Shielded by a bush, rod pointed behind me, I knee-crawled up to the bank of the stream, hunched down, carefully poked my head around the branches, and watched every brown trout in the pool scatter.

Instantly.

This, I realized, was going to be harder than I thought.

The Old Small Stream Ain’t What It Used To Be

It turns out life happens even while we’re somewhere else (who knew), and in this case, Stream Y – so happy to give up its brown trout in the spring and summer – turned miserly as winter closed in.

Going down in flames, but classy - a Phillipson Bamboo Fly Rod makes even failure pretty

As I watched a half-dozen small-stream trout disappear (as if they’d been beamed up to the Enterprise), I realized the snow was falling again, so instead of simply being cold and fishless, I was about to become cold, fishless, and wet.

If that sounds as good to you as it does to me, then this may just be your blog post.

As The Options Narrow…

With the general trout season about to close, I thought about flogging the McCloud, but frankly – with fly fishermen reporting catches of big trout on big dries – it seemed a little obvious.

You know, too normal.

And besides, the same pair of small streams I’d been fishing all year beckoned; I’d never fished either stream this late in the year, and I wondered what was happening at altitude.

Were the brown trout spawning? Were bugs hatching? Would streamers work? After a couple storms, were some of the dirt roads even passable?

(Answers: Not really, no, not in my hands, mostly)

Stream Y - the last look this year

In truth, I’ve been on a small stream jag the last couple seasons, and I found little reason to stop now.

If you’re happy catching 7″-10″ trout in the summer, why not in the fall?

Which is how I found myself crawling around in the mud and leftover corn snow, wondering how the hell I was going to catch a trout when I couldn’t even get close enough to properly spook them?

Normally, this is the moment when I drag out the camera and take pictures, figuring the fishing isn’t going to get any worse while I’m being artsy, and it might just get better.

Sadly, I’d cheated myself of even that escape; I’d left my digital camera at home, and was reduced to taking pictures with my low-quality (and definitely non-waterproof) cell phone camera.

I forget, so you suffer. That’s symmetry for you.

The Part Where I Make Excuses

No fly fishing trip is complete with an exhaustive list of excuses reasons why the fishermen failed/succeeded in the face of overwhelming odds, and here’s mine:

• The riffles and current tongues that provided overhead cover (and plenty of bites) earlier in the year were largely vacant; the brown trout had moved to slower (and clearer, and tougher) stretches of water.
• The leaves on the bushes and trees were gone (depriving me of cover), and the water was low, so the trout were spooky. Damned spooky.
• I didn’t see a single bug or terrestrial, so the trout simply weren’t looking up.
• The brown trout were spawning/had spawned/were about to spawn, and were uninterested in feeding
• The water was extremely cold and hurt my hands, so I was happy I didn’t catch many fish

Ultimately, two deranged very smart brown trout fell victim to my cunning presentations, and while I’d love to suggest I solved the spookiness problem through some kind of Darwinian adaptation, the truth is less impressive: I just made longer casts.

(I didn’t say I was proud of it or anything, but it worked.)

Of course, there is a Big Fish story lurking here somewhere – a monster in the 11″ range which zipped out of a log jam, grabbed the black rubberlegs streamer I was dangling, and ran right back – wrapping me up and breaking me off in the process.

Other blogs talk about big fish - but we show you exactly where they live...

When you’re down, it seems even the trout know to kick you.

Lucky To Be Here

That said, I felt lucky to get what I got. In one sense, I was lucky to be there; it was sleeting when I arrived, but by noon it had grown colder, and by two, it was snowing.

When I finally left, I wondered if this was the storm that would close the road.

Even if it doesn’t, the next one might.

One the drive out, the truck skidded and slipped on dirt road, and I figured I might be the last fly fisherman to spook those trout until June or even July of next year.

Once, I entertained thoughts of skiing into this stream and fishing it long before others could get there, but the distances are daunting. And hell, I’m not even sure if the roads to the road are plowed.

Soon (very soon), the meadows will fill with snow, and they’ll stay that way for better than half the year, and the trout will go on about their lives largely untroubled – until one day the snow melts and a strange shape looms above them, waving a long, skinny stick.

If the romance of that escapes you, then check for a pulse.

Technorati Tags: fishing, Fly Fishing, fly fishing excuses, fly fishing small streams

The power of fly fishing lies not with its practitioners, writers, pundits, chest beaters, equipment manufacturers, or even its high modulus rods.

Fly fishing is something we engage in for reasons of fun or sanity instead of revenue or food gathering, so in other words, it’s an emotional thing, which allows us significant latitude when we talk about it.

He lives miles away, but he's on his home waters.

For example, the concept of “home water” clearly isn’t geographic in nature, but a matter of the heart.

One fly fisherman can tell another his “home waters” are literally halfway around the globe, and the second fly fisherman won’t bat an eye.

That’s because his “home waters” are a five hour drive to the north (the last ten miles on dirt roads), and while humanity is generally poor at accepting alien perspectives, fly fishermen do sometimes make worthwhile exceptions.

That’s why I tend to seek out smaller, wilder waters even though I live on a beautiful freestoner. It’s not because blueline fishing is “easy” (for the record, nothing’s easy when you’re fishing from your knees or crawling through bushes).

It’s because the fishing is – to leverage a pair of overused words – intimate and predatory at the same time, a combination I find irresistible.

A Brown Trout just after he made a mistake.

The Latest Small Stream Experience

Which leads us to the actual small stream fishing report (not the fictional version posted here), where I invited Singlebarbed along to serve as bait for the hordes of mosquitoes while I fly fished.

It only partially worked.

In fact, it didn’t work at all; the mosquitoes were on us like makeup on a politician the second we opened the truck doors, and I’m not even going to try and describe the horrific events that followed when I whizzed in the woods prior to throwing on my waders.

I’m having a flashback just writing about it.

Singlebarbed quickly doused himself in gallons of his vintage Muskol repellent – a product made from 100% Deet. A highly effective mosquito repellent, it’s become clear that DEET works by altering your DNA to the point that mosquitoes no longer recognize you as a mammal.

That reduces the number of bites by a considerable portion, but your friends will wonder why you’ve got another hand growing out your elbow.

It’s a trade off, but when the payoff is a small stream, a lot of trick casts, and a few willing brown trout, I’ll take mutation any day.

Blah Blah Blah Small Stream.

The fishing itself wasn’t dramatic, but it was – for want of a better term – pure. The casting was difficult, the fish gorgeous, and the setting unreally pretty.

Can you see him? That's an 8" trout.

I rarely see photographs of myself fly fishing (I’m usually taking the pictures), but when most every picture shows you hunched behind a bush or casting from your knees, you realize you’re reverting from “civilized behavior” (which isn’t very civilized at all) into a predator – without really noticing it.

