Trout Shadows

You'd Have to Be Nuts to Put up with That

2011-07-23T14:57:00.000-07:00

“Much Madness is divinest Sense -
To a discerning Eye…” Emily Dickenson

“I don’t start fishing until the air temperatures are in the sixties and the frost is out of the ground,” he said looking over his tying glasses and tying vise. “You guys that go out in that early season are just nuts!” He raised his hand with index finger pointed at the ceiling for emphasis and to keep me from responding “I know you catch fish, but you know, if a guy has to go out and drag his ass through the water when the ice isn’t off the banks then I guess the fish will just have wait for me, because it isn’t my cup of tea.”
What’s to argue there? By their very nature fly anglers are a different breed. Some of us really do go to the extremes. Destination fishing has proven that. Fly-fishing for Tamen in Mongolia or River Dorado in Brazil take the angler to the extremes of travel, and the target fish of the trip sound other worldly compared to the brook trout and brown trout found on my home river. Let’s not even talk about tackle and methods because we push the limits there as well.
So, I go out and fish the early season and get a little cold. In these cases, the rewards are always personal. For me, skiing is just about done, and the opportunity to get out and fish relieves a little of the house bound feeling that accumulates over the course of our long northern winters.
I am always rewarded. Getting out to see how the rivers have wintered over, affords me the time to reacquaint myself with the waters we fish and to get to know the river at a time of the year when it is waking from the sleep of winter. Wading through sections of the river in the early season helps to spot springs that may not be visible at any other time of the season. This in turn may give the angler clues as to where trout might hold when the water warms later in the season. Spawning areas can be seen by the clean spots worn in the river gravel that might indicate the success of the years spawning run.
The river’s barren appearance, akin to the skeletal look of the woods before spring’s green push, has its own beauty. The angler can see the shape of the bottom more clearly. Underwater cover visible in the early season may be hidden by weed growth in early June.
The light at that time of year has a different intensity. When it is bright, it is remarkably clear and blinding. When there is a slight overcast, the diffuse light can be surreal as it to bounces off of the snow in the woods producing an almost shadow less world. A more pragmatic reason for angling in the early season when the leaves are down and a hard snow pack is still in the woods may be that getting to some of the remote sections of stream is easier without the summer growth of the under story.
The fish target the few hatches of insects that are active during this time. If the water temperature warms enough, trout will pursue smaller fish especially the big brown trout. Though the fishing strategies are narrow in focus, they are not as complex as a river in full bloom. Anglers still have to be careful of their presentation and approach to the fish.
However, trout will eat just about anything they sense as food. A few years back my fishing partner and I watched a sizable brown trout vomit a desiccated bullfrog just before we released it. We wondered about how the fish got a hold of a large frog at that time of the season. A year later at about the same time of the early season we watched as a dead bullfrog tumbled down stream on the bottom of the same river.

I recognize that the weather can eat into your reserve of tolerance. Trout do not always go for what is put on the table. Patience can be replaced by a deep need to get back to a warm truck, to drink hot tea and to drive thinking of the waiting sauna. What keeps me coming back during the early season is how very elemental this part of the season can be. The black-capped chickadees have started their summer songs. The little black stoneflies crawl out onto the snow and ice covered banks. The geese are moving north. Large sheets of ice float down stream oblivious to all things they encounter. Things are moving along the river.

We’ll catch fish. The first pulsating lunge of the rod since the close of the season is the reward for waiting through a long winter: the reassurance that the river and its fish made it through another cycle. The season’s turn comes just as the days get a bit longer and the sun a little higher. It’s warmth a balm easily soaked in on a bright March day. Those of us that are crazy enough to go out know why we are out there. We all are surprised at what we find. The beauty of a cedar bough, ice coated, as it bobs into the current and out. The grace in a brace of trumpter swans as they grab air to get into the blinding blue sky. Sometimes we’ll be surprised at the bright flash on the bottom that stops the fly in its mid-current swing. The dark shape takes off in a rod-hammering run down stream. The iridescent golden shine in the bright spring sun surprisingly vivid after being play in mid-stream. I guess you’d have to be nuts to put up with that.

Fishing on the Shoulders of Giants: Bob North

2011-04-06T08:56:00.000-07:00

The blessing of having fished with numerous talented fly anglers over the years has enriched my life and my fly angling experiences as well. Some of my most cherished friendships have been because of fly fishing and more specifically because of the river I call my home water: the Bois Brule River. I don't remember when I first heard the phrase "standing on the shoulders of giants." In that regard I am "fishing on the shoulders of giants." The debt I owe to those whom I have traveled the river is a debt that I will never be able to repay. Perhaps it is better to tell their stories and past their wisdom on to others.

The fly fisher skillfully unfurled a number of false casts to get the distance right for what appeared to be a difficult cast under a low cedar. His guide, Lawrence Berube, slowly back paddled the canoe to hold it in place. The caster never lost focus, he never glanced our direction as we passed them quietly giving plenty of room to work. A small shade shrouded spot under a cedar was clearly the point of his concentration. This was how it was supposed to be I thought to myself. When you fished the upper Brule River, you fished from a canoe, worked as a team: the guide holding the canoe in the right position and the fisher concentrating to make the perfect cast. Both skills work in unison to cast for trout. Truly this was fishing together.

