salmonoid
Well-known member
- Joined
- Jun 19, 2007
- Messages
- 2,707
At the beginning of last week, a plan began to come together that would put me in NC PA for a few days at the end of the week. I just had a few details to work out - how to get there, how to take a day off work, and how to gain permission from my spouse to do all of the above. Thankfully, everything came together and Thursday night, I found myself pulling into a parking lot in the woods. I had thrown a second tent in while packing, thinking I would set that up Thursday night (since I hate the thought of carrying the extra weight of a rain or dew soaked tent) but didn't feel like setting it up. Plan B was to sleep in the truck bed, but there was a threat of rain Friday morning, and while I had packed a second sleeping bag for the same reason I had packed a second tent, I also didn't feel like waking up with me rain-soaked or dew-soaked. So I settled that by deciding to sleep in the truck.
First order of business, though, was to do some night prospecting for trout. In particular, a hole near where I was parked has produced 2 fish on 2 trips, so I figured I'd try for a third. I was last there in September, and caught one of the ugliest browns of the year at night. This time, the stream was markedly lower and was also filled with leaves. Last time, I was fishing by the light of a partial moon, but this time, the moon was at a scant 4% and wouldn't rise until early morning. The first time there this summer, the sky was lit up with the stars and thousands of fireflies, making for one of the more surreal fishing experiences I've had in a while. This time, it was just cold starlight that greeted me. The cold had driven the fireflies away and the twinkle of far off stars glanced off the top of the stream. On the fifth cast, there was the satisfying slurp and gurgle of a take, and I set the hook, only to come up empty. I fished down to the tail of the pool, and then back up through, and the chill of the night air began to set in. There was not a cloud visible; it would be cold tonight, I thought. Back to the stream; a few more casts, and boom, a fish crushed the mouse, and this time, it was hooked. I reeled it in, only to find the same old ugly brown I had caught in September. This is either one sick looking wild fish, or what a stocker looks like by the end of a season..
However, three trips to the hole yielded three fish caught, so I couldn't complain with that, and opted to goto bed. There's not a whole lot of room in a Tacoma for a six foot guy to sleep, but I crawled into my sleeping bag, put the seat back, and drifted off to sleep. I woke up with cold feet; thin socks in sleeping bag on a cold floor do not for comfort make. I woke up again to the sound of rain; it seems the decision to sleep inside was a good one, despite the discomfort. Finally, around 7:30, I got up for good. The initial rain had been a brief shower, but it intensified as I began packing my backpack and making some breakfast. Finally, a little before 9, the rain stopped, and I was on my way.
The first half mile of the stream fished poorly. It warms in the summer, so its not surprising that the trout had migrated elsewhere. Fishing such stream stretches has a tendency to lull one into a false sense of not paying attention, so I perked up pretty quickly when two browns came out from a stump. Normally, when browns chase a fly or other lure, they generally pull up when the action on the fly stops. But not this guy. As soon as I started moving the rod again, this fellow charged and struck. This pattern would be repeated two other times; the browns in the lower part of the stream were super aggressive, and had a three or four inch patch of blue coloring behind their gill plate.
I had come here based on a fairly good fishing experience I had in September, but that feat, at least in terms of numbers, was not to be replicated in October. What did excel was the fall colors, and the shades of brown, and the birds. I saw dozens of them; no doubt they are there in the summertime, but with the leaves off the trees, they're all the more visible now. I saw at least eight grouse; nothing like having one of them come blasting off away from you, while you're standing in the middle of a small stream!
I discovered of a beaver dam, where one had not been this summer..
Not a big dam, mind you, but one large enough to at least maintain a small pool level, in what was otherwise low water conditions. I was pleasantly surprised to pick up a brownie, just a few inches upstream from the dam; he must have been hiding under a few leaves, because I never saw him, until I practically lifted my line out of the water.
The beaver's lodge was there and his paths into the streamside brush were clearly visible as well. And finally, from his pool, I caught my first brookie. What was interesting is that just prior to catching the brookie, I foul-hooked a bright yellow leaf. I have no idea what my retrieve mimicked, but a larger brookie charged out of nowhere, and just started chomping on the leaf. It was quite comical.
