Fly Fishing, Chess and Sniffling on the Upper Sacramento River

Greetings from the sniffly, germ-ridden Underground, where the noses run far more freely than does the river of pity.

That lack of pity? The L&T pointed out I got sick after spending a chunk of yesterday waist deep in water only a teensy bit warmer than ice, and though the snot came freely, the trout didn’t.

I hate it when she’s right, which is most of the time.

Still, you could hardly blame me for going; it was a perfect BWO day — cold and snowing mid-river.

You can count me among those who will happily fish in falling snow; it’s a hell of a lot warmer than fishing in the rain, and quieter too.

In fact, until a van pulled up and dumped a load of screaming kids into the snow, the Upper Sac was as quiet as it’s ever been.

The BWOs started floating downriver roughly on schedule (a few minutes after noon), and stopped before 2:00 — earlier than I wanted (and yes, that’s pretty much always the case too).

Despite the good numbers of bugs, only a handful of fish rose regularly, and the water was clear and low.

It was cold enough to form a skin of slush and ice on the current-free parts of the river, and more than once I popped a few ice crystals off the rod guides.

In a situation like that, you’re not casting to fish as much as stalking them, and the sooner you realize it, the sooner your flies will start getting eaten.

In the tradition of outdoor writers, I’d love to describe my exploits in manly fashion, explaining to you how I hung fish after fish with my zippy, arrow-straight casts (the product of my tawny, sinewy forearms), but in truth, I mucked it up pretty thoroughly for the first 20 minutes.

I’d spot a working fish, sneak up on him, and then discover I’d gotten the angles all wrong, and that my backcast was impeded or my forward cast was going to put down another rising fish.

It’s a kind of chess match on the water, which isn’t much of an excuse given that I used to play in chess tournaments, but stalking rising trout always comes back to me after I’ve successfully performed the most common screwups and started getting takes.

Snow falling on trout; snow dusts the trees lining the Upper Sac.

In the end, I got four grabs, hooked three fish, and landed the smallest — a 14″ rainbow that went un-photographed because my hands were stinging so much I just dumped him out of the net and commenced with the airing of the cold-weather epithets.

The two better fish broke me off, and given my use of a fairly willowy 5wt glass rod, it’s a reminder that my 7x tippet is better than 18 months old (illustrating how rarely I resort to the stuff).

With no storms headed our way until next Thursday, I’m either going to be flinging a big dry for shallow fish, or tying #18 Olives in an attempt to bolster my sagging supply.

See you (sniffling) on the river, Tom Chandler.