The sunlight played with the line and leader magically reflecting their color and slight shine. The fly, a big tuff of feathers, floated lazily through the air as each back cast, then forward cast, cut through the heavy summer air. The whole scene seemed to slow down as we watched waiting to see the final presentation of the fly. The line seemed to be an extension of the fisher’s fingertips as the fly was launched by the curving arch of the line with as much dexterity as it took to flick a moth from a coat sleeve. The tuff of feathers disappeared into the shadow of the overhanging cedar and appeared for an instant in a sliver of sunlight that poked through the dense cover. A hole appeared in the dark glassy surface. The fly was gone.

The trout never had a chance. It was played, expertly netted by the guide, and dropped into the live well of the canoe. They had done this before. The old man’s head turned and looked directly at me in way that gave me the impression that he had just become aware of my presence. With a smile and wink he said, “Well, young fella, what did ya’ think that?” Lawrence smiled and waved, and we moved on down river. That smile and wink still shines in my as memory as one of those unique moments that makes it hard to forget. A few years later I would get a phone call from an old fisherman that would make that memory burn even brighter.

School had started, and I returned to the classroom to begin another year of teaching English feeling great about the summer break. I had gained a few new clients and had a good number of returning customers so I was content with the success of my recent season of working as a fishing guide on the Bois Brule River. So receiving a phone call about going out for more trips on the river with a new client was pure gravy. Even richer when I discovered that I’d be guiding the old fisherman with the smile and the wink.

We had agreed to meet at Stone’s Bridge for a half-day trip down to Buckhorn Camp and back. He said his name was Bob North and that he had been going out on the river with Lawrence Berube for over thirty years and needed to find a new guide because Lawrence was retiring from guiding. Bob North was a well known on the Brule for his efforts in rebuilding and maintaining Hidden and Buckhorn Camps after the straight line winds came through in July of 1983.

The trip down river was uneventful. Generally, this is a good thing in everything except guiding a client on a fishing trip and especially the first trip where the client has the high potential of hiring you again. Bob make it quite obvious that he was not impressed with my abilities to get him into fish.

“Sure looks like we’ve got the stink of the skunk on us!” he blurted out after a pause in our conversations that were more job interview than fishing trip. I was not doing well in impressing my “new boss.” The Brule was more the Dead Sea than the Sea of Galilee so we decided to pull into Buckhorn Camp eat sandwiches and head back up to Stone’s Bridge.

“What you think of Reagan?” Bob asks out of the blue, taking a bite out his sandwich and giving me a look that gave me the impression that he was looking for the right answer.
“Not much,” wasn’t the best I could muster, but I had come to the conclusion that we were not getting along well, so I thought that I should not hold back on my opinions. Besides he insisted that he pay me for the trip in the parking lot before we started the trip.
“You know what they say, ‘When I was young and foolish, I was a liberal, when I grew up I saw the error of my foolish ways,’” he said as though he’d had a great deal of practice. “Reagan will turn this country around!” The two topics a fishing guide tries to avoid at all costs are politics and religion. I got the impression that Mr. North was not one that would quibble when it came to either.
“It’s OK with me as long as he doesn’t screw up the fishing,” I quipped, “Let’s go fishing.”

Things were looking dire in the half-light of dusk. We hadn’t been on the water for more than five minutes and Bob started his critique of my “resume.” “You sure you know what you’re doin’?” and “You don’t seem to know any more about fly fishing than you do about politics,” and variations of the first two mixed with a questioning of the whole idea of night fishing and the sanity of those who take up the pursuit. After about a half hour of Bob’s critique, he settled into a string of low grumblings with occasional outbursts.

“I can’t see worth a damn,” he remarked after a long period of river silence and quiet concentration. In the growing darkness, I still could make out the fly he was casting as it drifted back towards us. I prayed for one fish, one fish that we both needed. A big brown trout to come out of nowhere and just blast the oversized Rat Faced McDougal he was casting. Right on cue, the fly disappeared in a enormous slashing rise.

Over the years, I have come to discover that perfectly competent fly fishers suffer the temporary loss of skill when the lights go out. Bob was no exception. Whatever prowess he’d developed over the years fishing with Lawrence Berube disappeared. The image of that the caster on the Brule I had in my mind dissolved.

After a few moments fumbling with the line and reel, Bob got control of the fish, which turned out to be a brown trout of about four pounds, and regained enough of confidence to play the fish and steer it to the net.

The whole temperament of the evening changed. Bob’s interest in night fishing peeked, his confidence restored, he was a man on a mission and for the rest of the short trip back to the bridge we caught fish. Fish obliged us by hitting the fly so hard that they set the hook on themselves. The bag limit back then was ten fish per day, and we nearly filled out Bob’s bag limit in little over an hour. We neared Stone’s bridge, Bob dragging the fly in the water next to the canoe while I moved the canoe into a better position. This would be the last spot to try before the night was over. I could hear the metal of the hook faintly tapping on the side of the old aluminum canoe. Something slammed into the side of the canoe at the water line startling us both. Quickly realizing he had a fish on, Bob managed to get control of his line and the fish the whole while laughing at the sudden surprise.

“That’s ten! Let’s head for the barn,” he exclaimed. With a complete bag limit in the creel we headed for the landing. “I didn’t think much of this night fishing, but I could be a new convert,” Bob conceded as we approached the landing. “This was worth the price of admission,” he said with a genuine sense of awe.

With a feeling of total vindication, the canoe slid in near the landing. Before I could get the canoe settled next to the elevated part of the landing Bob stood up. This unexpected maneuver would have concerned me more if I had known how unsteady on his feet Bob really was. For some reason I thought that he has been out with Lawrence for years so he knew his way around a canoe.