The result was a fishing trip where you stop your pursuit of trout every few minutes to appreciate what you’ve submerged yourself in, and even then you still can’t quite grasp it.

Sometimes it’s almost as if you’re an actor in an unbelievably boring (to the world), wildly perfect movie, as if perfection can’t be achieved in every day life.

Fish Parts

This fishing itself wasn’t that dramatic, and rather than risk repeating my recent small stream reports, I’ll simply say this:

The fishing was largely good, though like most small streams, it turned on and off suddenly.

A rare Underground fiberglass fly rod photo (we're only human).

We arrived a little too early, and one run yielded exactly nothing. Two hours later we passed the same run, this time mining it for six pretty brown trout.

It’s easy to fall for the hype (anti-hype?) that small stream fish are dumb and easy – eating everything that floats by – but the truth lies pretty far from that statement.

Like anything almost perfectly in tune with their environment, they dance to a tune that us clumsy, smelly humans have largely forgotten (or are simply ignoring).

Fish Parts 2

I can’t explain it in explicit terms, but it’s clear I’ve become fascinated with pictures of brown trout parts. Like most trout, they’re more colorful than they’d seemingly need to be, and while I won’t say I’m tired of rainbow trout, I can say the brightly colored brown trout offer a nice break from silver.

What color exactly would you call that?

Sure, he's upside down, but check out the colors.

Wave good-bye.

The Fly Fishing Itself

The fishing itself was alternately too hard, too easy, too frustrating and too overwhelming to write about.

Befitting our shared status as geezers, Singlebarbed fished an old Fenwick HMG fly rod (8.5′ 5wt), while I dragged out my old-style Diamondglass 8′ 5wt – a rod so sweet you could descend into a diabetic coma just by waving it.

Authentic Geezer Gear (I'm starting a new fly fishing line by that name)

And I won’t even bore you with fly selection (though Humpies are our friends).

The bite was damned slow in the morning, but picked up midday. In truth, you don’t need high-end gear or boxes of flies to fish a small stream, but you’d better come equipped with a good roll cast and a great deal of accuracy.

See you on your home waters, Tom Chandler.

Bye!

Technorati Tags: brown trout, fiberglass fly rod, Fly Fishing, fly fishing small streams, home waters

Everybody goes through phases. Two year olds have their “no” phase, teenagers have their “I hate you all because you’re stupid” phase, and apparently some fly fishers go through a “small stream, smaller fish, absolute minimum of humanity phase.”

The water was pretty, the fish were willing, and the bugs intense.

The last described me pretty accurately, though I wasn’t completely aware of it until Curtis Knight of CalTrout asked me how often I was fly fishing the McCloud these days, and I realized the real answer was “hardly at all.”

The last couple seasons I’m more likely to hike into a small lake or stream, and while I’m sure years of psychoanalysis would uncover the root cause of my affliction (perhaps I had a bad experience with a big trout when I was a child), I’m actually pretty content to wallow in my neurosis – especially when it involves a lot of brown trout that seemingly can’t say no.

The more battered a humpy gets, the better it fishes.

Following hard on the heels of my semi-successful trip to Stream X, Elderly Underground Friend & Alert Reader Jim Troyer and I found ourselves exploring water I’d never fished before (let’s call it Stream Y).

It turns out that exploration is good.

Every run on this tiny stream held at least one eager brown trout (sometimes many eager brown trout).

In fact, the action started on the second cast, and never really let up.

Simply put, it was the kind of day you tell yourself you’ve earned via all those other ugly days, though you know deep inside that would only be true if you’d been attacked and killed by wild animals on all those other trips.

To say too much more is to gloat unnecessarily (the Underground doesn’t gloat, we report). And yes, if it makes you feel better, the mosquitoes were intense – to the point that multiple applications of insect repellent were needed (for godssakes don’t breathe the stuff), as were lots of coverups.

In fact, the slightly built Troyer was at several points in danger of being carried off by hordes of the vicious bloodsucking beasts.

You can know that mosquitoes are part and parcel of the backcountry in spring, but that doesn’t mean I have to like or even accept it (suggesting that stubbornness is a another lifelong “phase” for me).

More Brown Trout Body Parts

This time, I caught no Brook trout, though the vibrant paint jobs on the brown trout meant I wasn’t too disappointed:

A neon scaled banana? One of my brightest brownies.

Cars would still have fins if they looked this cool.

One of those darkly pigmented brown trout that looks like it lives in a cave.

More Fly Fishing Gear Stuff

The bottom line on the fishing? I fished my Diamondglass 8.5 4wt, while Troyer got along nicely with an older 8′ 3wt Redington.

As often happens on small streams, the fish weren’t selective to flies – until you tried something new. Then they’d stop eating, and you’d think they were selective until you compared notes with your buddy, who was fishing a fly pretty much the exact opposite of yours.

For the record, a dark caddis did a lot of damage, as did a Beetle Bug and humpies. The small stimulator didn’t fly. That’s really all I know.

I also test-flew the new Korkers wading boots, and there’s plenty more to be said about these interchangeable-sole critters.

More Fly Fishing Soon

It’s been an odd week, and yes, I even wasted a couple hours on a media gig that couldn’t have turned out much worse, but this weekend may find me wandering around the backcountry yet again, though I wouldn’t necessarily make book on Stream X or Stream Y.

Maybe I’ll do both. I hear the fishing’s pretty good.

See you on the couch streamside, Tom Chandler.

p.s. – No, I’m not telling. But it’s right at the end of this path:

Technorati Tags: brown trout, fiberglass fly rods, fishing, Fly Fishing, fly fishing small streams, fly fishing the backcountry

The last couple seasons I’ve been on a small stream jag; given the choice between big water and small water, the trickles have won out over the torrents. And why not?

Odds are you’ll bump into fewer fly fishermen, see more wild stuff, and – without anyone watching except the wildlife – get to stalk and cast (it better be accurately) at fish that may not have seen a fly this season.

On the flip, the trout are smaller, the mosquitoes more aggressive, hero-pic opportunities largely absent, the travel longer, the roads worse, and the odds of being stranded where no one will find you much, much higher.

Naturally, that adds to the romance.

That’s why – on a Friday where I could have headed almost anywhere – I found myself bouncing over a series of rutted, washed out roads, wondering if I was supposed to turn left two identical-looking dirt roads back.

I was taking miles off the life of my truck (and years off the functional life of my lower spine), and I wasn’t even sure I was headed in the right direction.

It’s in those moments that you can turn back – proving that you’re possessed of common sense – and go fish the water you know how to find.

Fortunately, I’m not over-afflicted with that common sense stuff.

The Small Stream Post (Sans Pictures)

Because I planned to take many, many photographs of my small alpine stream trip, I made a point of charging both camera batteries, and promptly left the whole mess sitting by the charger.

