Fishing With A Pro

I had the opportunity to fish with someone I consider to be very, very good at fly fishing. I have fished with her in the past at Bear River Reservoir and PIPI Valley, but this time she wanted to me to give her some pointers. You see, Barbara has come to the Dark Side of the Force, she bought a Tenkara rod.  

Meet Barbara

Like I told her, there isn't anything mystical about fishing Tenkara. You just don't have a reel on your fly rod. You use the same flies, drift them the same way, and occasionally catch a fish.

We met at 0900 at Cat Creek Campground and once wadered up, fished the pool below the pool below the bridge. That's always the first stop o any fishing trip here. Barbara fished an Irresistible Adams and I fished the Paralyzer. We both had hits, but none that would stay on the hook.

After a while we moved upstream where Juan and I fished on the 19th. Again, we had hits, but nothing would stick. Note to self, put some glue on the hook. Just kidding.

Somewhere up the creek I managed to bring this one to hand after doing a short distance release (at my toes actually) of a small brown. 

First rainbow of the day.

Barbara bought a couple to hand and missed a bunch more. They are fast little buggers.

Another pool

After some thought about the fact that we were fishing right after the three day Memorial Day weekend it's no wonder we didn't find many fish. The campers probably fished the place to extinction. We did find a lot of trails through the grass from the path to the water.  

We fished maybe 3/4 of a mile and by then I started getting to the point where I was beginning to stumble when I walked. Years ago I had a small stroke and the more tired I get the easier I stumble, so when I get to that point it's time for me to call it quits.

Barbara continued to fish after I left and I'm sure she brought more to hand. There is no doubt in my mine that she knows what she's doing when she has a fly rod in her hand whether it's a regular fly rod or a Tenkara rod.

On the way back to the truck I took the following two pictures.

From under the bridge

From on top of the bridge

I'm not sure what the black stuff is in the water, but upon close inspection it looks alive. Sorry, but I didn't take a closer look. Anything that is black, in the water, and wiggles is not something I want to be closer to. I've watched too many movies on the Sci-Fi Channel.

Till next time.

Mark 

Sporty Fishing Weekly

Hey Guys. Don't forget I'm over here too.

http://sportfishingweekly.com/2013/05/27/bait-dunking-and-how-i-do-it/

Mark

3 Geezers Fly Shop

If you've been out on Howard's (Windknots & Tangle Lines) or Mel's (The "Reel" Fishing Posse) site then you know what the 3 Geezers Fly Shop is.

This afternoon, while I was watching the Giants/Rockies game I cruised (as I do every day to check if there are any good movies out there) the Pay per View channels and guess what I found? You guessed it, a movie called "3 Geezers".

I thought, no it couldn't be about Howard, Mel, and Bubby the non-fishing dog. When I went to the explanation of what the movie was about, it said "Actor J Kimball researches what it's like to be old and run a online fly shop". I was blown away. The 3 Geezers Fly Shop made it to a movie. How good is that?   

Then I woke up. I had fallen asleep watching the game and when I actually did see the explanation about the movie it said " Actor J Kimball researches what it's like to be old for a role in an upcoming movie". So instead of getting Howard, Mel, and Bubby the non-fishing dog in the movie, you get J.K. Kimball, Tim Allen, and Scott Caan (from Hawaii Five-0). Boy was I disappointed.

Just a little humor for your Sunday before Memorial Day.

Mark 

Call Me Obi Won

I just wanted to let you know that I have been out fishing since the last post on May 14th.

This guy in the picture below is Juan Lopez. You can find him over at the "Breaking The Bank" blog here: http://breakingbank.blogspot.com/.

Juan has been a might busy lately and has been a little slow getting the post up of our fishing trip last Sunday, but let me whet your appetite.

Juan has never fished with a fly rod. Juan has never caught a trout on a fly rod. So when you get a chance, drop over there and when he gets the story posted give him a shout.

Don't want to give too much away, but this was the second one.

Welcome to the dark side Juan. 

I'll be back in fishing form next week.

Mark

The Art Of Relaxation Goes South

In the beginning (no Bible stuff I promise) In the beginning there was sunshine and blue skies.

I headed out of the house around 0740 and after coffee at Cooks Station, headed to the target lake, Caples. My original plan was to go across the spillway and set up on the sandy side. As you can see in the picture below, it was still a little white on that side. To negotiate that side when it's like this is to slog through, not only the snow, but the muddy runoff from the snow above. It's not a pretty sight so I'll just wait until the snow melts.

The sandy side of the spillway

I got there at 0830 and decided to set up by the dead tree instead. I don't think I've ever taken a picture of the dead tree, but I know I've talked about it quite often.  