He gave away the unsteadiness of his stance when I felt him rocking the canoe from side to side. I reached for the stubbing poles too late. Bob shuffled his feet in a move to turn and take a step onto the landing, however the motion had the opposite effect. Instead of stepping up, the motion to turn caused the canoe to tip in the opposite direction depositing Mr. North into his beloved Brule backwards and head first.

I managed to stay with the canoe and right it by pitching my weight to the high side of the roll. His legs were still in the canoe when the boat righted keeping his head and torso underwater. I flipped his legs into the drink and quickly leapt into the water. Grabbing him under the arms to get him on his feet and making sure he could stand on his own, I threw the gear that I saw floating in the river back into the canoe. Helping him out of the river, I heard a mumble about going to get the car. What I thought I had regained in a trout feeding frenzy disappeared in what most guides will tell you is the worst thing a canoe guide can do short of murder: baptism. Mr. North was wet, his ego bruised, however he was not injured.

As I collected gear to load into his car, I imagined that if I saw Bob North again it would on the river with another of my peers. I heard the car pull up to the landing, but I couldn’t bring myself to look the old man in the eyes. The ambivalence of having one of the best and worst days on the river reduced me to wishing the whole day would end. I kept thinking just get the stuff in the trunk and get the old guy on his way.

I kept my back to him. The trunk opened. I just couldn’t turn around. I wanted to avoid him at all costs. There wasn’t much more I could do but turn and start loading the car. Before I could turn, I felt a hand on my shoulder. When I turned my head to look, I noticed a wet twenty-dollar bill lying on shoulder.

Bob headed back to the car and sat in the front seat with the motor running and the heater turned up on high. I loaded the car. Bob rolled down the window when I closed the trunk and shouted, “I’m cold, and I’m going home. If it’s alright with you I’ll see you next week same time, same place.”

The Lincoln Town car pulled out of the parking lot, the low growl of the engine faded into the night. Mr. North and I would meet again before the end of the fishing season. For nearly twenty seasons, Mr. North and I would fish the Brule together. We would talk about politics and religion and would rarely agree, and we would catch lots of fish.

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

Catching the Biggest Brook Trout of Your Life

2010-11-02T14:05:00.000-07:00

See the previous post about the trip to Hudson Bay.

As soon we got our canoe loaded at Albert Chookomolin’s landing on the north end of Hawley Lake, Charlie and I started down the Sutton. The flight in roughed us up more than and I expected. Flying under a thick, gray cloud deck at 500 hundred feet over the Hudson Bay Lowlands can put a dark cast unto the start of any river trip.
Taking the back seat of the Turbo Beaver turned out to be a mistake. Low altitude, a headwind mixed with rain all made the flight a stomach turning ride from hell. With no way to see a horizon line out of the tiny side windows of the plane, I managed to hold back my first technicolor yawn for over an hour and a half of a three-hour flight. Two brothers followed the first before we landed on Hawley Lake. The waves of nausea passed quickly as we paddled down river. Gusty waves of rain that rhythmically pounded us on the trip north didn’t however.
It felt good to be on the water regardless of the weather. The river channels through a summer’s worth of weed growth were far too narrow for us to try to fish. In the gin clear water, we saw small schools of brook trout scoot under the canoe. Small numbers, big fish! The surreal nature of a school of brook, average size 17 to 20 inches long, swimming under a canoe still makes me smile in disbelief.
The Sutton in its upper section close to Hawley Lake runs slow through huge channelized weed beds. The banks were low to the water and lined with tag alder, scrub willow and high grasses with the tree line close to the bank. We started looking for a camp when the banks appeared to be more accessible. What we saw for the first two hours of paddling was very low and marshy. We arrived at some sharp bends in the river, a place called the First Rapids (not much of a rapids) where we were told by Albert we’d find a camp on the second bend of the first set of rapids. Almost on command as we came around a turn and there it was: our first camp.

Setting camp helped to settle the feeling of being exposed, a feeling I hadn’t felt this intensely on a trip before. Perhaps, it was the flight in over the inhospitable land, the weather, or the fact that Charlie and I would be traveling down a very remote river alone for thirteen days. To be honest, the fact that we were traveling through polar bear county loomed in the background. Even though the trees along the river made it appear we were in a northern pine forest, it only took a short walk through the trees to be reminded that the open and relatively flat Hudson Bay lowlands and it tundra like appearance stretched for miles away from the river. The vast stretch of the landscape inspired a healthy respect for the rugged strength of this land that has been the place of spiritual quests for the native Cree for generations and an appreciation for the awesome beauty of the stark landscape.
Setting tents, stringing up a tarp, stowing gear and cutting and stacking fire wood gave us a opportunity to slow our pace and start moving to the rhythm and the time of the river. The urge to get out and fish took hold immediately when we started to see fish rise in the run directly out front of our camp. While we strung up rods, the wind gusts mixed with rain and challenged our tarp and rain suits but didn’t put down the occasional trout the rising in the big bend turn hole just off of the landing from our camp.
I crossed the river to fish the runs coming into the bend turn. Two casts later I hooked and landed the first of many Sutton River brook trout. The wind and the rain challenged us. The casting was tricky, but nothing we hadn’t expected or experienced on our home rivers during the early and late seasons of Wisconsin or the exposed windy rivers of Montana.

Though the weather was obviously working against us we still caught fish. The aggressive way they took the fly was impressive. Equally impressive was the way they fought. Both presented us with an immediate problem: hook mortality. These brook trout would fight to exhaustion. Quite literally if we did not bring them in quickly they would be far too stressed to revive—one sea run brook trout literally ruptured its gills! We immediately started flatting barbs and strung our leaders from 6-8lbs. test to 10-12 lbs. test. Even though the Sutton runs very clear, the larger tippet size did not affect the fishing and allowed us the comfort of playing the fish more aggressively.

