Sport fishing column for March 15 to 22, 2010
Last week we touched on blending the benefits of school based fly fishing clubs and education. Another of our members to take advantage of this was T I.

TI came to the Terry Fox club in its third year. In discussions about his goals and aspirations he expressed a desire to become a career writer. At the time I had a naive idea of seeing our club members produce their own fly fishing magazine. I knew some training would be required so I suggested to T that he and I approach our local newspaper, with the idea of a weekly fishing report. The first meeting was met with some skepticism on the part of our contact, Diane Stranberg, but never the less she let him try. Not too long later T was referred to Kate Fletcher, who requested the report be expanded to a column. He did a very good job until a girl friend entered the mix. Life and mistakes are all part of all education; and for T it was no different. Soon he began plagiarizing another sport fishing columnist in an effort to spend more time with his new interest. I believe all things, both good and bad, can work together for good, for those who choose to believe they can. T lost his post as sport fishing columnist, but learned a valuable lesson. Later he was able to use his time and experience as a spring board to land a post as a teen field editor for a sport fishing magazine.

The report

Someone threw the switch on our lower mainland lake fishing, and shifted things into reverse. Once the present cold front moves off we can expect spring fishing to return; watch your barometer. For wet (sinking) fly fishing try: Chironomid, Bloodworm, Big Black, Wooly bugger, Micro Leach, Baggy Shrimp, Coachman, Cased caddis, Zulu, or Doc Spratley. For dry (floating) fly fishing on sunny afternoons, try: Tom Thumb, Lady McConnel, Irresistible, Renegade, Black Gnat, Griffith Gnat, Royal Coachman, or Elk Hair Caddis. Kokanee are on the bite as well, try: Red Abbis, Red Spratley, Bloodworm, Royal Coachman, San Juan Worm, or red Micro Leach.

The Fraser River back waters and sloughs are fishing well for cutthroat, rainbow, and dolly varden. For cutthroat try: Flesh Fly, Eggo, Egg & Eye Alevin, Rolled Muddler, Mickey Finn, Tied Down Minnow, Professor, Lioness, Stone Nymph, Coachman, Zulu, Chez Nymph, or Souboo. For rainbow try the above along with red Spratley, red Carey, Kaufmann Stone, Royal Coachman or Black Gnat. For dolly varden try: large (#4 to #2) Eggo, Flesh Fly, Rolled Muddler, Zonker, Clouser's Deep Minnow, black Popsicle, or Big Black.

The Stave River is good for cutthroat, rainbow, steelhead, and whitefish. For whitefish try: small (#14 to#20) Eggo, Flesh Fly, Griffith Gnat, Stone Nymph, Chironomid, or Caddis Nymph. For steelhead try: Squamish Poacher, Thor, GP, Popsicle, Big Black, Flat Black, Poplar Shrimp, Eggo, Purple Peril, Holliman, Steelhead Spratley, Steelhead Nightmare, or Kaufmann Stone.

The Harrison River is good for cutthroat, and rainbow.

The Chehalis River is good for steelhead, cutthroat, dolly varden, and rainbow.

The Vedder River is fair to for steelhead, cutthroat, and rainbow.

Until the next time, "Keep your fly in the water".