Proof that water levels are at fall lows - practically all the smaller order tributaries are bone dry.
I continued to fish upstream, as the morning passed. I did not see many fish, and of the fish I did see, only a single set was paired up at the tail of a pool, starting the dance. The fish I did catch were beautiful, especially the two and three year old fish.
One guy has the genes to become a big daddy some day, if he survives the next several years. I caught a handful that had a very prominent high back. They reminded me of miniature versions of some stocker pigs of brookies I've caught over the years.
I was hoping to get into some big browns on the trip, especially in a stretch that I had fished in September, but other than a single fish that I hooked, who jumped out of the water, gave a head shake, and was off, I didn't see a single brown in that stretch during my trip upstream during the day.
I arrived at my campsite in the middle of the afternoon, half-starved. I made some lunch around 3PM (noodle soup, and pepperoni cheese bread - is there anything that tastes bad in the woods?), and setup camp. And with AccuWeather calling for a low of 21, I decided a fire would be a good choice for the night, so I gathered a mess of downed wood. And I did something I haven't done for awhile - I did absolutely nothing for about an hour.
Of course, the days are getting shorter, so the opportunity for night fishing presented itself sooner rather than later. I started out with a size 8 rubber legged olive wooly bugger. These were some purchased flies that I got over the summer and they are a trifle removed from what I consider to be a wooly bugger. But, I had them and decided to try one.
After about a dozen casts to the middle of a pool I was fishing, I heard a huge splash, but not from the middle of the pool I was casting to. Instead, the splash was from the top of the channel of the stream, upstream from me. I continued to cast to the pool I was fishing, but was of course immensely curious about the splash. Another dozen casts later, and I felt the line go tight on a strip. I could see a flash of white as the fish came near, but I could tell by the way that he did not bend the rod that I hadn't tied into a bruiser. Nonetheless, I was extremely pleased to hbring my first night-time brookie to hand! And it was another high-back brookie, like the one I had caught earlier in the day.
With the headlamp on, and after releasing the fish, I decided to spot the head of the pool, where I had heard the splash. I thought the splash was a little bit closer to me, but didn't see anything in that part of the stream. But about ten feet upstream from there, I saw the beady reflective eyes of a fish caught in the glare of a headlamp. And this fish WAS a bruiser. He was hanging out in the water, looking every much like a lion hunting prey on a savannah; he had predator written all over him. He didn't exactly move away from the light, but he also didn't care for it. He took a look at the bugger when I threw it his way, but eventually swam slowly under the rock ledge. I turned my efforts back to the pool, casting every now and then upstream, but nothing took the bugger.
The night was growing colder so I went back to the fire for a bit. And I also realized I hadn't eaten supper yet, so I cooked some of that up while the night advanced. I decided to switch over to my trusty deer hair mouse for the next wave and I returned to cast with that. I prospected the pool for a bit, but could not generate any strikes. I flipped the headlamp on and shone it upstream again; the bruiser was not out, but a smaller fish, maybe 16", had taken his place. After a bit, he tired of the light and swam downstream a few feet and disappeared. The fish did something that was a first for me to observe; he burrowed himself down into the leaves that had accumulated at the bottom of the stream!
I went back to the fire again and kept thinking about the larger fish I had hooked and lost in the afternoon. I decided to give it a try at night, even though it meant a cold night-time walk downstream, for a quarter of a mile. I started walking, and with no moon, had to use the headlamp. Brookies are very distinguishable from browns at night for two reasons:
1) They are much more reflective, an almost silvery white fish in the water;
2) They are spastic; each brookie that the light would shine on would zig and zag across the stream in a frenetic manner, trying to escape the light. The browns, on the other hand, would almost allow you to walk up on them, before they would move out of the way.
Because of using the headlamp, what I discovered as I walked downstream is that all the holes that I had spotted fish in during my September trip and that had appeared to be barren earlier that afternoon, had fish of the relatively same size as I had spotted in the same spots in September. This was interesting to me for two reasons; first, I was puzzled where the fish had disappeared to that afternoon (burrowed in the leaves?), almost wondering if another angler had fished ahead of me and put them down, and secondly, it appeared the fish literally had not moved from their respective hole in a month. The 18" brown I caught in September was in his lie, the smaller brown was in the hole below him and a brown in between in size was in the hole above the 18" brown. And the sporadic, spastic brookie showed up every now and then as well.