The dead tree (the far one)

Down the lake, what a couple hundred feet, I found (well, not found exactly since I've fished this area a bunch of times) a spot where I could set up my red Coleman  camping chair. I put out two rods with Power Bait (one with Anise and the other with garlic) and proceeded to get comfortable.

Across the lake

Just so you can enjoy the beauty of the hill across from where I was sitting and understand how this can be so relaxing.The shot below is to show how clear the water is.

Right below my feet

Comfortable, warm with a slight breeze, I settled in for the wait. The wait for the fish to bite, of course. In the past I've showed you pictures of this snow shelf. It returns every year just like that and keeping in mind that some day it will let loose, that is another reason not to fish that side quite yet.

Yearly snow shelf

Now I want to whine a little. Why is it that when I'm at Red Lake the wind blows across the mountain below and into my face and when I at Caples it blows across that same mountain top and into my face? What am I, a wind magnet?

Never mind, back to warm and fuzzy. Sitting in my camping chair, head back using my sweatshirt hood as a pillow, it wasn't hard to drop off to sleep. Every once in a while I'd open one eye to see if one of the rods was bouncing with a bite.

Then one time I opened my eyes, I noticed the clouds creeping over the hill across the lake.

Clouds on the creep

Then I noticed that further to the right the hill over there had creeping clouds too.

More creeping clouds

No matter, back to snoozing and occasionally taking a peek for a bouncing rod tip.

Then when I opened one eye I noticed that the creeping clouds were getting a touch darker and a might bigger.

Darker creepers

Then they started to get a LOT darker and a lot creepier.

More and darker

If you've ever experienced afternoon thunder storms in the mountains (and I know a lot of you have) then you know that when the wind stops, and it did. Then the wind starts to pick up again, but this time it's a cooler wind, and it did. Then the clouds get a lot darker you're in for one of those Spring thunder and lightning events.

So here you are sitting on the side of the lake (water is a good conductor of electricity by the way) with two six foot lightning rods right next to you and the sky starts making a bunch of noise, what do you do?

You pack up and get the hell out of Dodge, that's what you do. Which is exactly what I did.  

Oh, I forgot to mention that the weather guessers said on the news this morning that this was going to happen . Must have been a senior moment.

Did I catch anything? Not even a nibble.......

Mark

Not Stellar, But You Benefit

What does that mean? Like most of you out there (I'm only guessing here) when fishing isn't knocking your socks off, you tend let your mind wander. This morning was a day just like that. So sit back and enjoy.

My driveway after four days of rain

I rolled out of La Casa Kautz at 0745 and after coffee at Cooks Station I backtracked to the road to PIPI Valley Campground. It's a similar trip like the one to Cat Creek, about eight miles of winding road. Got parked, wadered up (not so new hip waders now), fly rods (regular & Tenkara) strung, and off I went. 

Middle Fork of the Cosumnes

This is a few miles downstream from Cat Creek Road and flowing a little faster because of a couple of feeder creeks in between. I fished my regular fly rod and Tenkara based on what the conditions were. It gives you a sense of flexability.

Not too far from the bridge this little guy came to hand. He's kind of hanging there because I couldn't get close enough to the water to get my hand wet for a release. I snapped a quick shoot and then got him back into the water for another day. If you stretch it, he was probably seven inches, but enough to put off the old shunkeroo. 

Another thing I forgot. That was caught on a yellow paralyzer. 

First and only fish of the day

All right, the caption gave the rest of the day away. Here is where you benefit. When there isn't a lot of fish biting, I tend to take more pictures.

These pink (they are actually red) flowers as a sure sign of spring. I've come across them in most mountain areas and sometimes they even stick there little noses up through the snow.

Spring is here

I fished the area below and and had a couple of follows, but let me tell you they were little.

Further upstream

Up a ways from there is this boardwalk. It runs for a good distance and I think the main reason is that the ground is quite mushy in the spring.

A little viewing area on the right.

I wandered down to the creek here and again had a couple of follows and as the above spot, they were little. Over to the left of the viewing platform, this was the view across the meadow. I wanted to put this one and the one above side by side, but Blogger won't let me so you have to use your imagination. 

Meadow

All along the boardwalk there are names etched into the boards. I couldn't find, nor did I have the energy to chase down the campground host and ask the how and why this is done. If I had to hazard a guess I would say that it's a buy a board and honor someone or some family that is alive or deceased, that liked this camping area. In the future if I can find out, I'll add it to another post.

That's it for this trip. One brought to hand and a couple missed along with a mile or so cardio walk out and a mile walk back. Needless to say that this old body was pooped by the time I got back to the truck, but like my wife says, walking and spinach is good for you.

