Fly Fishing: Skinny Big Hole Trout...

...for whatever reasons have been the norm (for browns and rainbows) all season long rather than the usual exceptions. The brown above is your typical early spring winter-starved version but...A couple days ago fishing the Slough Channel with our PA pals, Paul and Gretchen, we netted several, mostly browns and a rainbow or two, just as skinny. The why of this is more than I know? Theories being bandied about by local guides and experts range from "a somewhat skinny spruce moth hatch" to "not many hoppers" to "fighting all that high water" and probably a lot more I haven't heard yet. Well, maybe? Me? Like I said don't pretend to know and it could very well be just an old man's wild imagination but...time after time this season I recall muttering the same tired tune as I slipped the hook from a client's trout...pretty fish, really colored up nice but (more as an aside to self) a bit too skinny to my way of thinkin'! Hopefully before winter sets in the Big Hole will serve up whatever's needed to put some weight on, though at this stage I sure don't know what the hell that might...Better still all this really is just an old man's wild idea and all systems up there really are good to go...

For Once Plan B Saves the Day

Sad but true often the best laid plans go awry. Sadder still when Plan A fails Plan B might sound good but, at least in our experience, seldom works out much better. But today was different.

A day off from guiding, I decided to take the girls fishing. We hadn't fished a certain pet brook trout crick as much as we like this spring, mostly due to the abnormally long and high runoff. But now that the cricks were dropping to more normal levels it seemed high time to make up for lost time.

Alas, no sooner off the blacktop we encountered cows and lots of them. Based on past grazing seasons (most national forest grazing is rest rotation so cows aren't always an obstacle) we were fairly certain the meadows upstream would be over run and they were...now what?

Since we didn't really have a Plan B winging it seemed the only alternative...so we headed for a stretch of crick we'd been meaning to fish for several seasons but somehow hadn't...no good reason to think cows wouldn't be there too but as the man once said, "ya don't know if ya don't try."

As luck would have it we found plenty of cow sign but surprise, surprise, no cows at present.

The crick here drops significantly creating a series of deep, though plenty fast moving, plunge pools. Inviting as hell but I thought it could be too high gradient, the bottom scoured by ice and run off and worse, troutless.

As turned out I needn't have worried for first cast--actually more a shaking out line to make a first cast--as soon as the #16 Royal PMX hit the water a trout grabbed it. Startled and way too slow on the uptake I failed to make the hookup...but not to worry.  Two or three casts later I hooked a beautiful dark cutthroat of decent size, kicking off one of the best couple hours fishing we've ever experienced. Gale then took a colorful, exceedingly dark brookie from the same pool. Then I nailed a stunning rainbow and then...then we just kept handing the rod back and forth as we hooked trout after trout--mostly brookies, with a few cutts, cutt-bows and rainbows for good measure. Lady luck continued to smile until finally Gale declared "enough fun" I'm hungry."

"Me too."

Back at the truck we broke out the lunch cooler. Gorging, much as the trout did earlier, on left over bar-b-que chicken legs and thighs, peanut butter and cheese crackers and fruit...In between bites Gale observed, "What a way to wile away a summer morning."

"Amen."