The Shadow

There I was down to the pond today with my 1 wt. tossing a wet hackle to the bluegills and having a fine time. ONe little fella grabbed the flie and this submarine, a piscatorial shadow, zoomed directly underneath it. Can you say twenty inches of lmb? I quickly switched to the 7 wt. fiberglass. I caught several bluegill on a size 8 orange hackle when just to my left I saw two shadows moving very slowly, stealthy, powerful bigmouthed bass. There were two of them, much closer to two feet than one foot in length with eyes as big as a penny. It is way to early for bass to be nesting, but maybe these two do not know that. I watched them for over an hour trying to understand their movements, their methods. They had some kind of ritual going wherein the male would zoom out into the deep water and a few minutes later he would blast back. The female was nearly motionless, her gills barely flaring. She was facing me, just eight feet away, as if to put me in my place with here steady glare. LIttle bluegills were swimming around her so I guess she was not in the mood for a snack. You know every time I witness something like this I feel close to the almighty Flyfisher. There is magic in the water, even with just two large bass doing what they have been doing for eons. Sometimes I am lucky and sometimes I feel blessed. Today I was both.