I’ve already mentioned that the Underground’s Pentax Optio W10 – the target of much abuse the last couple years – was suffering.

Actually, it’s dieing.

It’s no longer waterproof and the batteries – one of which used to offer plenty of juice for a long day on the river – now fail a couple hours in (necessitating the charge of the second battery, which isn’t part of the pre-trip routine).

So it got left at home.

Sorry kids.

One of the benefits of a screwup like this is that I now have a reason to go back and try again.

The Fishing

Though this particular stretch of water is a spring creek, it’s still subject to runoff. It was running clear but high when I arrived, nicely illustrating that idea that we expect things to always be the last way we saw them.

I’ve never fished this stream quite this early in the year, and now I know why.

Still, it goes on the pile of useful information we accumulate over time: Fish Stream Y in the spring, then Stream X in the summer.

It wasn’t great fly fishing, but I was skulking along a small, alpine meadow spring creek, and while the bite wasn’t great (on dries), I did manage to scrape up ten or so grabs, and landed six brown trout that oddly enough all fell into the 10″-11″ size.

One brown trout would feature the intense red spots that make the species so attractive, while the next was faded, and the next featured a metallic golden hue.

The variation is both intriguing and puzzling; are these the genetic remnants of different stockings (I don’t believe this creek is stocked any more)? Or just natural variation?

My ultimate “watch this” meadow stream cast and drift – the one I learned from watching local legend Joe Kimsey fish a small creek – didn’t work (shockingly).

It’s the one where you cast barely upstream of an undercut bank, and keep just enough tension on the line to bounce the fly off the individual blades of grass. (Note to Undergrounders: Always go fishing with tricky old guys, and always take notes.)

My bites came from the calmer, slower-moving ambush water in the middle of the runs – the kind of places usually holding smaller trout.

And as further proof of the perverse nature of fish and fly fishermen, I didn’t see a single bug on the water, but saw a bunch of ants on the banks.

Naturally, the ant patterns didn’t buy a single bite, yet the smaller attractor dries did. (Next time, I’ll fish a creek where everything makes sense.)

It’s Like Thunder, Like Lightning

After a couple hours spent covering a fair amount of water (my small-stream default when I’m by myself), I stopped to take stock.

It was raining (it had been raining on and off). It was dark and cloudy, and the fishing was getting harder instead of easier.

Time to try something else – a technique explained to me by another tricky angler – where you tie on a big, rubberlegs nymph and then dangle it right in front of the deeper undercut banks.

It’s a low percentage gig, but it can net you the biggest brown trout in the admittedly small creek.

Yet when I reached for the fly box, things suddenly got very bright, and then very loud.

My hand stopped.

A bolt of lightning had struck the ridge farther up the meadow, and given the time interval between the flash and the sound, it was less than two miles away.

It’s in those moments – when adrenaline enters your system as if some overbearing gland had turned on a fire hose of the stuff – that you’re acutely aware that you’re not a Master of the Universe (the default perspective for most of us), but more an expendable, temporary organic construct.

In other words, run.

The Great Egress

Thunderstorms had been rolling through the area for a couple days (a relatively rare occurrence up here). And once or twice, I’d heard the very far off rumble of thunder far to the north.

Still, I was in a small alpine valley with very high, very steep sides, and the storm kinda snuck up on me.

The danger was minimal, but somebody forgot to tell the reptilian part of my brain that fears loud noises, the dark, the rustling of things I can’t see in the woods, and sudden flaming death from the heavens.

Abandoning the attempt at a big fish wasn’t a hard decision, and yes, it’s possible I moved at slightly above my normal pace on the way back to the truck, which I was pretty damned careful not to overshoot.

On the way out – safely insulated by four rubber tires – it occurred to me the thunderstorm was impressive as hell, with big swirly, dramatic clouds and everything that went with them. I wondered how the Brown trout – so reluctant to rise this day – perceived the thunderstorm from beneath the surface of the water.

See you on the small stream, Tom Chandler.

Technorati Tags: Fly Fishing, fly fishing small streams, fly fishing spring creeks, fly fishing the backcountry

It’s when I was knee-walking my way closer to the edge of the meadow stream that I literally stumbled across a pair of truths.

First, I formerly owned (and lost) knee pads for just this sort of thing, and by tomorrow morning, I was probably going to wish I’d bought another pair. (To the tune of several aspirin, this prediction came sadly true.)

And second, there is a kind of meadow flower that – after it blooms and the seed pod dries – sounds a lot like a rattlesnake when your fly line brushes against it.

The first realization was of the slow-dawning kind, but the second landed a little harder; when you’re on your hands and knees and think you hear a rattlesnake 1.5 feet to your left, the thought process flows quickly, as does the urge to simultaneously levitate and soil yourself.

Steve Bertrand fly fishes the meadow stretch of a small stream

Later, I demonstrated the rattlesnake doppler plant to Steve Bertrand, who couldn’t see the seed pod from his location, and you could tell he didn’t entirely buy my explanation until I physically pointed out the plant.

The whole episode reinforces what I’m starting to believe about myself (at least at the start of every new fly fishing season); I’m not a slow learner as much as a forgetful one.

We didn't "slaughter 'em" though we did catch a lot. And it was fun.

I seems my capacity for re-learning things is only outstripped by my ability to forget them, and I suppose the glass-half-full view is that every day offers people like me a fresh, new perspective on the world.

At least that’s what I’m going with for now.

Fish on. (Click image for a 1440 x 900 wallpaper version)

Fly fishing one of the freestone sections of the stream

The Fly Fishing

Steve Bertrand and I abandoned our adult responsibilities (he’s a fishing guide, so he has damned few of those), and fished a small stream that alternately runs through tiny canyons and grassy meadows, figuring the water flows there would be better than in those on the bigger rivers.

We were right, but in truth, that’s simply sophistry. I wanted to fly fish a small stream, and this one has all the goodies; brown trout, freestone sections, meadow sections, and yes, it’s not exactly what you’d call a “well known sporting destination.”

If this doesn't give you goose bumps, you may be dead.

That may be due to the smallish size of the trout (our biggest went 11″), but more likely, it’s just a small stream in a remote stretch of the county, and it takes a little too long to get there given the size of the fish. At least that’s how most people seem to feel about it.

Because this was all about fun and not efficiency, I fished the same 8′ 5wt Phillipson Peerless bamboo fly rod I used on the tiny Montana Cutthroat meadow stream of a year ago, and while most of the world would have trotted out a 2 or 3 weight for this kind of work, I’m happier with a softish 4 or 5wt, reasoning that a little insurance in the big wind/big fly department is a good thing.

Plus, they’re just more fun to cast.

You gotta love the reddish amber color of the Phillipsons

In the end, we more or less caught trout in all the places you’d expect we would, and though I wouldn’t say the trout were technical (they weren’t), they are damned spooky, and demanded a little stealth on their approach.