We fished until late afternoon amazed at the quality of the fishery, the size of the fish, and the raw beauty and the unique nature of the Sutton River. It was truly like catching the biggest brook trout of your life over and over on a river we had quite literally to ourselves.

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

then to the trust of rivers

2010-10-16T20:47:00.000-07:00

as if falling from that place
where all things go when they are lost
or if, for an instant, the mechanics
of time unfurled themselves

the trout move
then to the trust of rivers
towards where they
as spawn
broke out
from the uterine thrust
of rain fed spate
up and through
their story wrote in water

the scent of the depression
muscled out of the gravel for generations,
at the tail out
of the big bend hole
overhung by willows
back across their own juvenile history
their origin
this spot
that mystery
fills currents born of silent flow

screaming a call
echoing through rock and water
lingering ghosts of
waiting female and competing male
the compelling musk
of sand and granite
rotted cedar log
whorling maple leaf in a back eddy
moss covered ledges
and stone

driving them
to dominate or surrender
to dig deep into the stream bed
of their ancestry
or to tumble lifeless,
back down into the moon lit pools.

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

"I dreamed the dream of the other dreamers..." Walt Whitman

2010-09-22T11:56:00.000-07:00

This is the first of a number of posts about a "dream" trip to Hudson's Bay.

Walt Whitman emerges from American literature as the 1st urban poet. His poetry, a rich mixture of detailed imagery and a kaleidoscope of experiences, is effused with vignettes of 19th century urban life, and, at times, transcends experience into the metaphysical. In other words, he can get a little freaky. "I dreamed the dream of the other dreamers...." I'll get to the picture of the bear eventually which is other worldly in its own right. In his poem "The Sleepers," Whitman walks about his world experiencing the lives and dreams of a whole host of people.

I have long dreamed of fishing in the usual exotic locals: Alaska, Patagonia, Iceland, New Zealand.... Besides the occasional trip to some of the famed waters of the lower forty-eight, I haven't taken a trip to exclusively fly fish for an extended period of time. When it comes to trout fishing dream trips, I have for the most part "dreamed the dreams of the other dreamers."

The Sutton River got added to my dream trip list twenty years ago when I read about it in a magazine. Big brook trout in a remote river that flows into Hudson Bay, all of the things that dreams are made of. The Little North of Canada, the region between Lake Winnipeg, Hudson Bay and Lake Superior has been a destination for me on other trips to paddle some wild rivers. However, I had never made it to the Bay by traveling through the unique region of tundra below the artic circle that rings the Bay, known as the Hudson Bay Lowlands. Its stark beauty and unusual wildlife, polar bears and seals and whales, makes it a fairly exotic place to travel only 500 miles north of where I live in Wisconsin.

Charlie d'Autremont, a good friend of mine, and I have talked of doing a remote river trip for a few years. Finding the time and the right river seemed to be the only things standing in our way. We started looking into the logistics of the trip about a year ago. Being a fly-in/fly-out trip presented some cost challenges. Coupled with the idea that we were to travel 90 miles by ourselves in one canoe in a remote part of Canada gave us additional challenges as well.

Berger and Terry's description from the web site ottertooth.com was a great help in trip planning as was their book Canoe Atlas of the Little North.

There are few air services interested in flying into the Sutton River. Hearst Air of Hearst, Ontario, specializes in flying into the Sutton from july to August and has canoes stored on the river. They work closely with Albert Chookomolin, a Cree Guide, who runs a remote fishing camp on Hawley Lake (Albert's Fish Camp). He has rustic accommodations for fisher and hunters that want to home base out of Hawley Lake or to stay in his outpost lodgings on the river. Albert was born on the Sutton River and is a great resource for trip planning.

Once know as the Trout River, the Sutton is known for its big brook trout, its stark beauty, its clear running wadable water and its ability to inspire a soulfulness that I will never forget. It's gradiant drop is evenly spread out through its run to the bay which makes it a fairly easy river to run. The Sutton runs through Polar Bear Provincal Park. The likelihood of encountering one of North America's ultimate predators is very real. Besides resident brook trout, the Sutton also takes a run of sea-run brook trout starting in July.

For thirteen days Charlie and I paddled and fished down the Sutton and never encountered another human soul. The only man made sounds were our own and the occasional distant sound of an air craft. Evidence of other travelers along the river was minimal. I have traveled in remote parts of North America numerous times. Never in all of my other trips have I encountered a more enriching experience in such unexpected ways.

Sun set on the lower Sutton.

More about the trip and the encounter with a polar bear at twenty paces in my next few posts.

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

The Delivered Fly

2010-03-07T11:06:00.000-08:00

When the water pools on the ice that has had the river locked up since it froze over about mid-January and in places the river opens, its lacy currents playing in the bright March sun, I mentality wander around pondering piscatorial pursue that we are on the cusp of…

My wife scoffs at the idea that fly-fishing is sport. She views it more like an illness that comes on in late winter and leaves around mid-November with various relapses throughout. She is a wise woman and is probably “more right” about her observation than she knows. Though she fly-fishes, she’s not as “bit with the bug” as I.
The phone calls about the coming season start coming from clients, friends, and the one phone call I always expect from by friend and guiding partner: “Are we taking our usual trip out on the opener?” This is the beginning of a “slight fever.” The calls are only a few of the harbingers of the coming on of that sweet sickness that I willingly surrender to. The urge to spend time at the tying bench, the dreams of fishing, I even believe I hear the rush of water as it flows round my legs—though I probably have a touch of tinnitus—it all tells me, much like a sore throat and a headache tells me, I am about to get a full blown case of it.