Unfortunately for me, I misjudged the location of the hole I wanted to fish, and had my lamp powered on too close, as I arrived. I would have preferred to walk the last hundred yards in darkness, but instead, lit up the rock ledge above the stream as I approached, until I realized I had arrived. Perhaps unsurprisingly, fishing there yielded no results. I tried fishing upstream on the way back but caught only a tree branch. As midnight approached, I decided it was time for supper's dessert and cooked up some apple crisp (or what passes for it in the form of a freeze-dried dessert; it turned out to be the worse part of the food I was carrying).
Back to the pool where I was camping, I decided to try fishing the head of the pool, where I had spotted to the two fish earlier. I inched my way downstream and cast, the mouse making that satisfying SPLAT as it hit the water each time. But I generated no hits. With the temperature dropping, I experienced something that is usually reserved for steelhead fishing - my rod ferrules started to freeze up. I went back to fishing the middle of the pool, and eventually tied the bugger on as a dropper. I had two small strikes on this setup, but did not hook the fish, and eventually, the thought of going to sleep crept into my head, and that idea gained traction, so to the Shangri-La I went at 2AM.
Despite the falling temperatures, I remained warm enough and fell into an uneventful sleep. At least until sometime later in the night, probably about 5AM. I awoke from a deep sleep, half aware that something had just happened. Its probably happened to you, where you awake, half groggy, semi-conscious that something woke you up. Only a few seconds after I awoke, I was fully conscious of what woke me up - it was the Yip..Yip...Yip of a coyote, that couldn't have been more than a hundred yards away. It wasn't a howl, it was more like a coyote whoop. Even though I think I could take a coyote if I had to, I settled deeper into the sleeping bag and pulled my hat tighter over my head, and wondered what I'd do if Wiley decided I looked like food, while I was out walking earlier in the dark. Apparently, I fell back asleep, because the next time I woke up, it was 9:30AM and the sun was shining. I was greeted by what was apparently a terminal frost; plants were drooped, and the ground was covered with a heavy frost.
I checked my portable weather station after I got out of the tent and it was completely frosted over. I rubbed the frost off to take a look at the overnight temperature - 20 degrees.
Coffee and some warm blueberry granola and some pudding and some mandarin oranges helped get the internal furnace started, and the fire was still smoldering from the night before, so it came to life fairly quickly.
I snapped a few pictures; the valley wall to the east of me was still hidden in shade and frost. The valley wall to the west of me was bathed in the cold morning sunshine. The trees had mostly lost their leaves there, and the frost of the night had hasten the leaf fall of the remaining trees that still bore their adornment.
When I was out filtering some water the prior day, the stream I was using was more or less dry; however, there is one small waterfall hole that usually holds water, and so I had sneaked up on it to see if it also held fish. It had at least six two-year old brookies in it and when I returned that morning, I discovered it also had about six year-old brookies in it too. Everything scattered when I stood up and I watched the one two-year old fish burrow his way into the leaves, just like the brown had done the night before.
I returned back to the campsite and spent a lazy morning, waiting for things to dry out, and the air to warm up. Morning turned into early afternoon, and I decided I might as well make lunch. As I was cooking, I heard a rustle in the leaves beside me. I looked down, expecting to see something from the herp family slithering out, but instead, it was just Mr. Toad.
After lunch, and with the backpack packed up, I began my meander downstream. Part of the way down, I came upon a part of the stream that had been cut off by the main stem by the dropping water levels. I could see three fish in it; when I cast, a fourth fish came rocketing out from under a log and smacked my offering and I missed it. However, a short while later, I brought the prettiest brookie of the trip to hand.
And three times, while I continued my hike out, I was reminded that I was not alone.
About a mile before I reached the vehicle, I spotted a lone deer. She raised her tail as a white sentinel but didn't run away; we passed within a few tens of yards of each other, me munching on a granola bar and her seeking for a few blades of green that had escaped the frost.