They’re wild things after all, and it’s in their best interest not to be seen. By contrast, most of humanity’s doing stranger and stranger things in a bid to be noticed, and of the two, the trout seem to make more sense.

Hey, I get to catch one (and only seconds after painfully lurching to my feet) (photo: Steve Bertrand)

Steve started fishing a dry and dropper, but quickly relented on the dropper part due to snags and the realization that I was getting bit fairly often on a small stimulator.

Later – on the meadow section – we went with a flying ant, which was as reliable as it always is on these waters. (How many do you have in your box?)

The red spots on some brown trout look so much brighter than they'd possibly need to be.

Almost everything we caught was a brown trout (even in the freestone stretches), and all had that undeniably lumpy (orange peelish) brown trout feel to them.

Naturally, when the light got right, Steve Bertrand and I went to a specific spot on the meadow with the intention of catching and photographing a nicer brown trout, so Bertrand promptly caught two rainbows, and I was forced to fire him on the spot.

Rainbows occupying the slower water of a brown trout stream? Stop the madness!

What photographer wants to work with talent who can’t catch trout (the right trout) on command?

Later – when the light got even better and we both caught nice, red-dotted brown trout – I forgave him his clumsiness.

Apparently I’m the fickle artist type.

I’m in the middle of a couple big weeks, yet I’d consider taking a human life to get back out to that stream (there are two more sections we didn’t even see). Still, with a Web site & email program to launch for a client and two more online marketing boot camp classes to teach, any fishing will probably take place closer to home.

See you on a small stream, Tom Chandler.

Technorati Tags: brown trout, dry flies, fishing, fishing dry flies, Fly Fishing, fly fishing a small stream

For a big chunk of winter I was shuffling around like a wheezing old car fully expecting to break down on the next flight of stairs, and while that whole episode is behind me, the lack of activity left its mark on my general fitness level – a fact underscored every time I try to speedwalk the Wonderdog.

This doesn’t portend well for the backcountry fly fishing season – which will likely come very, very early this year.

I make no pretense of extreme fitness, but I am used to tossing a pack in the truck and hiking wherever I need to hike, but I’m pretty sure a long uphill slog right now would end in Wally the Wonderdog sniffing forlornly at my cooling, disgustingly unfit body.

It’s not a pretty picture up here, so Saturday and Sunday I embarked on the Trout Underground’s First Annual Hiking Fitness Program (and Whinefest), whereby I took the Wonderdog for three hours of nonstop hiking around some unexplored local trails (I hate walking by trails when I don’t know where they go).

Backcounty fly fishing coming early? You should be looking at three feet of snow.

Sunday, I followed it up with “speedwork” – a more intense 1.5 hours up and down the hills (if it’s one thing we’ve got, it’s hills).

The goal here isn’t a guest appearance on some exercise equipment infomercial. The goal is to jump start a little “normal” fitness for those fishing trips where your choice of footwear is more important than your choice of fly rod. (That’s today’s helpful hint: buy this season’s hiking boots now so you’ve test flown/broken them in before you take that first [and potentially blister-filled] hike.)

The last couple years have seen me choosing the high country surprisingly often; bypassing the Upper Sacramento in favor of smaller, higher waters.

I don’t wholly understand the impulse; for all the extra work, the fish are generally smaller and the bugs less available, but the high country exerts a pull all its own. It’s gorgeous, the fish are naive and jewel-like, and there’s that nagging – if wholly delusional – sense that I might be the first person to cast a line in some of the less desirable places. (That’s utter rubbish, but it’s not as if the rest of human behavior is entirely rational either.)

And yes, having been raised by parents who grew up during the Great Depression, a part of me believes the stuff that’s too easily accomplished (drive to river, exit car, fish) inevitably leads to sloth (like watching too much TV) and rapid growth in your character flaws (like kicking dogs, cheating elderly widows, political aspirations, etc).

Don’t worry; you’ll be spared daily fitness reports, though with any luck, you’ll be around to read some of the fishing reports. Given the lack of snow so far this winter, you could be reading those reports months earlier than in prior years.

See you on the trail, Tom Chandler.

Technorati Tags: backcountry fly fishing, dead bodies on trails, Fly Fishing, fly fishing fitness, hiking

Early in the year, small stream trout exhibit the kind of easygoing eating habits fly fishermen tend to attribute to dumb, rural fish. Later in the year, those same trout get picky (fast), and they become immensely unhappy when fly rods and body parts intrude on their view.

He’s either hiding from trout or praying for a clear backcast.

Still, with clouds and drizzle in the forecast, I decided – despite a great big steaming pile of unfinished work – that I needed to fish a small alpine stream I’d somehow bypassed all year long.

I call it “Stream X” (and no, don’t bother writing to ask), and while it’s hardly a secret, it’s also not particularly well known, and given the paucity of truly good small streams around here, I’m sorta hoping it stays that way.

Off he goes, but not before I get a picture of those gorgeous colors.

With any luck, it might stay a little-fished stream. Finding it amidst a labyrinth of dirt roads is never easy (and I supposedly “know” where it is), but what’s most important is that it’s challenging fishing – especially when the water is low, and the fish spooky.

At the best of times, you need to sneak up on ‘em – and while the abundant snags and bushes provide some cover, they also make casting nearly impossible when you’re sneaking around like a frat boy outside a sorority house window.

The result is a daylong circus of snagged flies, improvised-on-the-spot casts, muffled obscenities, and yes – a handful of embarrassed brown trout.

That’s an embarrassed brown trout if I’ve ever seen one.

Helping matters a little was the drizzle, which at times turned to rain. Helping a lot less was the wind, which happily gusted pretty much every time something delicate was going on streamside. Or maybe it just seemed like it.

I fished Chris Raine’s 8′3″ 4wt hollowbuilt bamboo rod – a hair on the strong side for this stream, but useful when the wind blew. Raine was waving his new 8′3″ 5wt staggered ferrule design around, and after testing it for a bit, the only knock I had was that the rod didn’t display the native intelligence needed to avoid backcasts into trees (someday they’ll build one, trust me).

The 8′3″ 4wt and reel (manufacturers should pay me for this kind of photo placement).

Flies didn’t seem to matter (as long as they floated). I concluded the fly needed to bounce off overhanging grass in the stream or even scoot long the undercut banks themselves; not one of my six trout came out of a riffle or the middle of anywhere.

Most the browns we catch around here lack the bright red spots, but not these.

Chris did about the same, and after a bunch of hours spent skulking, knee walking, hunching, climbing over downed trees, and (yes), catching the odd trout, we were both pretty bushed.

Fall color was definitely on display up there.

Fortunately, we had less trouble finding the way out than the way in, and I drove away pretty pleased with the day – it was challenging fall dry fly fishing and I’d enjoyed modest success – but I wondered why I’d waited all year to get here, and if I’d make it back before the first snow closed the roads.