The internet has done a lot to cool the fever that starts to rise in me even before “the fit is upon me”: surfing around, reading old fishing reports, reading fly-fishing message boards, looking up fly patterns. Though I really do miss the days when I’d start thinking about fishing, which usually sent me to the literature on the “sport.” I did a lot of reading, research and contemplative repose back then. I still do. Some might call it waiting, quietly on your own. Back when I was younger I had more time and I would take trips down to the river, locked up for winter and see if there was anything going on. On warm days when the thaw was going good, I would even go so far as to donning the waders and walking around in the cold current. Occasionally, I’d spook a few holdover steelhead.

It’s different now. People seem to be more connected. We reach out to each other: E-mail, IMs, Tweets, Message Boards, and Facebook. In that regard I find what’s happening just as interesting. The solitary contemplative repose I would have drifted into years ago has commingled with the digital world of the Internet. I find my random thoughts leading off into a discovery of the joyfully unexpected.

I was reading my guiding partner’s fly of the month column on our service’s website (yes, a shameless plug). So I got to thinking about that fly pattern: The Pass Lake.

After looking at my guiding partner’s version of the Pass Lake I got to thinking of why such a wide difference in materials—if you compare both of our versions you’d think they were two different patterns. Not to mention a third found on the internet. I know that patterns evolve this way. One tier takes the pattern and puts their own twist on it. Regional differences on popular patterns often will change a pattern in this way. That’s what makes the “sport.”

Fly patterns account for a good portion of the word count of all that is written about our “sport.” Hook and materials fashioned into the perfect dupe. It is always surprising what trout will take. Back when I cleaned the catch for my clients, I would always check the stomach contents. (You wouldn’t believe how many cigarette butts I have found besides the real trout food that ends up in the guts of a fish.) I once had a client have a eight inch brook trout take a small Pass Lake, only to have the brook trout disappear in the maw of a monster brown as long as my arm. The poor eight inch brookie didn’t survive the encounter neither did the client’s leader when the big brown realized there was something just not quite right about the brook trout firmly held in its kype. The leader parted when the trout decided to shoot out of the hole as quickly as it appeared, shocking the client into a “death grip” on the line and rod, leaving the molested trout to float to the surface. We retrieved the fish with the Pass Lake still firmed planted into the corner of the significantly smaller fish’s jaw.

The Pass Lake has been a part of my fishing arsenal for a long time starting as a wet fly pattern in sizes #12 and #14. Working as a guide for Cedar Island Estates introduced me to the fly as a real go to streamer pattern in larger sizes. Years later, I learned that it fished well as a dry fly pattern. When, on mid-morning in late June (1985), a client hooked and landed a brown of about 25 inches on a Pass Lake dry fly, I came to believe that the legend of the pattern deserved the attention it was getting in all of its variations, a real midwestern legend that has stood up to the test of time.

Out of curiosity I searched for the Pass Lake on the Internet and found a discovery of the joyfully unexpected. On the Wisconsin Fishing Forum “Duke” Welter held court on the history of none other than the Pass Lake by relaying the words of the late Larry Meicher, “The Pass Lake Kid.” At the time Larry evidently didn’t have a “hook up” to the “Net.” (You can read it here.)

It has amazed me how interconnected we are. You talk to someone coming off river from a day of delivering a fly like the Pass Lake and start a conversation and end up making all sorts of connections. Places, patterns, people; they all commingle waiting for a discovery of the joyfully unexpected. Larry Meicher fished the Brule with me nearly 30 years ago and introduced me to the Pass Lake.

Things do run full circle.

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

a water sign

2010-02-25T16:27:00.001-08:00

a water sign

we are sent by water
into this world of air
only to be
drawn back to its
feathery tangles
whirling eddies
current and tide
wave train that crashes folds into
a whorling pool foam granished
after a long race over cold stones.

each encounter is a reminder of
liquid life that speaks in a language
of living motion and primal buoyancy
where water was mouthed first
before air, before sound only
the measured meter of the heart
the arbitrary noises of human plumbing.

our random beginnings
a discharge
in the transparent flow
of the ancient element
to live then is
to give drink of the essential knot
to water something
down, to submerge it
in the flood taken
from a colorless source

or
a bottle of it bought off a duck’s back
poured carelessly down the drain
to eventually run under the bridge
or over the dam.

Sorry to have been hibernating.

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

Transparent Mysteries

2009-12-15T09:50:00.000-08:00

Pleading our lives
like the woven intricacies
of two streams mixing
through rock and sand and wood

we reach out
ruminating on the iridescence of trout

can’t help but wonder at the mystery
as color’s shifting splash
and subtle shift in wave frequency
change in angles of light
nerve impulse stimulation
electro-chemical twinge light reception
measured in foot candles
in lumens all in
discrete packets, zillons of them
the photon, quantum of the electromagnetic field,
how then does it translate
to beauty?

Merry Christmas and a Joyous New Year

Hyvaa joulua Onnellista uutta vuotta

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

Bemused

2009-09-30T09:17:00.000-07:00

The eddy line where everything either gets swept under a low overhang of cedars or gets slammed by the whole of the main run taunted me from the moment I waded into the pool at 5:00 in the morning. I had cast into that magic suspension of currents, using at least three different strategies, for at least a half hour. Before you start accusing me of buggy whipping the hole, I'll say that at 5:00 in the morning its dark enough to cover most of my miscues (if any), and I gave pause enough for any beast to feel secure enough to venture forth.

