sitting quietly on the bank while I’m trying to catch a trout, but he’s entirely too clear on the idea of retrieving one after they’re hooked.

Still, I wasn’t so much bent on catching lots of trout as I was taking a walk and field-testing a new graphite rod [gasp].

Around 1:00, I hustled down to a stretch of the Upper River, rigged a single nymph, and – Wonderdog in tow – hiked a mile down the tracks.

There I proceeded to catch a pair of 10″-11″ trout, looking up from the second in time to see the Wonderdog plunge into the water from the far bank.

Driven by the thought that Nancy would probably kill me if her dog died on my fishing trip, I tossed the rod on a dry rock and ran downriver, where the Wonderdog – apparently unclear on the concept of fast-moving current – was inching closer to a brutal dunking, if not worse.

After falling once, I arrived just in time to nudge his buoyant, sausage-shaped body into the calmer water at the edge.

Whew.

The good news is he survived. The bad news was that I was stuck slinging 85 pounds of fat, sinew (and bare minimum of neurons) back across the river.

This little job consumed another 45 minutes of searching for the most appropriate crossing, and then urging, luring, shoving, pushing and carrying him to the far side.

Total Time Spent Not Fishing: One hour.

Not Sleeping on the Couch Because I Killed L&T Nancy’s Dog: Priceless.

The Wonderdog’s actually a lot of fun in the outdoors, but he’s unfortunately plagued by either intense stupidity or a death wish.

Both tend to interfere with the fishing, and I’ll probably limit his exposure to moving water in the future.

The whole outing was over by 3:30, but any fishing trip where your waders get wet and your dog survives should probably be considered a success.

UPDATE: Dogs aren’t wholly useless in the backcountry. This Black Lab is credited with keeping several people alive through a cold, wet night on Mt. Hood.

Speaking of Fishing

The river’s in very fishable shape right now, though the recent cold front likely slowed things a bit.

Still, I caught a couple pretty quickly, and of course, I have little idea what’s happening on the lower river or just before dark.

The forecast for the coming week suggests some good BWO weather, but I’m unlikely to tumble for that ghost hatch again; the olives have just not appeared in numbers this winter (with a few exceptions), so the few rising fish I’ve seen are typically concentrated in small areas.

As always, more fishing (and Wonderdog drama) when it happens.


Mount Shasta and clouds. Never gets old. Never.

[tags]fly fishing, upper sac, upper sacramento river, wally the wonderdog, nymph, trout[/tags]

Posted in Fishing Report, Upper Sacramento.