The following story is from my friend Blaine - as you might have guessed, he's retired and really enjoying it! And if the story drives you to want to try some fishing in Colorado, let me know and I will give you his email address...
Yesterday turned out to be one of those great Colorado Spring days. One where the wind did not blow, the sun was out, the temperature approached 65 degrees and the fish were gently rising to a size 24 black bodied midge pattern with just a hint of a white wing. I exaggerate just a bit as there were only two rising fish anywhere near to where I was.
I left the house late, about 0930 to make the trip to the South Platte River near Deckers. On the way I stopped in to visit with the proprietor of the only fishing shop in Deckers, actually there are only two shops, the convenience store only opens on Fri, Sat, and Sun during the winter. Name of the shop is Flies and Lies, so I really couldn’t put much stock in the fishing condition information that I got there. O well… I got to thinking though that if what he told me was a lie then I could expect the opposite to be true, right? But there is no guarantee that it would be a lie, perhaps just some of the information is a lie. I kept thinking about this as I went on up the river to the parking lot for access to the trail head at Cheesman Canyon, the famed stretch of water that was totally surrounded by the Hayman fire two years ago. The fire, the largest in Colorado history, of over 200,000 acres, burned to the top of the ridge, but did not go down the canyon walls so it is as beautiful as ever. The hike is only 1-2 miles, but is up hill both ways. Because of private property to the east, we must hike up over a ridge on the way in and then back up over the ridge on the way out. It is a good exercise program for fisher persons though.
I fished with nymphs on the bottom until about 2:00 when I stopped to eat lunch. While munching on my peanut butter sandwich and some Doritos I noticed a fish rise in the slack water on the other side of the river. I watched for another 10 minutes while continuing to eat and the fish rose 2 more times. I re-rigged the rod for a tiny dry fly, see above, and installed a 7X tippet. This fish would be able to get a real good look at everything and so it had to be just right.
I tucked the rest of my sandwich back into the zip-lock bag and headed down stream to a crossing point. After crossing I inched my way back up stream to a hiding point behind a large boulder about 20 feet downstream from where I last spotted the fish. By now the sun was directly upstream and provided an extra glare off the calm water so I adjusted my position to get the best view and still be able to hide.
A few natural midges were floating on the surface, but the fish only took one about every three minutes. Undaunted and determined to make my first cast work I did a couple of false casts over the fast water to get the distance right and on the last cast placed the fly five feet upstream from where I had last spotted the fish. Slowly the black midge meandered to the left and right in sort of an S pattern as it made its way to the target area floating softly with the bubbles. I see the shadow of the fish as he rises slowly from the depths to take a look. Remember the water is about 33 degrees so the fish don’t move quickly. After hovering below the fly for what seemed like one hour twenty-three minutes and fourteen seconds he decided to take a closer look and moved the last five inches to break the surface, but something was wrong and at the very last micro-second he closed his mouth and just bumped the fly with his lips pushing it about 4 inches away as he rolled over like a porpoise at the surface.
Disappointed in total result, but encouraged that my fly had at least caught the attention of this beast I proceeded to cast a few more times, with no success. My mind raced with possible solutions to the refusal. Normally when a fish refuses a fly at the last second it indicates something wrong with the size so I brought the fly to hand. I carefully trimmed the length of the wings and even removed some fibers to make the wings sparser. When finished I waited for him to rise again. He finally did, about five feet to the left of the first encounter. After a few casts I finally put it into his feeding lane. This time he rose and slowly inhaled the fly and casually swam back to the bottom. I let him have the fly for a couple of seconds and then lifted the rod tip to insert the hook into his lip. It worked; there he was hooked to the end of my line. After a brief tussle I carefully lowered the top of my net allowing the nice 15 inch brown trout to swim away, back into his feeding place to continue munching on midges. Perhaps this exercise period did him as much good as mine did for me to get there.
I hope that you all had a good day.
Blaine
Today, it's off to the AT&T at Pebble Beach............ One of the best sporting events of the year, played in one of the most beautiful places on earth. Little did Bing know when he started this tournment 37 years ago how popuar his event would be! And as popular as it is, going on a mid week day is extra special as you can get up close to the golfers and always have a great view.