The previous night I had held the canoe for a client in the press of the run so that he could skate a fly through the eddy line in hopes of moving a least one good fish. This place always holds good fish. However, it hasn’t produced anything for a number of seasons—not even a “drive-by," "how-are-you," or "No-I’m-not-interested.” I have reasoned over the years that when good spots stop producing, a big fish has taken over chasing out all rivals. This theory has shown some validity when big fish are caught from these previously quiet places. Usually big lake run browns. We worked the fly for a good half hour before we strung up the rod and headed down stream and into the night. So I returned after a few hours sleep to try and reconfirm the theory.

I stood and watched the eddy slowly push the foam up to the top of the eddy and then slowly swing it down along the undercut bank and back down to the end where it met enough of the push from the main current to start it cycling through again. Bemused by the movements of the river, I may have fallen sleep on my feet or somehow had one of those strange experiences where you find yourself loosing any sense of the passage of time. Driving to work comes to mind, where you discover yourself at work, but you’re hard pressed remembering the drive. A hot shower can spend time for me. What I thought was a few minutes turns into a cold shower wake-up.

The bump of a canoe hitting a rock at the top of the run brought me out of my trance. Surprised not by the canoe that was yet to make the turn into the final part of the run before the pool, but the sunlight pouring through an opening in the cedar canopy. What had been a dark, shadow-shrouded hole was now fully illuminated by the low angle of the sun reaching the over the top of the valley. Rocks, woody tangle and the sand spout of a bottom spring shown clearly. The shadow of the cedars had moved out into the run with the edge of the shadow hovering over the sweet spot of the eddy: the current break between the main thrust of water and the cycling turn of the eddy. How had I missed the transition from the nether world of the half-light before dawn to this? The canoe bumped another rock. I glanced up the run. As my head turned, I glimpsed, out of the corner of my vision, a large silver shadow dart down the eddy line, flash brightly through the sunspot on the bottom of the eddy and slide under the undercut and dissolve into the mystery of those velvet thoughts that are marked by the revolving question: Did I really see that? Or was that what I wanted to see?

I am pretty certain I said hello to the canoeists as they slipped by and rounded the next turn. The sound of the rapids rushed through my head for the whole of the trip back to the car. The rest of the day was bemused by the movement of water.

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

Waiting

2009-07-17T14:55:00.000-07:00

Fly rodding involves a lot of waiting. Waiting for the just the right conditions: light, stillness in the air, humidity, time of day, feeding activity. I am always taken back by what appears to be. A stretch of river absolutely lacking in feeding activity can come alive in the course of a few minutes. Wait a few minutes and things can change. Where you'd think there couldn't be a fish-one appears.

I sit and drink tea while I wait. Will the wind settle down? Ponder the state of man? Did I remember the bug juice? Sip tea. Fight the urge to fish the water. Did I choose the right pattern? Sip tea. Check the sky. Not dark enough, yet. Wonder about whether I locked the car. Too bad, I'm not going back to lock it anyway. Stretch the shoulders. Think about who won the ball game. Check out the fish that rose next to the log upstream. Watch the mink as it snakes its way downstream, ducking under branches, submerging then emerging next to the moss covered rocks. It scrambles up onto the trunk of cedar that has grown curving out from the bank. Shaking its body body in a quick blur, the mink clears the water from its fur and moves on nosing its way through the ferns and sweetgale. Sip tea. The wind is calming. Mental flossing directs your attention to those occurrences that happen all about you. A mosquito flies off so heavy laden with my blood that it nearly drops into the river before it gains enough altitude to fly off--I usually feel their faint sting.

First Brown Drake spinner of the night takes its clumsy flight over head then others appear, followed by more. Its getting darker and more still. Did I mention that I drink tea while I wait?

The first fish takes a spinner as it struggles in the surface film. I watch another fly flutter an inch, writhe, then disappear in a swirling rise that looks like a miniature toilet flush. Other fish join in. Each has its own distinctive take and sound. Splashy and bold, soft with a distinctive sipping sound, gentle dimpled ring. In the course of a few minutes there are more than a dozen fish actively feeding. I've waited long enough.

I've been away from the computer fishing the June hatches and guiding. The keyboard is foreign to the touch and being indoors is starting to feel confining. I gotta get out again.

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

river trails

2009-05-27T11:14:00.000-07:00

always narrow, weedy and mud slicked
boot polished smooth and sun baked hard
twisting through willows thick,
dip and shinnied around skin barking stones
crossing hot meadows and wind corroded snow
through cedar shade cool

in blackberry tangle grab
low under the alder rain drip
over wire fence cautious straddle

woven roots in the well worn
way looking
at
the direction of the imprints
of familiar souls

the path wear
points the way to where we came and
the other to where we can go

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

quiet water

2009-05-13T13:42:00.000-07:00

quiet water

under
the shimmering lace
the blooming transparency and

mesmerizing flow
a tail shadow flies over
illuminated sand and gravel

dissolving in momentary
feathery whorls of
shadow cast one on

one to break as
the surface rolls and pushes,
divides and plunges into

darker quiet water

and in it
its ability to tell lies
and to reveal truth

finds comfort honestly
evades us easily
even though we traffic in

the best of human guile
they elude us
in the reflective glare

we are mere imitations
water ghosts locked up in
windowless rooms of our own reflection
bound to strong currents

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

They're here!

