I am spending the week in Wyoming to do some fishing and see the family. Last night, my brother and I floated the river that runs through town with the fly rods to see if there were any fish left. When we were younger, we spent countless hours fishing the river, much of the time spent using worms to catch suckers out of the deep holes. Every once in a while, we would hook into a nice trout, and we would carry it home proudly to show Dad.
However, as we got older, we found that by using lures, especially Rapalas, we could capitalize on the big trout the river held. By the time we were in high school, it was not uncommon to spend a night on the river and catch several fish in the 18-20 inch range. After a good stint of catching them with the spin rods, we started chasing them with fly rods. There were times when we caught a few on dry flies, but most of the time we were casting big woolly buggers and coneheads that we tied ourselves. This was the way to catch the big browns.
It was nice to see that the fishing had not changed in the river. I am not sure that there are quite as many in the river, but the fish in there are still really nice. In the second hole, Justin hooked into a hog that he fought for 2 or 3 minutes before it got off. We figured it was a good 20 incher, though we never did get a good look at it. By the time we got to the house, Justin caught three more nice browns in the 16 t0 18 inch range.
It was a kick to be fishing the old holes with my brother and pulling in the big browns (although he ended up doing all the pulling. I couldn’t get a good hit to save my life!)
I got done with the first session of summer school today and headed out to the lake hoping to beat the storms that I could see ot the west. I ended up getting to fish for about an hour. The carp were feeding in the shallows, but there were so many sticks that I had a hard time zeroing in on them. The water is so high this year that it makes the fishing tough because the carp are feeding in the brush instead of out in the open water.
I did finally manage to hook up with one. I saw his back out of the water about 10 feet away and got the fly in front of his mouth. I didn’t really feel him hook up. I just sort of pulled up to cast, and he was on. About the time I got him in and released him, the storm blew in. The radio said that the storm was pushing winds over 75 miles an hour.
I am hoping to go out in the morning, so when I got home, I got out the vise and did some tying. This afternoon at the lake, I was using the Backstabber, a fly that I found at the Fly of the Month Club. It’s a pretty hot little fly and the website has been out of stock ever since I found the fly. I guess that is the joyof tying flies. Nothing is ever out of stock.
This fly has been producing well while casting to tailing fish. As always, it is important to get the fly withing a few inches of the fishes nose, especially in brown water. I like to strip it with long, slow strips. I also keep the tip of the pole just under the water. When I think a fish has sucked it in, I pull a little faster on the line and set the hook before I raise the rod tip. This seems to keep me from snapping off so many flies. I have learned that a hard jerk on a 15 pound fish doesn’t work well. Anyway, here’s a few flies that I just whipped up.
A good mess of Backstabbers ready for a hungry carp.
I was doing some looking around the other day to try and find something to write an article about and came across a bigfoot sighting in Oklahoma. I thought it was pretty interesting, and started doing a little more digging. It turns out that there are quite a few people out there, all across the country, that are on the lookout for the big guy.
One of the biggest organizations out there is the Bigfoot Field Research Organization (BFRO). This group has regular “‘expeditions” where sizable groups of people get together and look for bigfoot. Now, I am not one to say that there is or is not a bigfoot. My brother swore that he saw something on a trip in the Windrivers of Wyoming when we were in high school, so I have some belief that there is something. The BFRO are convinced. Looking through their sight will show just how serious these people are with numerous accounts of hearing, seeing, smelling and interacting with bigfoot. There are even recording of purported bigfoot vocalizations.
Some of the stories are just darn entertaining. Imagine a bunch of grown men walking through the trees in the dark howling like bigfoot and beating sticks off of trees. On the other hand, some of the stories make a person think a little. I told my wife about it, and she just laughed at me.
I am spending the week in Wyoming to do some fishing and see the family. Last night, my brother and I floated the river that runs through town with the fly rods to see if there were any fish left. When we were younger, we spent countless hours fishing the river, much of the time spent using worms to catch suckers out of the deep holes. Every once in a while, we would hook into a nice trout, and we would carry it home proudly to show Dad.
