Rites of Spring

It was cool this morning, around 40 degrees, which seemed cool after the 80 degree day we had yesterday. Our April heat wave has set things in motion such as raking the lawn, picking up dead falls from the maples which accumulated during the winter and doing a little outside painting. But that was yesterday. Other things are in motion on this cool morning like the urge to pay my annual visit to my secret stream. I say "secret" because I am the only one you fishes it. I'm sure of it! I really think that the days are long gone where a fly fisher, or any fisher, would hike a few miles on a wooded, rock strewn path to have the chance of fishing for the Real McCoy, the Last of the Mohicans, that relic of another time - "real" brook trout. I say "real" because this little rill has NEVER seen a hatchery truck. It's not even on the state's map of native trout streams which is ok with me.

Now some fly fishers will catch a native or two but it's usually in pursuit of larger stocked trout in the same water. No chance of that here. Everything is stream bred and at best about 8 inches long, a real giant on this stream.

My "fly" was a tiny San Juan Worm, hot red and only a 1/2 inch long tied on a #16 hook. I hate this fly but it may be the only way to fish here without bait. A tiny ball of tungstun weight was attached about 6 inches above the fly. I let it drift through pools and runs. The brookies saw that hot red fly and attacked it.

I'm lucky to have this secret place and each Spring I hike in to check on these little guys. They're doing ok. They remind me of a passage in an old book of mine that stated that the Chinese refer to their tiny trout (yup, there are trout in China) as "Water Angels". Hmm...I like that!

Ken