A Pretty Good Day...
My granddaughter is 4 and flies are still a little time into the future for salmon. She has caught a number of grayling on flies she tied herself, including some big ones, by almost any standard. But today was about silver (coho) salmon and it was a bit technical for her age. So she got a bobber and roe on a spinning rod.
Last year, at three, she caught her first solo salmon... today she caught four, at four. I suspect most things in her life are going to be easier for the training she has gotten with a rod in her hand...
But the big take-away... Riley was born when I was just shy of forty. I knew my personality type was not good for raising a kid so I waited until I had matured a bit. Riley did not follow my plan and is 26 with a 4-year-old and a 20-month-old. But what he did today was spend ALL of his time making sure his daughter was fishing and he did not even set up a rod for himself until his daughter was finished for the day. She missed many and lost several on the way in. But, she also caught four legitimate silvers at four...
When Denny visited about a dozen years ago Riley made sure Denny got into the grayling he was looking for, a literal 22 1/4" grayling... I should have realized then he had the stuff to help someone else do their thing without inserting his own wants. But it does make me feel very good knowing my grandkids are getting such an incredible introduction to fishing. It does not hurt that they get to learn here in AK.
As an aside, my granddaughter ties many flies sitting on my lap and the grayling she caught this spring, up to 18" or so, fell to flies she tied with me. Funny how grayling like pink... I never suspected that!
Sorry that I cannot post their pictures, but some folks are sensitive to that...
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