To Our Fallen Brother

Although I have been away for a while and have a lot of fishing to report on I am going to put that aside for now. A couple of days ago I checked my facebook only to find a post that said that,  “one of our own had passed away.” After a couple of clicks I found out that it was my great blog buddy, Bryan Dale from the Rogue Outdoors. I can’t help but miss him as I write this and so I will now take some time to express some thoughts about our fly-fishing brother. 

In an age where people are taught to worry about self interests and making profits or promoting self, Bryan stood out as different. He seemed to do things because he cared for others around him, even if it meant going out of his way to do so. He was the kind of person that I trusted right off the bat. His e-mails and comments were filled with a genuine kindness which is rare now in days. This drew me to him. By looking at his facebook page I can tell this drew others to him as well. 

I don’t remember if I found his page or he found mine but I’m blessed to have known him. I always looked forward to his comments. He was encouraging and never withheld his angling experience from me. Not only was he helpful, but he was extremely generous. On a couple of occasions he sent me some great patterns of flies that he tied and when I tried to pay him, he refused. All he said in response was that “we as fly fishers need to support one another.” 

And thats the type of caring, generous, warm individual he was. Or at the very least thats what I learned about him from our correspondence. You see I never met Bryan in person. I never talked with him on the phone. I never wet a line with him. And even though all of that is true, I still was able to see all of this through our e-mails messages and blog comments. It takes a great man to stand out based only on online communications but that’s exactly what Bryan was; A Great man, a great outdoorsman. 

I never got to fish with Bryan. We talked quite a few times about fishing together in his neck of the woods or mine but unfortunately we didn’t get to do it. And although we only spoke of fishing together, his memory will now accompany me through my travels and he will be with me when I wet a line, go camping or hiking. Bryan’s memory will be with me as I explore the Rogue Outdoors. 

I finish this Post with some words from Norman Maclean and his timeless classic, A River Runs through it. 

“The river was cut by the world’s great floods and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs. 

I am haunted by waters.”

"I Got the Hook-up, Holla if You Hear Me!"

 I have a lot of people who have asked if I tie flies since I fly fish but with the quality of flies available out there, I don’t see a point for the time being.  Especially when you have friends who have the hook up!

So first off, let me give a shout out to Justin from Carf Outdoors . Back in October of last year I purchased a bunch of flies from him and I just wanted to show you some pictures of those.

I ended up purchasing:

1 green and white minimum cowbell

1 blue and white minimum cowbell

1 green and white EP baitfish pattern

1 white and red  EP baitfish pattern

2 white damsels

1 red panfish fly which he threw in for free. 

These are some fantastic looking, well tied flies that I plan to use this spring and summer to get into some big bass on my 8 wt. 

Second, Bryan from over at The Rogue Outdoors HOOKED me up with some fantastic Sarge’s crappie Flies which I used to catch crappie last year. I realized I had a good fly on my hand so I asked him for a few more. I wanted to pay for them but God Bless him, Bryan wouldn’t let me. Instead he hooked me up with :

 

11 Sarges Crappie

2 Crappie Candies

1 clouser

1 zebra midge

Bryan is a class act! Hooking me up with all kinds of flies when all I really wanted were 2-4 Sarges Crappie Flies! 

Last, I entered a new Year giveaway contest over at Howards place and ended up winning a prize! I seem to have luck over at Howard’s blog. This is the second giveaway on his page where I win something! Well anyway, my original prize was a “Fiberglass Manifesto” T-shirt (I had never read TFM before I won a T-shirt of his). Fortunately, There weren’t any t-shirts in my size and I was sent some “swag” instead. I say Luckily because this is what I received:

 

2 Fly fishing Koozies

4 black TFM Stickers

1 red TFM Sticker

Those are two of the coolest looking koozies I have ever seen! They have flies on them, how cool is that?! 

Well anyway, I just have to say i have some fantastic fly fishing buddies who hook me up with some great stuff and I am glad to have them in my network of Fly Fishing buds! 

Time for a Hail Mary!

I planned to release 3 blog posts the other day and didn’t even realize that I only posted two! Lol here is the third.  

The ultimate panoramic shot: a 360!

First Spot

With a little under 300 fish, I hoped to reach that number with a few trout out at Collins Lake this past Monday. I got together with Jeremy and made the hour and 20 minute drive up the hill into the Browns valley area. The lake was a little higher than it was last year around  this time but not by much.

Good to the last drop

It was after 12 by the time we had lines in the water. We had some lunch and a couple of Sierra Nevada Celebration ales. Both of us are fairly outgoing so we talked to the people next to us for a bit. They said that nobody had gotten a bite all morning. Not a good sign but I stayed positive.  