See you in the mountains, Tom Chandler.

fly fishing, fishing, fishing report, fly fishing small streams, small streams, brown trout, bamboo fly rod

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Technorati Tags: bamboo fly rod, brown trout, fishing, Fishing Report, Fly Fishing, fly fishing small streams, small streams

With 700 Billion good reasons to get the hell out of the house (and away from the news), the L&T, Wally the Wonderdog, and your intrepid reporter loomed up the daypacks and headed for the mountains once again.

I brought a fly rod, but fishing was second fiddle; after a couple hours of hiking, we found ourselves at a pair of mountain lakes (frequently visited and fished mountain lakes).

Hot damn; more beauty than you can shake a fly rod at.

Lately, I’ve been striking out on the mountain lakes like the Yankees have been striking out at the ballpark, and part of the reason is the timing; the lakes are still best in the evenings, but I’m usually dragging my flattened writer’s butt out by then.

No matter. Catching fish is a desirable byproduct of going fly fishing, but if it was all there was to the gig, then I’d probably stay home.

I won’t say things have been necessarily grim as of late, but at times, I clealry have lost sight of Wally the Wonderdog’s credo, where you find a little joy in every day, even if it’s simply because you’re sniffing a whole lot of new stuff in a pretty place.

Still, the Wonderdog’s very serious about his trout fishing, and I know beyond a doubt that he’s pretty fed up with me not catching trout, despite him helpfully pointing out the places where the trout obviously are:

“They’re right there, you schmuck. Catch one…”

Still, the focus was getting a little babe time outdoors in the company of the L&T – with all the stress, worries and hassles of everyday life stripped away. It’s a little like stepping into the kind of carefree existence we pretend we want before we clutter our lives to the point of madness.

In fact, to prove my point, I’m conducting a simple online test here on the Underground. Who would rather compile another STP report in a cubicle than do what the L&T’s doing?

The L&T at Upper Deadfall Lake: few fish, but quality napping.

I rest my case.

The fly fishing news? Not a single riser dotted the horizon, and as near as I could tell not a single trout attempted to burgle my streamer, Hare’s Ear soft hackle, Yong Special midge, or – and given all the hoppers around I was sure this would work – a grasshopper pattern.

Even wearing the Singlebarbed hat didn’t help.

It’s a short fishing report to be sure, but that’s the beauty of modern fly fishing; unlike our prehistoric fly fishing ancestors, you don’t go home skunked and hungry.

There are sandwiches and gorp to be eaten, and when you get out of the mountains and within cell range, there’s even a steaming pizza waiting at the pizza parlor.

I have no reason to print this other than I like it.

Still, at times I’ve used the phrase “your money or your life” to justify changes in my lifestyle that others would suggest weren’t in my best financial interest, and in a conversation this morning with a certain cranky rodmaker, I allowed as to how choosing “my life” over money in 1999 probably added a decade or two to my fast-diminshing urban lifespan.

As usual, I’m overcommitted when it comes to the words that have to be written, but I have managed to eek out time for another fly fishing trip later this week.

See you on the creek, Tom Chandler.

fly fishing, fishing, alpine lake, backcountry, hiking

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Technorati Tags: alpine lake, Backcountry, fishing, Fly Fishing, hiking

Fly fishing in the fall is akin to a high-wire balancing act; almost everything’s actually fishing well (or at least it should be starting to), and adding a high-stress note is the realization that almost all of the good fishing has a fast-running clock on it.

That’s fly-rod wielding Older Bro Chandler, checking out a lake we didn’t fly fish.

Fall is landing on the Mount Shasta area with both feet; yesterday morning it was 37 degrees at Trout Underground/Man Cave World Headquarters, and the acorns are hitting the ground hard (hard enough that you don’t want to stand under oak trees for long).

Once winter’s freezing temps and snows come, most of the fly fishing simply shuts down.

Of course, it’s also true that spring and summer fishing comes with a timer attached, but it never seems as brutally final as the end of the fall season, an error in perception that’s more a reflection of human psychology than reality.

It’s also a perception that’s unlikely to change soon.

So it’s fall, and my Oldest Brother is coming up, shiny new fly rod in tow.

He wants some room to learn to cast the thing, and he’s a monster backpacker and hiker, so we do what any fly fishing guerrillas would do; we headed for the hills, fly rod tubes strapped on our packs.

Hiking an uphill trail and fishing a downright beautiful lake.

Last winter, my brother and I attempted to cross country ski our way up a river canyon and over two ridges to visit a mountain lake; we didn’t quite make the last ridge before the legs turned to rubber, but today seemed like a golden opportunity to show him what we missed (sans eight-foot snowbanks).

The Trip Outshone the Fly Fishing

Unfortunately, the hiking was far better than the fishing – though no, I wouldn’t trade the whole enterprise for a ten-pound trout.

Grey clouds scudded by overhead (sometimes at warp speed), and though I humped in my better-than-a-decade-old Bucks Bag float tube, I never used it, figuring we’d get hit by a “pack that thing and let’s get out of here” thunderstorm the minute it got wet.

The trail was damned steep, and I had a chance to regret the extra weight while dragging my butt (and my float tube’s butt) up a fair amount of seemingly vertical trail.

Wally the Wonderdog, alert for risers (he didn’t see any)

Unfortunately, the brookies were largely a no-show; my brother landed one, but I was across the lake and didn’t get a picture.

Later – fishing this year’s theme fly (a big, glittery streamer that I’d have told you was too big by half for this lake) – I hooked up with something that gave me two ponderous head shakes before it sawed my line through on some downed timber.

Deep breaths, don’t swear…

Fly Fishing & Hope

Was that a big brookie? Who knows, though several years ago I caught a beautiful 14″ male in spawning colors from this same lake, and a spin fisherman claimed to have taken home a 16″ brookie (of course) a year later.

Among fly fishermen, it’s not so much an article of hope as it is a given; lakes always contain at least one great big trout – even alpine lakes, where the growing season is hellaciously short.

Downed timber is good for fishing, but bad for landing.

In the end, my brother made amazing progress with his cast, and we both hiked back out with a sense of having accomplished something, even if that something didn’t include photographs of a brook trout.

Wally the Wonderdog sniffed everything in sight, big eyes laughing and his necktie-sized tongue hanging out the side of his jaw, and then he collapsed in the back seat and slept all the way home (and all evening).

Dogs can do that; they’ll double your mileage during the day, and then while you’re running the day’s activities through the deeply flawed Human Perception/Tortured Writer/What’s It All Mean filter, they’re happily dreaming of chasing rabbits.

