Snake Guides: Solo Gravy

I'd have easily joined my 4 friends for a repeat of yesterday, but the way the day unfolded I went solo. The kids were out in the yard playing, my wife was doing some computer work and I had just finished running the dog...so he was napping.

A Sunday in March with temps nearing 60. The breeze was blowing at decent clip which would be the only downside I could think of against going streamside...but after the winter we've had, not likely a deterrent.

The sun is factor. As I drove to the little spring creek near here, I looked at the shadows cast by the car ahead of me and decided that I'd prefer to have the sun at my back for 3 reasons.
1. Better visibility into the water
2. Tougher visibility out of the water (for the fish)
3. Photo light.

The car's shadow wasn't too long so I figured I could get away with cashing in on the 3 benefits above without blowing the water with my shadow.

I trekked up to the head of my beat, thrilled that nobody else was parked at the access point.
Hiking boots a 3 weight and my camera. No waders, no expectations, no stress...yesterday's outing satiated me and this outing was today's gravy.

I fished down, swinging my leech through the crannies and shadows.
Nothing.
I kept going and finally had a nice trout come out of an undercut and make a swipe.
I continued pitching but that was the last I saw of it.
Moving down further, I caught movement in the grass downstream and focused on two turkeys making their way to the stream bank.
I pulled up my camera, zoomed in and prepared to watch turkeys swim or fly.
The choice was fly and I snapped some shot as they crossed only to find out (later) that I farmed the focus and missed what could have been a pretty cool shot. In the picture below you'll see the first turkey's head in grass on the right side of the frame. I messed up his crossing shot too...oh well.

I finally wrangled a small brown and admired it for second before sending him home and stepping down.

The thing that I am learning (or perhaps re-learning) this year is that fish can be just about anywhere.
They need cover and food and places like that come in a number of configurations.

I was keeping this in mind as I came across a shadowed bank fifty feet below me. The water was only about 15" deep but the flow was good and it seemed like a good idea to marinate the leech there. Quartering the cast down and across, the fly landed and swung to the shadow...I watched a small 6" brown trout track the fly and then make a mad dash downstream as a big dark shadow shot out and hammered the leech.

I came up blank on the set.

I sent the fly in for do-overs and the bigger trout slid out of the shadows and gave the leech another thump.

This time, I came up blank again.

I gave the water downstream another 15 minutes of fishing and was rewarded with another nice little brown trout to hand.

I cast a long shadow across the road as I stowed my rod in the back of my vehicle. I looked upstream to the spot where the big trout lives, took a mental note of the location and drove home.

The kids were still playing in the yard, my dog was up from his nap and my wife asked how the fishing was.