Forgot one thing, water temperature 46.8 degrees. Paid all that money for the handy dandy digital thermometer, might as well use it. 

Till next time.

Mark

The Real Fly, A Name Correction

Back on the 27th (Opening Day) I mentioned getting and using a fly from American Fly Fishing Company called Agressor. My error. Today I had to take a drive down to Sacramento to run a few errands and while there stopped in at American Fly Fishing Company ( you know I can't resist as long as I'm in town) to pick up a few more and find out the real name of the fly.

The fly is called Sloan's Paralyzer. The one I used on the 27th was orange, but all they had today were yellow and olive. I picked up a half dozen each in size 12 (Old guy, bad eyes) for the upcoming trip/s and the soon to be not so secret trip with a fellow blogger.

I'm not going to tell who it is until the day is over and I'll let him/her tell you the story. I love secrets.

The three pictures below are Sloan's Paralyzer. 

Orange

Yellow

Olive

Of course, I'm not waiting until then. I'll be out later this week and will let you know how it goes.

One last thing, I'm now a contributor to Sport Fishing Weekly and am publishing an article each week. The articles will be put online over the weekend, so if you're interested stop by at:

http://sportfishingweekly.com/

The first one is already there and you'll find the same fabulous (gag) writing you find here so take a look.

Till next time.

Mark

Silver Bear

No, not the one that keeps trying to get in my trash can. Although that bear is around again. The other day I heard him clacking down by the creek, but it's so dense down there I couldn't see him. This is about Silver Lake and Bear River Reservoir.

I had a few spare hours so I took a drive up the hill to check out Silver Lake. I've not heard anything about catching so I thought I'd see for myself. Grabbed a coffee at Cooks Station and hit the road. I was at the lake at 0800 and had two rods out, one with PB & garlic, the other with just plain PB.

While I sitting, absorbing the nice surroundings, I took a few picture for your pleasure. This first one is kind of hazy and I apologize for that because the sun  was in my face and I couldn't see what I was looking at. What I was trying to accomplish was to get a shot of the creek running into the lake. There is so much running water that it was loud all the way across to where I was.     

Somewhere over there is the inlet

A second try

The snow feeding the creek

Hey, I kept trying...

Still a little hazy, but I think you can see the creek

Double click and look at it in a bigger shot.

This is my little island in the lake. From here I first fished at a 45 degree angle (Y), one to the right and one to the left. Then I went to a 90 degree angle (T). When I didn't get any interest I went straight out (II). How did I do with the little symbols? Just trying to be cute.

In a reverse shot from where I was sitting, you can see what I mean about my little island. I came out of those trees and across the water and rocks to get where I was. Hey, I didn't even get my sneakers wet.

Again, while I was absorbing the nice surroundings I noticed (I'm very aware of my surroundings since the guy on one of the forums was talking about a 3 foot rattlesnake with 10 buttons) these little bugs dipping down to the water and then taking off and dipping again. I would assume (I hate using that word) they were laying eggs. I couldn't get close enough to one to see what it was but I guess this one was spent as it dropped into the water. It's the little white speck in the black crack.  

In this one it's below the crack.

Somewhere along the way I actually got a bite on the rod with the Anise. Oh, sorry I forgot to tell you I changed the rods to one with sweet corn and one with Anise. Guess I got all excited about the bug laying eggs. I did miss the bite, but I reeled it in, put on new PB & Anise, and when I threw it out the fish hit it again almost instantly. OK, I missed that one too. That was the total excitement for Silver Lake.

After three hours of absorbing the nice surroundings, I packed up and hopped over the rocks and back up the hill to the truck for a drive home. Since I was going by Bear River Reservoir anyway (and I noticed that the resort sign said that it was open) I drove down the 3 miles to see if the gate was open and voila! it was. Naturally I had to drive down by the lake, which has quite a bit of water in it, and with about an hour of time left before I needed to be elsewhere, I stopped and put out a couple of rods. I also took a few more pictures because I had a lot of spare time.Tthere weren't any fish biting.

To the left

Across along the dam

Further to the left.

On the other side of this hump of rock here, there were three of four other people fishing, but they hadn't caught anything either. As the clock stuck Noon, I packed up and headed home. Skunked for the first time since Steelhead fishing in February. I know I didn't catch anything at Middle Bar Bridge last month, but I don't count that one.  

My Tenkara replacement part is at the Post Office, I think (I got a notice from the mail girl that what ever it is it won't fit in the mail box) and maybe Monday I wander up to either Caps crossing or PIPI Valley Campground and do a little small stream fishing. I'll let you know.  

Mark