Who Remembers their first fly rod caught trout?

I'm hard pressed to remember the first trout. Like others here I started on bluegills & L/M bass, and that was using poppers. I sort of graduated from there - learned how to cast with the poppers and catching (especially) bluegills, all at once we were planning a trout fishing trip. The first time I did poorly, confused as to what to use in the fly department, AND how to use it. The next trip I did so much better. An old timer took pity on me and had me stand sideways to the current (wide river), and cast to my left (upstream), using a black nosed dace, let the current carry it down stream and then I would retrieve it, and cast it again. Don't remember how many I caught but it was a few. Important thing is that outing opened a whole new world to me!

Interesting that you mentioned a fly rod from Japan. I think it was around 1951-52, my oldest brother was in the air force in Japan and brought me a bamboo rod set home. He knew I loved to fish with a cane poles, and decided that this would be a good present. I'll never forget that it came in a balsam wood case with two tips and some rudimentary Japanese (very colorful) flies. Didn't take long for me to break the first tip in a willow tree, but I caught many bluegills in the farm pond close to home. As for trout, I think it was around 1972 in the South Platte River in Colorado while stationed at Fort Carson. That was the first time I laid eyes on a trout. I'm a southern boy by birth.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by krauseb

Garmich 1959 on my honeymoon with a fly rod package from Japan that cost $10.00 sent by a friend in the Navy.
I saw a trout in a little creek flowing into a lake. Couldn't resist, set the rod up, one cast and had it hooked and released before anyone caught me.

---

12" stocked rainbow on the Patapsco River. Spring of 03 or 04. Had bought an outfit from the local Bass Pro. Can't recall the fly - I know I stuck it on a hat as a memorial. Think the son took the hat when he moved out....

Lord no, I don't remember. It was well over 60 years ago.

Hatchery trout from Piru Creek So California about 40 years ago. LOl funny to remember that fish.

I caught a rainbow on the duck river with Jack Hise for a guide. The profile pic is me holding the rainbow. I only had that little guy hooked for a few minutes, but he hooked me for life. Been trying to fly fish ever since. Thanks Jack

My first fly rod trout, or any trout for that matter, was a stocker caught in a local municipal lake and I think I caught it on a black wooly bugger. I caught that fish the first year the Iowa DNR stocked that lake with rainbows and have caught many, many stocker trout since then.

i do remember, but only because it involved blood. First trout hooked on my own, stocker, local over-fished nearly-a-spring-creek in Pennsylvania. i was in such a hurry to release it that i stuck my fingers in its mouth to get the fly out...nobody had told me that TROUT HAVE TEETH! man, i was startled, bleeding, and fearful that the fish would expire right there in my hands. remembered the hemostats, got the hook out, and fish swam away. then i debated for several minutes whether i would come down with something dreadful if i put the bleeding thumb in my mouth. apparently not...

I do, and it was a beauty. I was 14 and out learning how to with my uncle. I was fishing a dry on a little stream near my house. My first fly rod fish, a 15? brown and a very big fish for that stream, was in a small pool and thankfully stayed there after sipping in my dry fly. I remember yelling to my uncle who was 100 yards upstream to bring the net, bring the net. I somehow managed to keep from breaking him off until my uncle arrived and scooped him up in his net. Back then we ate what we caught and that fish was dinner for sure. I vividly remember periodically checking inside my wicker basket creel throughout the morning seeing that fish lying in a handful of wet ferns and admiring how beautiful it was. After that day, I was destined to be a fly fisher for life. I still have that creel, my uncle gave it to me a few years later. It hangs on the wall in my ?man room? as a lasting reminder.