I went into the woods, hoping to catch the brownies in the same strain of aggressiveness that they were in September; this held true for the bottom part of the stream, but definitely not the part that I fished in September. I was hoping to see some of the brookies begin their dance, but only came across a single pair that were beginning to follow each other. I watched the plant life whither, as it literally had the life frozen out of it overnight. I caught fish, but caught way more leaves. The fishing wasn't great, but maybe that gave me more of a chance to do nothing and relax.
First order of business, though, was to do some night prospecting for trout. In particular, a hole near where I was parked has produced 2 fish on 2 trips, so I figured I'd try for a third. I was last there in September, and caught one of the ugliest browns of the year at night. This time, the stream was markedly lower and was also filled with leaves. Last time, I was fishing by the light of a partial moon, but this time, the moon was at a scant 4% and wouldn't rise until early morning. The first time there this summer, the sky was lit up with the stars and thousands of fireflies, making for one of the more surreal fishing experiences I've had in a while. This time, it was just cold starlight that greeted me. The cold had driven the fireflies away and the twinkle of far off stars glanced off the top of the stream. On the fifth cast, there was the satisfying slurp and gurgle of a take, and I set the hook, only to come up empty. I fished down to the tail of the pool, and then back up through, and the chill of the night air began to set in. There was not a cloud visible; it would be cold tonight, I thought. Back to the stream; a few more casts, and boom, a fish crushed the mouse, and this time, it was hooked. I reeled it in, only to find the same old ugly brown I had caught in September. This is either one sick looking wild fish, or what a stocker looks like by the end of a season..
However, three trips to the hole yielded three fish caught, so I couldn't complain with that, and opted to goto bed. There's not a whole lot of room in a Tacoma for a six foot guy to sleep, but I crawled into my sleeping bag, put the seat back, and drifted off to sleep. I woke up with cold feet; thin socks in sleeping bag on a cold floor do not for comfort make. I woke up again to the sound of rain; it seems the decision to sleep inside was a good one, despite the discomfort. Finally, around 7:30, I got up for good. The initial rain had been a brief shower, but it intensified as I began packing my backpack and making some breakfast. Finally, a little before 9, the rain stopped, and I was on my way.
The first half mile of the stream fished poorly. It warms in the summer, so its not surprising that the trout had migrated elsewhere. Fishing such stream stretches has a tendency to lull one into a false sense of not paying attention, so I perked up pretty quickly when two browns came out from a stump. Normally, when browns chase a fly or other lure, they generally pull up when the action on the fly stops. But not this guy. As soon as I started moving the rod again, this fellow charged and struck. This pattern would be repeated two other times; the browns in the lower part of the stream were super aggressive, and had a three or four inch patch of blue coloring behind their gill plate.
I had come here based on a fairly good fishing experience I had in September, but that feat, at least in terms of numbers, was not to be replicated in October. What did excel was the fall colors, and the shades of brown, and the birds. I saw dozens of them; no doubt they are there in the summertime, but with the leaves off the trees, they're all the more visible now. I saw at least eight grouse; nothing like having one of them come blasting off away from you, while you're standing in the middle of a small stream!
I discovered of a beaver dam, where one had not been this summer..
Not a big dam, mind you, but one large enough to at least maintain a small pool level, in what was otherwise low water conditions. I was pleasantly surprised to pick up a brownie, just a few inches upstream from the dam; he must have been hiding under a few leaves, because I never saw him, until I practically lifted my line out of the water.
The beaver's lodge was there and his paths into the streamside brush were clearly visible as well. And finally, from his pool, I caught my first brookie. What was interesting is that just prior to catching the brookie, I foul-hooked a bright yellow leaf. I have no idea what my retrieve mimicked, but a larger brookie charged out of nowhere, and just started chomping on the leaf. It was quite comical.
Proof that water levels are at fall lows - practically all the smaller order tributaries are bone dry.
I continued to fish upstream, as the morning passed. I did not see many fish, and of the fish I did see, only a single set was paired up at the tail of a pool, starting the dance. The fish I did catch were beautiful, especially the two and three year old fish.
One guy has the genes to become a big daddy some day, if he survives the next several years. I caught a handful that had a very prominent high back. They reminded me of miniature versions of some stocker pigs of brookies I've caught over the years.