2009-05-04T13:12:00.001-07:00

Opening weekend and Hendrickson hatches have always had a special place in fishing the seasons of the trout calendar. Everything about Hendricksons speaks to fly rodding for trout or at least what I envision as fly rodding for trout. Trout will feed activity on all stages of the insect's life cycle. I have even caught fish using a size 22 egg sack pattern--a tiny ball of yellow dubbing! Some of my fondest memories of opening weekend have been because of these storied of mayflies.

This past weekend, with the wind howling down the river, E. subvaria (old school latin name) came off at about two in the afternoon despite the wind. Many of the duns skated on the surface like iceboats racing with the wind until they fluttered off lost in the gusts. The number of insects coming off would have made for a perfect hatch by fly fishing standards enough to keep the trout looking up but not too many to make imitation an impossible feat. Mysteries of the behavior trout won out again. With abundance of available fodder and no fish feeding--not on the bottom either, I could see them still and lock jawed--the hatch continued for an hour while I looked on. Some times it is better this way. Waiting in humble silence, contemplating in the moment, knowing full well that fortune is a harlot.... It was a beautiful day filled with blue sky and clouds and small flights of ducks and the occasional flash of a spooked fish or those that drove by to have a look. Most of it familiar yet it still refreshes the memory.

After the hatch let up and with just a few bugs popped off the river, I moved down stream to a run that is some times the haunt of other fly fishers. Some that I have known for years. I am of that age that I can say that and envision a good hand full of people. A few of whom have passed away. Their presence is still sensed there and at times I can hear them as they back cast or wade slowly to the next position closer to the feeding fish. The local cemetery is just a hundred yards away so I am sure there may be a few haunting this run even as you read this.

The remains of an old bridge still stands on either side of the run as I looked up river. As the river glided around the bend and narrowed in front of me I thought I could hear voices up stream. It happens to me a lot lately. Running water speaks its language, and I forget where I am and suddenly I am hearing conversations that took place years ago, but only in bits and pieces. I even mistake them for voices that I believe are actually speaking in the here and now but are masked from recognizing because the rush of water over rock confuses my hearing...or the voice gets muffled in a gust of wind.

There was a truck parked in the space where we all have parked our vehicles at this place. I stood looking up stream for awhile listening to the bits and piece of the conversations trying to recognize the voices. Then I heard it. The sound of a wading staff hitting a rock. Faintly at first then steady like an angler moving back down stream, wading through the run not fishing. The figure appeared at the top of the run, and I took him for the driver of the truck. I hoped that I would recognize him. He appeared ghost like in the shadows. "Well, it's all over they've come and gone. You 'miles well wait until dusk and see if there's a spinner fall," the shadow spoke in a loud and familiar voice. "Did you come with some one or are you by yourself?"

He stepped into the yellowing light of the afternoon sun and smiled. It was Dave, the fly tier, an old fishing friend. He said that it was his first time out, "Would you believe it?" He shook my hand with a familiar wry smile on his face and climbed the bank.

"I do," I said. "You're retired and don't have to pound the water like the rest of us on the weekend's"

"I gotta go to church. Michelle said I had to get out of the house for awhile," he added putting his rod down next to the truck. Dave is serious about his fly fishing and his Catholicism. "I've been retired nine years now and there isn't a retired person that I've met that doesn't pray." He paused and faced the river holding his hands above his head in praise, "Thanking God, for the time to do stuff like this. Opening weekend, for a few hours at least. I can go anytime, you know, but opening day..."

"Maybe there will be spinner fall."

"If the hatch has been on for a few days, it's possible and if the wind comes down. I gotta go," he replied

We chatted for a few more minutes about what we saw on the river and if we had seen or heard from any river people we knew. I didn't tell him about the voices I been hearing lately.

As he drove off, I thought about the possibility of fishing the spinner fall. I had heard voices in the water, then Dave appears. There are all sorts of emergences on the river. I let the spinner fall and fishing wait for another time, another opening day.

Keep tight line,

Steve Therrien

Temptation

2009-04-29T12:23:00.000-07:00

walking the river on the edge
of someone else’s trout boundary
temptation gets the better
so I cross barbed wire
pulled tight by hoist and muscle

ignoring the sign

makes the bending wire hard
complicated by fly rod
the hole widening in a fence line
becomes a wrestling of two egos:

those that build
those that want through

if the bending isn’t done right,
standing too soon...
a hand slips...
a tangled rod tip ...
a rusted point could catch your waders
your skin
with righteous indifference
could make it nasty later
scratch
cut deep
puncture
but the wound
wouldn’t be much
to the thing that drives
the crossing of fence lines

laying on to the pulse of the forbidden
the effort and the risk of it
when someone slips through strands in a fence
then looking back over
where you’ve been
to
what is
that is there

heart throb that
hums when the wind whispers through
the wires
and ripples the surface
of the transparent mysteries
that tempts us

that speaks through it all
below the surface
finning through the lacy eddies
that hug and caress river rock
ambivalent to the trespasser’s boot

With the opener (just around the corner), I hope this greets you well. I pulled this out of an old folder. It was from a time when my enthusiasm for the "quiet sport" would sometimes blunt my ethical governor. Today, I imagine the ghost of my former self beckoning me on from the other side of the wire. We all confront the sign sometime.

I hope you all encounter the tight lines we all dream on...

