Bluebirds, A Fly And Some Fish

One of those days, when I woke up in the middle of the night, and couldn’t back to sleep.  So, I took advantage of the peace and quiet and was able to accomplish work related tasks until mid-morning, when I was required to participate in a conference telephone call meeting.

After the meeting, I though to myself, “Self, go fishing.”  I had my vice clamped to a part of my desk, and started messing around with some material that was at my fingertips.  Tied a few very rough looking flies – not the usual, either, and then answered my own self’s earlier invitation:

“Ok, self.  Let’s get out of here.”

Part of the reason was this window of opportunity to do some fishing in the middle of the afternoon.  The upcoming Canadian Fly Fishing Championships have two fishing sessions per day, one of which takes in the middle of the afternoon.  I figure it’s about time to try to get used to fishing the middle of the day, and just see what’s happening out there.

I arrived at the spot I wanted to fish, and was all alone, except for very pretty bluebirds darting around the shoreline of the river.  Bluebirds are not to be confused with bluejays which are much larger and louder.  If you’ve ever been camping and been awoken by bluejays at the break of dawn, you’ll know what I mean by louder.

The water level was low.  Very low.  The water was not much deeper than ankle deep where just two weeks ago, I was catching fish.  Although it was partly cloudy, the sun was very bright when clouds passed. There was nothing going on as far as hatches or any visible activity.  Crapshoot time.

Well, if we’re going to get into a game of crapshoot, why not go all the way, huh?  “Let’s try out these weird flies we tied today, self,” I heard a voice say.

“Naw – just use something you know that has worked in the past.”

“Yeah.. but.. why not, just give ’em a try.  You can always change flies later.”

“True.”  Sometimes I hate crapshoots.

So, I tied on this “thing.”  After several casts and nothing, one part of me was thinking I should just get on with tying on some old dependable or other.  The other part of me said, “Yeah but, come on – the water level really is low here, even if you did catch fish here two weeks ago.  Move on.”

“O.K.”

I moved upstream.  With the weird “thing” still tied on.  First two casts were not exactly where I wanted them to go, but the third one was.  Stripping line.. stripping… feeling like it’s a lost cause.
Splashhh…

“What the he….?  That’s where my fly is!!”   Could it be?  The next cast was pathetic – too much excitement mixed with my head still kind of shaking from what I thought just couldn’t be, but what I had just saw and heard.

“Try again,” my other self said.  So I did.  “Ahh, ok, this was a good one…”  Let the fly drift a bit.. and bang! Fish On!

A small fish – and in fact, just a little chub.  I easily remove the barbless hook and let the little guy go – hopefully a brown trout will eat him, and get a little bit bigger.   But more casts are required.  I keep missing a bunch of hook ups!  Sheesh.  The sun is shining bright, this is not what I’m expecting at all.   Another cast, another strike, and this time, a nice 10″ brown!  Ah, what a pretty little fish before I remove the hook and release it, watching it dart back to whence it came from.

My doubting self is now starting to listen to that other self that suggested I go with the crapshoot, and I keep fishing.  Five minutes later, another brown trout!  This is fun.

But fifteen minutes later, nothing more out of that pool, so I decide to move upstream a bit further.  Because the river has changed so much from two weeks ago, it’s hard to figure out exactly where to wade into, and where to cast to.   Keep going with the crapshoot fly? Why not?

Several casts into what looks like nice water, a very small chub takes my fly, I chuckle at this little thing trying to be ferocious while I bring it to my hand where I can release this all of 4” worth of fish.  This won’t win me any competitions, but the fun factor is there. And the bluebirds are darting in and around the purple loosestrife on shore.  I only have another 15 minutes or so before I need to leave, and several casts later… another nice brown in hand before he swims back to his feeding lane.

Just under 90 minutes of fly fishing on the Grand River, the “weird fly thing” caught 3 pretty browns and two chub, while other fish also smashed at it as well.  Not bad for a warm afternoon, and a weird fly.