I was hoping to get into some big browns on the trip, especially in a stretch that I had fished in September, but other than a single fish that I hooked, who jumped out of the water, gave a head shake, and was off, I didn't see a single brown in that stretch during my trip upstream during the day.
I arrived at my campsite in the middle of the afternoon, half-starved. I made some lunch around 3PM (noodle soup, and pepperoni cheese bread - is there anything that tastes bad in the woods?), and setup camp. And with AccuWeather calling for a low of 21, I decided a fire would be a good choice for the night, so I gathered a mess of downed wood. And I did something I haven't done for awhile - I did absolutely nothing for about an hour.
Of course, the days are getting shorter, so the opportunity for night fishing presented itself sooner rather than later. I started out with a size 8 rubber legged olive wooly bugger. These were some purchased flies that I got over the summer and they are a trifle removed from what I consider to be a wooly bugger. But, I had them and decided to try one.
After about a dozen casts to the middle of a pool I was fishing, I heard a huge splash, but not from the middle of the pool I was casting to. Instead, the splash was from the top of the channel of the stream, upstream from me. I continued to cast to the pool I was fishing, but was of course immensely curious about the splash. Another dozen casts later, and I felt the line go tight on a strip. I could see a flash of white as the fish came near, but I could tell by the way that he did not bend the rod that I hadn't tied into a bruiser. Nonetheless, I was extremely pleased to hbring my first night-time brookie to hand! And it was another high-back brookie, like the one I had caught earlier in the day.
With the headlamp on, and after releasing the fish, I decided to spot the head of the pool, where I had heard the splash. I thought the splash was a little bit closer to me, but didn't see anything in that part of the stream. But about ten feet upstream from there, I saw the beady reflective eyes of a fish caught in the glare of a headlamp. And this fish WAS a bruiser. He was hanging out in the water, looking every much like a lion hunting prey on a savannah; he had predator written all over him. He didn't exactly move away from the light, but he also didn't care for it. He took a look at the bugger when I threw it his way, but eventually swam slowly under the rock ledge. I turned my efforts back to the pool, casting every now and then upstream, but nothing took the bugger.
The night was growing colder so I went back to the fire for a bit. And I also realized I hadn't eaten supper yet, so I cooked some of that up while the night advanced. I decided to switch over to my trusty deer hair mouse for the next wave and I returned to cast with that. I prospected the pool for a bit, but could not generate any strikes. I flipped the headlamp on and shone it upstream again; the bruiser was not out, but a smaller fish, maybe 16", had taken his place. After a bit, he tired of the light and swam downstream a few feet and disappeared. The fish did something that was a first for me to observe; he burrowed himself down into the leaves that had accumulated at the bottom of the stream!
I went back to the fire again and kept thinking about the larger fish I had hooked and lost in the afternoon. I decided to give it a try at night, even though it meant a cold night-time walk downstream, for a quarter of a mile. I started walking, and with no moon, had to use the headlamp. Brookies are very distinguishable from browns at night for two reasons:
1) They are much more reflective, an almost silvery white fish in the water;
2) They are spastic; each brookie that the light would shine on would zig and zag across the stream in a frenetic manner, trying to escape the light. The browns, on the other hand, would almost allow you to walk up on them, before they would move out of the way.
Because of using the headlamp, what I discovered as I walked downstream is that all the holes that I had spotted fish in during my September trip and that had appeared to be barren earlier that afternoon, had fish of the relatively same size as I had spotted in the same spots in September. This was interesting to me for two reasons; first, I was puzzled where the fish had disappeared to that afternoon (burrowed in the leaves?), almost wondering if another angler had fished ahead of me and put them down, and secondly, it appeared the fish literally had not moved from their respective hole in a month. The 18" brown I caught in September was in his lie, the smaller brown was in the hole below him and a brown in between in size was in the hole above the 18" brown. And the sporadic, spastic brookie showed up every now and then as well.