The Nitty Gritty Fly Fishing Gear Details

8.5′ of James Beasley-built bamboo fly rod goodness (and a much-abused Ballan reel)

Because I was tired of technology and glitter – and needed a packable 3-pc fly rod – I fished an 8.5′ 5wt bamboo fly rod built many years ago by James Beasley. I haven’t fished it in a while, and like any great fly rod, it left me wondering why that had come to pass.

Based on an exceptional Orvis taper taken off a rod built in early 1945, the rod might be a teensy bit delicate for an alpine lake, but it made the roll casts I needed (and you need a lot of them here), and handled the breezy, gusty winds just fine.

Flies ranged from a #14 Hare’s Ear Soft Hackle to some kind of rabbit-haired Zonker streamer (the fly that produced a visit with Mr. Ponderous Head Shake), though I also admit to hanging a chironimid (midge pupae) under a stick-on indicator for a half hour (just long enough to remind me why I never do it unless the fish are really jumping on the rig).

In truth – given the cloudy skies and impending winter – when this lake will freeze over – I expected more aggressive fish, but brook trout also spawn in the fall, and I wonder if they weren’t preoccupied (this is the kind of fish psychology I can understand).

The small pile of filleted brookie carcasses left on the bank suggests there aren’t as many trout in the lake as their used to be, though “fished out” is the coward’s way out.

There’s plenty of brookies there; I just didn’t catch any.

How Much is Left?

The question now – at the end of September – is how many alpine trips are waiting for me this year? The first big snowstorm doesn’t usually arrive until just before the holidays, but we often get something just before thanksgiving – a storm often big enough to close the higher trails and lakes.

Then there’s the little matter of the Upper Sacramento, which will turn on at some point (though never as early as people think). Then there’s the McCloud (which closes to fishing November 15 – a deadline shared by many rivers in the state), and Stream X, and the Rogue, and… you get the picture.

See you on the river, Tom Chandler.

Technorati Tags: alpine lake, bamboo fly rod, fishing, Fly Fishing, fly fishing the high country, wally the wonderdog

With big bugs (and bigger trout) elevating blood pressures all over the Upper Sacramento, McCloud and Upper Rogue, walking seven miles to catch nine-inch brookies isn’t necessarily an act of sanity.

Then again, most fly fishermen fail The Sanity Test at some point ("you mean you let them go?!"), and there’s no denying the beauty of alpine brook trout — or the places you find them.

An alpine brook trout. Bad picture, gorgeous fish.

The view from the trail. (Don’t walk and look at the same time.)

My brother Scott hiking in. Note the similar but less handsome features.

The landscape dwarfs us (which is part of the attraction)

 
Today on Oprah: Wildflowers and the bees who love them.

With my older brother in town, we headed up into the mountains to find what a travel agent might call a Quality Solitary Fly Fishing Experience.

A backpacker (they’re almost as weird as fly fishermen), he’s recently taken up high country fishing and wanted a few hints.

Typically, I caught fish, but had little idea why, and explaining to a novice why brook trout would eat an Adams dry when there weren’t any bugs on the surface isn’t easy (you try it).

The WonderTroutDog.

The biggest brookie was probably 10 inches in length, but clearly, the true length of any fish involves a complex equation, the variables of which include the setting, your mood, the weather, and the amount of effort you put into catching it.

By that measure, our biggest brookie was probably closer to 15 inches, but of course they weren’t — which is why this week will find me fishing the rivers mentioned above for bigger trout.

No trip is complete with the antics of Wally the Wonderdog, who ranged all over the landscape, and once we were on the road home, conked.

Wally the Wonderdog crashes.

Then again, I conked too – a reminder I’ve got more hikes ahead of me before I’m in any kind of backcountry shape.

Just before we left, our somewhat pristine environment was fouled by the arrival of a couple ATVs, one of the drivers of which really, really liked the word "f*ck," being as he used it as a noun, verb, adjective, and yes — a comma.

It was a jarring reminder that civilization still existed outside of our little alpine bubble, for better or worse.

Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch

I’m not going to pass along every rumor and story as if they were the truth, but it’s possible Chris Raine was fishing the Upper Sac and saw his backing while Dave Roberts was fishing the Upper Rogue and apparently saw god.

Others report mixed results; big bugs and fish one night, and nothing the next.

Naturally — with the fly fishing picking up all around me — it’s my cue to come down with a cold, which seems to be making the rounds up here.

Still, I’ll be out there, and I expect more than a few of you will too.

See you on the river, Tom Chandler.

Technorati Tags: alpine lakes, Backcountry, brook trout, fishing, Fishing Report, Fly Fishing, wally the wonderdog

That motley crew over at GoBlog tore themselves away from Battlestar Galactica reruns long enough to post an item that should interest any bluelining/brownlining/stream-seeking fly fisherman:

Google Maps added a "Terrain" feature last fall, and it was decent — yeah, cool, I can look at terrain features, whatever. Well, Google just announced that it added contour lines to its maps, making them pretty comparable to USGS topos. It looks like trails and campgrounds are even marked in most national parks.

Cool. Now you’ll know exactly how much suffering you’ll undergo discovering if that thin blue line holds fish or not.

 
The Upper Sac with contours (What–I’m going to reveal a secret?)

Then again, suffering is bad, the backcountry’s filled with dangerous, carnivorous predators, and the scattered fish are small anyway, so it’s probably best just to fish where everybody else does. I’m just saying is all.

Still, for masochists with a death wish (backcountry = danger), Google Maps is useful and yes — free. We like free.

See you suffering horribly, Tom Chandler.

Technorati Tags: contour maps, fishing the backcountry, Fly Fishing, goblog, google maps

 
30 pounds of float tube, fishing gear, lunch, backpack and alpine lake add up to a pretty picture.

With the Upper Sacramento fishing a little slow, I’ve been dying to get up into the backcountry and chase some alpine Brook trout.

There’s a simple way to accomplish that (put fly rod & flies in daypack, walk to lake, fish, walk home), but in my tortured mind, the simple route is akin to wimping out. Instead, I crammed 30 pounds of float tube and gear into my Osprey pack, and — loaded down like a water buffalo headed to market — off I went.

Slowly.

The drive up to the trailhead was sobering; the South Fork of the Upper Sacramento is moving so little water, it’s become a series of standing pools with only a trickle of water at the heads. The lack of a snowpack is really taking its toll on that little stream, and I can’t imagine the wild fish populations are faring too well.

Damn.

It’s not a fishery that sees a lot of fly fishers — and the trout are mostly tiny – but I fish there several times each spring, and it hurts to see an old friend fallen on hard times.

Hiking. More Hiking.

It took me an hour and a half to reach the first lake. It was predictably gorgeous, though it lacked the essential “happy little trout jumping for joy” element.

In fact, there was damned little happening at all.

In the fall, these alpine lakes sometimes don’t wake up until the afternoon, but I think I’m a couple weeks ahead of “fall.” Things could be slow until early evening.

