Wednesday Tuggin

Wednesday is the best afternoon for My son Dylan and I to get out and giver a go...

With a little bit of miscommunication with the school bus driver, we got to the river about 3:30 and fished till sun down.

Dylan caught this juvie brown and contacted with four other fish.

One of those, believed by me to be, the same fish in his photo. It took his fly on the turnaround at the tail end of the drift, where I don't want them hooked.

I have taught my son that this is farming, it is not correct from a purest standpoint. I feel as though this is luring fish. I would like the hook set just as the flies come taught for the last time as they pass the indicator. Any amount of time spent with the flies dragging behind is treated like a foul hook... In my book.

Another contact of a fish that stood out was a brightly colored rainbow that hit him at the tail end of the drift before it went to farming... Frustration was getting the better of angler as we all know much too well... The mends just weren't working for him and a breeze would come by and puff each time the line was lifted in the air. Lines became tangled and time was lost. This is when you have to keep it cool. As I stated, frustration was clearly getting the better of the angler and just as he dropped his shoulders, looked to the sky and gave a shake of his head, a big bright rainbow rolled on the fly... Slack in the line and the loss of focus cost a fish. What is that worth to you?..

I explained that you must keep it together, especially when it gets "like this"..

As we all know, after an instance like this, a fisherman will go through a rapid period of intense evolution, where nothing but focus and concentration exist. As Dylan experienced this and made a good clean cast back to the pool... A large brown trout rolled up and munched his indicator...

I placed my hand on his shoulder and said "let that be a lesson to you".... A look of confusion from the boy as I elaborated with "you blew it on the last one, and this one blew you". Eye for and eye!

Frustration won over the kid and he just wanted to do kid stuff... Ya know, like making a jack hammer out of a piece of drift wood and then using it as a pry bar to bust off chucks of a down tree... Which, by the way, is a bit annoying when your tryin to get a fish on the line before it gets dark on a school night, when the water your fishing has been hit with the frustration wand, and when the boy's little demolition project is going on behind me, right at the end of my line on my back cast.

Frustration and distraction won't get the best of me... I worked the water until I pulled a fish..

A healthy migrant rainbow that slipped through the canyon wall.

Summary: We set out to practice quiet, agreeing to work the water thoroughly. Set out to walk not run, to whisper not yell, to learn and better ourselves as boys, to be fly fisherman, not fish catchers. Results were... Goal's met...

We were quiet when we weren't being loud. We worked the water thoroughly alright, three loud hours of it. We bettered our selves as fishermen but that came in the long conversation on the ride home, which we finished in the driveway upon our arrival. The look he gave me when our talk was over, made me forget all about the wooden jackhammer.