Rock stack

The lake was calm and there were very few boats out. We talked to the people next to us about the Niners, Raiders and Jim Harbaugh.  We sat, we waited, we remained positive. After an hour and a half of no bites, we moved down a bit, past our fellow fisherman to an area that seemed deeper. We continued to drink and hang out. Jeremy completed a pretty impressive rock stack. 

Second Spot

We sat and discussed “the pits,” and what it might be like to fish them during this time of the year. We speculated that spring was going to be great there as we hoped for bites. Unfortunately there were not even bites to be had that day. 

Unfortunately I was unable to reach 300 fish this year, but the trip, as every other fishing trip, is never in vain. As we packed up our stuff, we both remembered the good old saying, “a bad day fishing is better than a great day working.”  And it sure was true. I had a great time with my buddy, ate some food, drank some beer and had lines in the water. I gotta say it was a good day!

Last "Selfie" of the year

That wraps up 2014 for me. I still have a fall wrap up,  and then a review for my 2014 goals and I can move on to 2015.

Total Fish: 0 

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To Catch or Not to Catch?

That is the Question! 

Howard from "Windknots and Tangled Lines" made an interesting statement on my blog the other day that I thought I would dissect a little bit in order to examine my own motives.

The statement was, “numbers and size just really don't mean much. Enjoy the experience.”

 Am I really only after big fish and numbers? I would have to take apart the question a bit and I start with the word, “Only.”

Am I “only” after the big fish? The answer is no. This year most of the fish I have caught have been smaller. In fact I caught a lot of panfish and I’m one of the only guys in my fishing circles that still has a blast with a bobber, worm and good a panfish hole. I’m not only interested in big fish, but with that said, I definitely DO want to catch some big “trophy fish.” And the idea is that I want to excel at catching fish. It’s like getting a promotion at a job or increasing your max at the gym. I want to constantly improve and attempt to master anything that I do. I am a fisherman, I catch fish. 

Am I after numbers? This year, I would have to say the answer is yes. Just being honest. I was out to prove to myself that my research thus far has paid off. Last year I learned a lot and this year I was testing my research. I feel my research paid off. Now am I only after numbers, no. However at the very least I am after one! If I don’t beat the skunk I sometimes feel like I failed. A man once said, “There's a fine line between fishing and just standing on the shore like an idiot.” While Salmon fishing I remembered this quote… but then I realized I was on a boat and that made me feel better.

View from above (slip bobber at center of picture, close to top)

To be honest, it’s not always about catching fish but sometimes it is. If I went on 5 fishing trips and didn’t catch one, I would be concerned. Then again, It depends on the trip. Like there is a fishing trip that I forgot to mention a couple of Fridays ago. It was an impromptu Friday night trip to Lake Minden, the lake where my buddy Russell works. It had been a while since I had fished with him so I was looking forward to hanging with him and drinking some beers together with lines in the water. 

Two rods out in the darkness

I had a slip- bobber rig in and a bottom fishing rig in the other. I got nibbles on the slip bobber rig and nothing on the bottom feeding rig. That is until I got a big take down. I set my hook and must have pulled the hook out with the big set but that’s not the point. It would have been nice to catch a fatty catfish but I didn’t see that trip as a failure by any means. I drank beers and ate brats with my good buddy and we caught up on life. Whenever I have a trip like this one, the last thing on my mind is catching fish but catching fish is a nice little bonus! Same goes when I’m fishing with Mark or getting to know a new buddy like Jeremy or if I’m night fishing with the buddies or fishing while camping. 

Thoreau once said, “Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after.” I know what I’m after, only sometimes is it big fish.
 

Total Fish: 0

Sac River report

The striper have not yet arrived in Colusa county. At least that’s what the latest fishing trip showed us. Even though it’s spring, the stripers are slow to come up north. 

I was out a bit early from work yesterday so I made the trip out to Williams to fish with my dad and my buddy rigo. Unfortunately rigo cancelled last minute so we didn’t hit boss pond as I had originally intended. Sure enough ol’ Pops wanted to hit the Sacramento River for striper.  I didn’t have the rod or gear for river fishing but we went anyways as Ol’ Pops can be a very stubborn man. 

We were on the Sac by 3:30 and stayed until about 6:30. At one point I was getting a good amount of bites but it turned out to be a pike minnow. It beat the skunk and was the only fish of the day. Not a very eventful day but not skunked either! Haha  

I doubt I will be fishing anymore this week as I will be departing for Usal Beach,  Sinkyone Wilderness State Park in Mendocino County. We will be beach Camping for a few days in what has become a yearly trip for me and my Chico buddies . It is supposed to rain every day we are out there so I will let you guys know how it goes. It’s my buddy Mike’s Bachelor party so we’ll  be partying like it’s 1999! Yea I know that was 15 years ago but we're all getting older so we are gonna try to party like we did back in those days in Mike's Honor! haha

Total Fish : 1 Pikeminnow