At Long Last

With some autumn rain at long last upon us, our rivers became swollen and the banks were scoured once again by rising water.

It was a perfect opportunity to sling big, articulated streamers with my seven-weight. At dawn, it was a chilly 29 °F and warranted some nitrile gloves to keep my hands dry. They make me look like a serial killer, but it’s a small price to pay when you’re streamer fishing in the cold.

I suspect tightlining junk flies would have worked very well, but I really longed to adopt a high-risk, high-reward strategy. I targeted some pocket water where I’ve found big fish in the past during high water. It’s also far away from redds. I’m not into targeting spawning fish.

The upshot is that I had only one fish on. But, it was a beauty and taped at just under 19″. It took an olive and black streamer.

 

It was a large hen with a swollen belly that, no doubt, soon was going to find some quiet water with a gravelly bottom. What a fight!

And, with that, I finished fishing that run and then headed home. Sometimes, one good fish is enough. So, it was about five hours of driving for four hours of fishing. I made it home in time to catch the 1 pm Patriots kick-off and to make Sunday Dinner for the family.

I hope everyone is doing well and hanging in there….

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4 thoughts on “At Long Last

  1. A fine fish! Instead of those blue-zombie-like gloves,
    I usually wear the white latex gloves under my neoprene fingerless winter fishing gloves. Works well, and, doesn’t scare any tourist hikers with their kids.

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