Still, I fired up the float tube — my decade-old Bucks Bags Mustang that has seen a lot of water with me — and fished.

Two hours — and two missed fish — later, the float tube idea wasn’t looking so great. So — like all manly backcountry types, I altered the plan to fit the conditions.

“Gosh” you say — striking your forehead with your palm. “This Chandler guy is freakin’ brilliant.”

And though modesty prevents me from agreeing publicly (it’s true), the fact remains I got out of the float tube, wandered down to the next small alpine lake, and caught:

 
The Official Char of the Trout Underground — just revving up the spawning colors.

Although time was limited, I managed to hang several Brookies and a pair of rainbows.

These were brightly colored, pretty Brookies (of course, they weren’t effeminate or un-manly), and I’d guess they’re starting to rev up the spawning colors for the fall.

Catching them was (as my fishing friend Howard used to say) “pure fun on a stick.” They seemed uninterested in floating ant and parachute patterns, so I switched to a #16 Hare’s Ear soft hackle, stripped it back slowly and irregularly, and set the hook when the fly’s tiny mylar wingcase disappeared.

I never cease to marvel at how I don’t feel 90% of the takes I actually see, and it makes me wonder what I’m missing whenever I fish beneath the surface.

Fly fishermen like to think of ourselves as largely Death From Above on trout, but evidence suggests that — as crafty predators — we rank somewhere just above the Three Stooges.

Picture Imperfect

Sadly, I only have three photographs of the whole trip. Turns out some dolt left the digital camera’s memory card sitting on his desk, and didn’t realize it until the Dolt used up the camera’s minimal internal memory.

In other words, the three pictures you’re seeing in this report are the only three pictures that exist. (Hopefully, no one asks for a refund.)

The Bucks Bags Mustang sitting pretty.

More Hiking.

Finally, a group of ATVs showed up, creating huge clouds of dust by spinning donuts on the bare dirt, so I packed up the gear and headed up the steep, rutted road, which lead to the even steeper rocky trail up the ridge, which lead to the up and down trail back to the trailhead.

All that lead to some sore legs, which lead me to thinking I’m not as young as I used to be, but clearly, that thinking is counterproductive.

After all, I’m still young enough to catch Brookies.

[tags]fly fishing, fishing, brook trout, brookie, backcountry, the high country[/tags]

I spent 6.5 hours in a car to fly fish 7.5 hours for trout I knew weren’t going to exceed 11 inches in size, yet by the complex calculus we use to define our fly fishing experience, I’m pretty damn happy with the bottom line.

Dave Roberts fishing a 7.5′ 4wt on a small, southern Oregon stream

After all, small streams aren’t about magazine-cover hero shots or an endless stream of big dumb fish. Small streams are one of the branches of the sport where you truly embrace the role of predator (if you don’t, you’ll be a largely fishless fisherman), and the intimacy of the setting is wildly seductive.

It’s really just you and the fish (well, not exactly; see “word of the day” below), and when you mess up and spook a good one, you marvel at the finely honed instincts trout use to survive in a tough, predator-friendly environment.

That’s provided, of course, you’re not throwing a temper tantrum at spooking him.

Bluelining For Dummies

Dave Roberts called, said he’s been doing a little bluelining, and hinted he was onto something. When I heard that, I (once again) abandoned my adult responsibilities, drove north to Southern Oregon, met up with Roberts, and like a pair of rugged, extra-manly mountain men, we headed into the mountains (only with paved roads, a powerful truck, cell phones, modern fly fishing gear, electrolyte replacement drinks and air conditioning).

Beautiful, but a little on the minuscule size; an alpine brown trout

Our first stop was beautiful, but surprisingly bereft of eager trout. The stream looked like it should be loaded with fish — and it probably was — but sometimes these alpine streams don’t wake up until the afternoon.

After we scratched out a handful of finger-sized rainbow and brown trout, we decided it was time for Plan B.

“Plan B” was another blue line on a map — a slightly smaller and even prettier stream that turned out to be filled with small trout.

Between streams, Roberts and I took a few minutes, sat on the tailgate, and ate a late lunch. In those minutes, we ran through a whole laundry list of the world’s problems, neatly solving them between bites of our by-now soggy sandwiches.

It’s a recurring theme on our trips, and it’s one of the reasons we fish together so frequently. At the very least, it’s one of the payoffs of fishing with a good friend (it’s not the soggy sandwiches).

Today’s Word: Deadfall

Alpine small streams are known for their difficult conditions, and ours are largely defined by the amount of dead trees scattered about. In fact, 80% of our alpine stream fishing time is spent in the following activities:

• Stepping over deadfall
• Climbing over deadfall
• Slithering under deadfall
• Straddling deadfall
• Walking on top of deadfall
• Walking around deadfall
• Tripping on hidden deadfall

After a while, deadfalls ceases to be just wood on the ground; it becomes a tormenting entity placed in your path by a vengeful god, who clearly wants you to lose a lot of weight or break a leg.

Dave Roberts in the stream — the only deadfall-free place in the area.

After a few hours of hand-to-deadwood combat, a good forest fire looks like a reasonable, sane alternative to even fifteen minutes more climbing, slithering and cursing, and you wonder why the forest service bothers to extinguish the things. Fire is our friend, right?

On the other hand, a well positioned piece of deadfall can provide cover to a stealthy fly fisher, providing what may prove to be deadwood’s sole redeeming feature. In fact, that’s today’s question, Undergrounders: Deadfall — friend or foe?

Back to Plan B

Stuffed with sandwiches, we hit the Plan B stream, and immediately started getting bites. The variety was impressive; Dave Roberts actually scored a Brookie/brown/rainbow Grand Slam from a single riffle.

I managed rainbows and browns, but ironically — given the Underground’s full-fledged embrace of all things Brookie — a brook trout evaded me.

An alpine Brookie. Why did they shun me?

At one point, my patience also evaded me, and Dave was forced to quickdraw his flask of 15 year-old whiskey to keep me from breaking my fly rod over my leg.

Fortunately, the fish started coming from the places you think they would, and after the morning’s beating, we were recognizably fly fishing a small alpine stream again.

Finally — after several hours of fishing our way up the Plan B stream (and running out of water along the way) — we turned and hiked out (over acres of deadfall, natch).

The Gear

You can start a pretty good fight on the Internet message boards by simply asking “what is the ultimate small stream fly rod?”

The answer, of course, is that there isn’t one, and I proved it pretty conclusively yesterday. I fished an 8.5′ 4wt Diamondglass that was a pain when maneuvering through tight spaces, but a joy once I actually got to fish it.

By contrast, I used a 7.5′ 4wt hollowbuilt cane rod (by Chris Raine) on the Plan B stream, and found it far less painful in wooded and restrictive spaces, but not quite as useful when pitching bugs at fish.

