Fishin' Fridays

[Bucky]

This year, my buddy Eric and I have decided to institute a weekly fishing outing, where we leave the office early on Friday and hit up one of the local rivers for a few hours. This was the first week of our Fishin Fridays, and it was exactly what we needed. Now, we were only able to get out for a little under two hours, but the weather was perfect and we had a little luck fishing. We had both been on a streak of getting skunked (if not every time out, most of the recent times out).

We decided to fish between two of the lower dams today, as neither of us had ever fished that stretch. The river was pretty brushy with a few overhanging trees where we entered, but cleared up overhead a short way up. We found a good looking seam along some overhanging brush, and took turns casting to it. I was fishing a beadhead pheasant tail behind a hopper, and he was fishing a gold ribbed hares ear off a hopper. He had the first few casts and didn't see any activity. Then I took a few casts. On about my third cast, I missed my target, but ended up on the seam away from the brush. As the hopper drifted past a submerged boulder, it dove under, and I set the hook. I could see the whitish yellow flash underwater and some weight behind it. After a 20 second fight, I had a beautiful ~13 inch brown trout in the net. It was probably the biggest fish I have caught out of this particular river, so my day was made.

About twenty minutes later, we came to the bottom of a riffle system with a couple boulders. Eric took the left side of the river, and I took the right, as both had beautiful looking hiles and seams. I threw a cast or two in the direction of a bright yellow-orange trout (they stock albino rainbows in this river) to see if I could get him to take. I was soon hooked on a submerged stick, and had to retrieve my fly. As I removed the fly from the stick, I heard my buddy give a shout of excitement. I looked over and he was working in a brown. He quickly landed it and had it in hand. The trout was about 9 inches, and the lateral spots were very bright red. A beautiful fish.

I landed one more shortly thereafter, and we had to call it a day in order to make a prior engagement. It was a great day on the water, as we both got the skunk off our back, enjoyed some beautiful weather and some beautiful fish. Can't wait until the next Fishin' Friday excursion.

[MontanaMoose]

Great report Bucky, i was doing the friday thing with a fly fishing friend all last winter and really enjoyed that time. Beat the heck out of sitting around all day looking out the window at the cold. Din't notice how cold it was once suited up and hiking and casting over steelhead.

Cheers,

MontanaMoose

[KeatonsDad]

Nice report Bucky. Any time out on the water is great. Glad you got into some fish too.

[Uncle Jesse]

I landed one more shortly thereafter, and we had to call it a day in order to make a prior engagement.

Great story, it carried me back close to 30 years, one of my best friends and I volunteered to come in late and stay late to take care of some flights coming into the Army Aviation Support Facility. We got into some serious bream fishing, releasing everything because we had to be at AASF at 0900. It was just painful leaving some of the best fishing either of us had been in all year. He was a full time sheet metal mechanic there and hated leaving more than I did. It is just so hard at time to leave the fishing hole.

I am a little envious of you having a buddy you can go down to the old fishing hole with. That makes good times into the best of times. Thanks for jarring the memory.

[Panman]

Nice story. It brings to mind one time I was home on leave from the Army and my dad, a native of Logan, took me up your way and we caught some browns as well as some of those Albano rainbows.

Thanks for refreshing old thoughts.

Tim

[kglissmeyer]

Bucky, nice report. Having grown up in norhern Utah I'm pretty familiar with the rivers and streams in your area, so I know what great waters they are. Your report takes me back to when I used to fish them regularly. Thanks for sharing, and I'm looking forward to more.

Kelly.

[Bucky]

Thanks for the comments, everybody. Was out of town at a conference all last week, so had to cancel last Fridays fishing trip. Not sure whether we will get out this Friday either, as I am going camping up in either Idaho or Wyoming (though I could possibly get in some fishing up there).

[Bucky]

Well, yesterday wasn't a Friday, but I did get out fishing so I figure I'll post it here. Went up the Logan River after work yesterday evening to get a few casts in before dark. The maples in the canyon have turned full red and the aspens are starting to turn gold.


P1020789.jpg


As I pulled into the access point, I saw another vehicle parked, so I first went down to check if anyone was fishing or if it was just someone hanging out. Met the guy on the bank as he was gearing up, and we chatted about what the fish have been hitting recently for a while. Then he told me he was going to be going downstream a ways and fishing down, so I asked if he would mind if I fished upstream from him, to which he replied sure.

After throwing a sparkle caddis emerger for a while, I started noticing some trout rising, and tied on a Purple Haze. After watching the water for another few minutes, I picked my spot, threw two casts, got a solid hit and landed a little brown trout. Unfortunately, even though the trout were still hitting the surface for another 20 minutes, I spent most of that time tangling myself in the trees and riparian brush. By the time I got back in the casting groove, the top action had stopped. So I tied on a bead head pheasant tail (my go to on the river) and flung that around for a while. Had what looked like a strike that I missed, though it could have just gotten caught on a weed for a second. A few casts later, almost as soon as the fly hit the water, my hopper I had the pheasant tail dropping from sank and I set the hook. A few seconds later, I had this little fella in my hands:

P1020795.jpg

As it was getting near to being too dark to see much, I started heading to the opposite bank, where I was parked. As I got about two feet from the bank, I heard a good sized splash just upstream from where I was exiting. I figured, hell, why not throw one more. So I tied on a rusty colored parachute pattern (which took about 5 minutes because I couldn't see the tippet or eye of the hook too well), and started casting. First cast, too short. Second, too wide. Third, looking good. I let it float down about 6 feet and SLAP. A trout hits it pretty good, and feels bigger than the previous two. He doesn't come to the surface until the very end when I have him in hand.

P1020797.jpg

Now he wasn't huge, but it was nice to end the evening with a decent sized fish that put up a pretty good fight on my 4wt. Can't wait until this weekend which is likely the next time I will get out.

[KeatonsDad]

Great report Bucky. Keep em coming.

[Bucky]

Thanks KeatonsDad. I just figured out that if you click on the images they enlarge. I haven't quite figured out how to just post the larger image.