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I was flogging a long, wide run today on one of the rivers that transport Cascade snowmelt to Puget Sound. Already tiring after an hour's fishing, I was letting the 16-foot Alltmor lob automatic 90-footers to midstream, when an old acquaintance appeared. After asking permission, he fished quickly through the lower part of the run. Then we stood on the bank and caught up.
I noticed that he was using a single-hand 9-weight, although he's used spey rods. Comparing recent results, we comiserated about the glut of silt that still remains from floods of the last two winters. Yes, we've had to relearn a lot of river bottom. Nevertheless, he hooked into 43 steelhead the previous winter/spring season.
To clarify, I haven't the remotest doubt of the truthfulness of that number. For years, I've known him as one of the masters of this region. The last time I'd fished with him all day, he'd guided our mutual companion to a 20-pound steelhead. He ties spey flies of museum quality. And he quietly keeps dipping in and out of our rivers like a hungry ouzel. (I might add that during the cold war I was a military intelligence analyst in Germany; much of my work was to evaluate the reliability of our sources of raw intelligence, many of whom were neurotics, double agents, and social misfits who would rather lie than tell the truth.)
He has a foot-by-foot knowledge of our steelhead rivers, compared to which my 34 years on the same streams barely enables me to go and return without getting lost. He knows which corner seam holds steelhead only when the nearest gauge is between 18 and 19 feet. He uses an assortment of sinktips, none more than 12 feet, with the weight enscribed in tiny script on the sleeve of the upper loop. He fishes whenever and wherever the steelhead are, including deep runs against heavily timbered banks, from the bank. But mainly he looks for soft, shallow water near shore, mini-seams and slots where he swims flies where others stand to start casting.
And for that, he prefers the close-range control of a single-hand rod. Spey rods, for the most part, cramp his style.
My vision swims; the floor beneith me trembles. Have the last nine years been a digression, a mistake?
I need an intervention, or a new spey rod.
I noticed that he was using a single-hand 9-weight, although he's used spey rods. Comparing recent results, we comiserated about the glut of silt that still remains from floods of the last two winters. Yes, we've had to relearn a lot of river bottom. Nevertheless, he hooked into 43 steelhead the previous winter/spring season.
To clarify, I haven't the remotest doubt of the truthfulness of that number. For years, I've known him as one of the masters of this region. The last time I'd fished with him all day, he'd guided our mutual companion to a 20-pound steelhead. He ties spey flies of museum quality. And he quietly keeps dipping in and out of our rivers like a hungry ouzel. (I might add that during the cold war I was a military intelligence analyst in Germany; much of my work was to evaluate the reliability of our sources of raw intelligence, many of whom were neurotics, double agents, and social misfits who would rather lie than tell the truth.)
He has a foot-by-foot knowledge of our steelhead rivers, compared to which my 34 years on the same streams barely enables me to go and return without getting lost. He knows which corner seam holds steelhead only when the nearest gauge is between 18 and 19 feet. He uses an assortment of sinktips, none more than 12 feet, with the weight enscribed in tiny script on the sleeve of the upper loop. He fishes whenever and wherever the steelhead are, including deep runs against heavily timbered banks, from the bank. But mainly he looks for soft, shallow water near shore, mini-seams and slots where he swims flies where others stand to start casting.
And for that, he prefers the close-range control of a single-hand rod. Spey rods, for the most part, cramp his style.
My vision swims; the floor beneith me trembles. Have the last nine years been a digression, a mistake?
I need an intervention, or a new spey rod.