I don’t think the answer is an 8′ 4wt; I think the answer is to make your own choice and start avoiding contentious message boards. Dave fished some a 7.5 4wt cane rod and Hardy reel (he’s soooo predictable) while I fished my 4wts with an Orvis CFO III reel (which Orvis wants you to think is a 5/6 wt reel but handles a DT4 nicely).

I told him I prefer the quieter Orvis over the Hardy reel because I’m a classic, understated genius while he’s a loud, obnoxious redneck, and all he said was “what’s your point?”

Well played, Roberts.

My only gear oddity is my recent embrace of a small North Face hydration pack, which also has room for a minimal amount of gear. I use a small Orvis pouch on a Lanyard — big enough for one good-sized fly box — and the whole rig allows me to carry a fair amount of water and the simple fly selection needed for small streams, and to do so far more comfortably than with simply a vest or chest pack.

It’s today’s tip, absolutely free of charge.

Since I’ve got real work to do, I leave you with a moment of fly fishing zen (again at no charge):

See you on the blueline, Tom Chandler.

[tags]fly fishing, fishing, fly fishing small streams, bluelining, backcountry, dave roberts[/tags]

Participation in outdoor activities like hunting, fishing & backpacking is falling, and one of the reasons bandied about is the lack of generational support. In other words, if your parents don’t introduce you to the outdoors, chances are you won’t go there — and your kids won’t either.

That’s why — on the heels of our Family Glamping Nightmare Post — this well-written piece on the Salon site (by Gary Kamiya) caught my eye; it’s about a man who caught the outdoor bug after it seemingly skipped a generation in his family. Great stuff:

My grandfather first went to Buck Lake, in California’s Emigrant Wilderness, just north of Yosemite, in 1937. He and his buddies hiked 16 miles to the lake (his pals rode horses part of the way, but he insisted on walking) and spent a week or two fly-fishing, telling tall tales and having a great old time. Grandpa’s Buck Lake trips went on for 30 years, until he was in his 70s, and became a part of my family’s lore. Grandpa was born in 1894, and he remembered a horse-drawn wagon trip he and his family took across Northern California as the great adventure of his life. He started delivering the mail on a rural route in a horse-drawn buggy. He was part of that single, remarkable generation of Americans who went from growing up in an agrarian-dominated society before cars — a life in many ways little different from that of a medieval peasant — to witnessing the moon landing.

Later in the piece, we read this:

But the Buck Lake tradition didn’t die. Grandpa never took his own children there, but David decided to revive the expeditions. He organized a backpack with his two sons and two of his nephews, my cousin Jonathan and me. We hiked in and had a glorious time. That was 32 years ago, and various combinations of the clan have been going in ever since.

You can read the entire article here. It instantly made me nostalgic for the Fall camping/backpacking get-together featuring my three other brothers. On the surface, it was a chance to reconnect our somewhat far flung lives, but in truth, there was always something far more interesting (and revealing) going on. Time for it to happen again, eh?

See you in the wilderness, Tom Chandler.

[tags]backpacking, wilderness, camping[/tags]

When the Fourth of July comes to town in the form of thousands of visitors, you have to decide between embracing the mob, or running for the mountains for a little fly fishing. Guess what?

This lake’s a hike away. This fish is a Brookie. (L&T Nancy photo)

The L&T Nancy, Wally the Wonderdog, and the humble Trout Underground headed for hills, and hiked for 90 minutes to a pair of lakes I love to fish, mostly because they’re filled with Brookies.

Strangely, I found more than I bargained for; at one point, I’d cast to the left and catch a small rainbow trout from a pod of them (who stocked the rainbows?). Cast to the right and I’d get bit by a Brookie.

Little wonder Brook Trout are the Official Char of the Trout Underground.

The rainbows were new, and I can’t help but think they were recently stocked in this tiny alpine lake. Damn. Advocating for one species of fish over another nowadays can bring charges of finny ethnic cleansing from the more righteous among the fly fishing world, so all I’m going to say is that I like Brookies, native or not.

Of course, no backcountry adventure is just about the fishing. The trail runs along the top of the ridgeline, so you alternate between stunning views to the east and then the west.

Once you arrive, you’re greeted with vistas like this:

If you don’t like this, then check for a pulse; you may be dead.

In fact, I fished two small lakes, though one proved far more productive. The L&T Nancy and the Wonderdog swam in the upper lake, giving me a chance to fish without Wally’s attempts to retrieve the trout once I hooked them.

Later, Wally found his own way down to my spot and took up sentinel duty, watching for rising fish. Twice he spotted one, helpfully swimming out to the riseform, apparently unclear on the concept of cruising fish.

Wally the Wonderdog waits… (L&T Nancy photo)

Hiking & Fishing the Backcountry

It was a hot day and even at the 6000′+ altitudes, our hiking trio suffered the heat. In fact, the Wonderdog — whose dark coat soaks up every erg of light energy — stopped often for water breaks on the trail, and today, his usual morning bounciness is gone, replaced by… sleep.

I know how he feels; I’m moving a little slowly myself. Still, the hike isn’t necessarily the poor part of the journey, and in the interest of providing even a teensy bit of “how-to” information, I’m including the rare Underground Gear Photograph:

I know that fly fishers obsess about fly rods, but in the backcountry, your boots are what carry you to the fish, so make sure the damned things fit — and well. Lots of people are wearing trail shoes (the Montrail trail shoes seem to be popular choices among the lightweight backpacking set), though I prefer the ankle support of lightweight hiking boots. (Bay Area fishers who like to hike should check out the newly remodeled Two-Heel Drive blog for information.)

As for fly rods, you need something capable of protecting midges on 6x tippet, yet suited to a little wind. An overlooked characteristic is the need for a roll cast; these alpine lakes are usually ringed by trees and offer few wading opportunities, so you either hump in a float tube or work on that roll cast.

I know that fly fishers want to fish their 3wts in alpine lakes because the fish are typically small, but the winds are big and you’re often making some long casts. I like to fish an 8.5′ 5wt Steffen Brothers fiberglass rod, though I could easily go with a 6wt.

In the interest of being a weight weenie, I’ll point out that wet wading is typically lovely in the summer, and that a pair of flip flops weigh little and do an OK job, though they don’t offer much protection.

Water Everywhere. Or Die.

When it’s hot, water is your best friend, and we twice ran into well-meaning but underequipped groups on the trail who lacked enough water. That’s bad.

Both the L&T Nancy and I went through the contents of our hydration packs, and even though the hike was only in the 1.5-2 hour range, we stopped frequently to make sure Wally the Wonderdog got enough water to keep the canine swamp cooler running.

Until next time, see you in the backcountry, Tom Chandler.

[tags]fly fishing, fishing, backcountry, high country, alpine lake, [/tags]