Unfortunately for me, I misjudged the location of the hole I wanted to fish, and had my lamp powered on too close, as I arrived. I would have preferred to walk the last hundred yards in darkness, but instead, lit up the rock ledge above the stream as I approached, until I realized I had arrived. Perhaps unsurprisingly, fishing there yielded no results. I tried fishing upstream on the way back but caught only a tree branch. As midnight approached, I decided it was time for supper's dessert and cooked up some apple crisp (or what passes for it in the form of a freeze-dried dessert; it turned out to be the worse part of the food I was carrying).
Back to the pool where I was camping, I decided to try fishing the head of the pool, where I had spotted to the two fish earlier. I inched my way downstream and cast, the mouse making that satisfying SPLAT as it hit the water each time. But I generated no hits. With the temperature dropping, I experienced something that is usually reserved for steelhead fishing - my rod ferrules started to freeze up. I went back to fishing the middle of the pool, and eventually tied the bugger on as a dropper. I had two small strikes on this setup, but did not hook the fish, and eventually, the thought of going to sleep crept into my head, and that idea gained traction, so to the Shangri-La I went at 2AM.
Despite the falling temperatures, I remained warm enough and fell into an uneventful sleep. At least until sometime later in the night, probably about 5AM. I awoke from a deep sleep, half aware that something had just happened. Its probably happened to you, where you awake, half groggy, semi-conscious that something woke you up. Only a few seconds after I awoke, I was fully conscious of what woke me up - it was the Yip..Yip...Yip of a coyote, that couldn't have been more than a hundred yards away. It wasn't a howl, it was more like a coyote whoop. Even though I think I could take a coyote if I had to, I settled deeper into the sleeping bag and pulled my hat tighter over my head, and wondered what I'd do if Wiley decided I looked like food, while I was out walking earlier in the dark. Apparently, I fell back asleep, because the next time I woke up, it was 9:30AM and the sun was shining. I was greeted by what was apparently a terminal frost; plants were drooped, and the ground was covered with a heavy frost.
I checked my portable weather station after I got out of the tent and it was completely frosted over. I rubbed the frost off to take a look at the overnight temperature - 20 degrees.
Coffee and some warm blueberry granola and some pudding and some mandarin oranges helped get the internal furnace started, and the fire was still smoldering from the night before, so it came to life fairly quickly.
I snapped a few pictures; the valley wall to the east of me was still hidden in shade and frost. The valley wall to the west of me was bathed in the cold morning sunshine. The trees had mostly lost their leaves there, and the frost of the night had hasten the leaf fall of the remaining trees that still bore their adornment.
When I was out filtering some water the prior day, the stream I was using was more or less dry; however, there is one small waterfall hole that usually holds water, and so I had sneaked up on it to see if it also held fish. It had at least six two-year old brookies in it and when I returned that morning, I discovered it also had about six year-old brookies in it too. Everything scattered when I stood up and I watched the one two-year old fish burrow his way into the leaves, just like the brown had done the night before.
I returned back to the campsite and spent a lazy morning, waiting for things to dry out, and the air to warm up. Morning turned into early afternoon, and I decided I might as well make lunch. As I was cooking, I heard a rustle in the leaves beside me. I looked down, expecting to see something from the herp family slithering out, but instead, it was just Mr. Toad.
After lunch, and with the backpack packed up, I began my meander downstream. Part of the way down, I came upon a part of the stream that had been cut off by the main stem by the dropping water levels. I could see three fish in it; when I cast, a fourth fish came rocketing out from under a log and smacked my offering and I missed it. However, a short while later, I brought the prettiest brookie of the trip to hand.
And three times, while I continued my hike out, I was reminded that I was not alone.
About a mile before I reached the vehicle, I spotted a lone deer. She raised her tail as a white sentinel but didn't run away; we passed within a few tens of yards of each other, me munching on a granola bar and her seeking for a few blades of green that had escaped the frost.
I went into the woods, hoping to catch the brownies in the same strain of aggressiveness that they were in September; this held true for the bottom part of the stream, but definitely not the part that I fished in September. I was hoping to see some of the brookies begin their dance, but only came across a single pair that were beginning to follow each other. I watched the plant life whither, as it literally had the life frozen out of it overnight. I caught fish, but caught way more leaves. The fishing wasn't great, but maybe that gave me more of a chance to do nothing and relax.