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

river crossings

2009-03-26T13:45:00.000-07:00

become well marked by
the river of boot soles that
have for the seasons marched
with collective calling
and necessity

then the path submits to
muscular wrestlings of river
water and rock and trees
and the complexities that
mix and boil the possibilities
and the uncertainty of flux

a good crossing makes suckers of us all
a slow submersion can quickly disappear
in the midstream weight and
toe tracing boulders
unsettled footing erodes the sandy gravel
roils out from under felts and studs
and deepening press toward down river
baptism and transformation
cloudless blue
then emersion
mixed and bound
to river music
until the next fishable run

there are those where
“returning were as tedious as go o’er”
that squeeze time out
into those few moments when
we can embrace solitude by
making the other side
of mayfly emergence and
ants on the wing

in the small places
nothing is new
otters chew brook trout heads
steelhead crash the alders
but for the passage
of few whorling eddies

we

inward turn
possibilities open
when we cross over
to something or from something

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

a good lie

2009-03-17T11:51:00.000-07:00

finding the right drift in new water
tests one’s curiosity in the unknown
riffles and back eddies
fishing out what we want most

adjusting the perception of the mix
to trace the line just so the drift
might lure out the lie of those
who need convincing most

each step up against the current’s press
through rock and gravel, sand and mire
adjusting the cast to tumble down, mend line
to slow it against the arguments in surface tension

a repetitive exercise in patience
persisting in a lie, to be fooled
by the anticipation that something
in fortune might change

to see a slight pause or envision
through broken sparkle
shadowy movement toward the fly and
the sudden surge of line and rod

play upon the presentation
arch and pull
fish or hooked to the earth

the fish or the the fisherman
taken in by the lie
that a fly works as truth
that a fly is the truth and will be taken as such
for some, one swing through the run is enough
for others, getting the right drift is a matter of casting
over and over, until it is the truth

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

We Should Learn to Share and Share Alike

2009-03-11T17:30:00.000-07:00

“With more and more folks looking for the same thing, how we approach the water, as well as the attitude we bring to it, will go a long way in defining the quality of the outing, the height of its enjoyment, and the depth of its significance.”
Jerry Kustich—At the River’s Edge

The fly angling world has become more crowded. More people are fly-fishing in a variety of waters. More information about where to fish and how to fish is shared freely. Because of the way we share information, the community of fly fishers has the potential of being brought closer together. In all things on and off the water we should learn to share our understanding, the resources, and most importantly ourselves. However, it seems that the very thing that could bring us together has distanced us. The phrase used in a lot of the literature I read as I grew up in the sport, “the fraternity of fly fishers,” seems to be disappearing.

Car rides to the river have their own mental rituals for me. I always run through the mental checklist: gear, where to fish, what flies I’ll use. The anticipation can brew a strange mixture of expectation of fish rising and the steady and strong pull of a good fish. After about ten minutes, I can catch a half dozen good fantasy fish in those special places with that certain fly all placed by perfect casts in the slow motion only my imagination can supply. Turning off the highway onto the dirt road to the river I get pretty wound up, and an odd feeling of entitlement starts to grow within me.

I don’t think anyone starts a trip to the river with the idea of getting into any conflicts. To assume that all fly anglers are righteous people is naive. If we believe, only a few muddy the waters for the rest of us, we are being equally naive. The growing lack of civility in the world and the conflicts it breeds is also evident in our sport. It certainly isn’t just the actions of “those other guys.” The rest of us have to take responsibility for a growing lack of civility that has emerged (pardon the pun) on our waters.

The parking lot was empty when I arrived. Late July fishing on this river is mostly an evening affair. I wanted to get to a series of turns in the river that started at a wide sandy spot and to fish down through the turns then walk back to the car after dark. The high banks all through this stretch of the river valley grow stands of red pine. The under story near the river is punctuated with cedars and alders, willow and sweet gale, and ferns. The turns in the river cut deep bank holes that are littered with sunken logs and rock. The long shadows of the setting sun, the sounds of the river settling into dusk, the smells, of humid earth peppered with sweet pine resin, invigorated the car ride’s mixture of anticipation, expectation and daydream.
Even though it is thought of as the quiet sport, there are a few recognizable sounds in fly-fishing. The sound that a rod makes as it cuts the air can carry a good distance in the right conditions. Hearing it halfway to the river was the most unwelcome sound. I was angry.

I’ll call it anger because I am not sure what else to call it. I know this moment well because over the years as a fishing guide I’ve witnessed it in the actions of other fishers and myself. A frustrated boot kick in the shallows of a back eddy, a rock thrown into a pool of holding steelhead, a canoe purposely paddled over a fly line are just outward manifestations of strong feelings. I know we all have been to this place where our behavior should take a right turn, but it doesn’t.

I was frustrated and disappointed as I stood watching what turned out to be a father and son fishing through the spot that I had already mentally claimed during my drive to the river. Father and son were enjoying their moment on the water, catching and releasing trout. The sight of it made me upset. How different would it have been had I arrived fifteen minutes later and they were out of sight? No trace of their being in the same stretch of river but a few current eroded wader prints.

The passion that we bring to our sport is often our undoing. We often fish by ourselves to be in those places where our solitude and the flow of the river can renew us. I wanted the chance to catch a “mermaid” as the poet of Frenchmen’s Pond once said. While I watched the father and son disappear around the bend of the river, I came to realize that it is not just about the desire to fish. It is about the disappointment when the fantasy-fishing daydream doesn’t match reality. This sets us up for conflict.

In my mind I owned that stretch of the river. Finding myself in an odd feeling of territorial encroachment, I decided to wait silently and quiet myself. I sat on the high bank looking down on the currents and “read” the water, to rest it, to watch and listen as the Bible instructs us to. Tom McGuane in his book, The Longest Silence, notes “...the best angling is always a respite from burden.” Why had I come out to the river in the first place? Over the years of fishing and guiding fly fishers, I have personally gotten away from the pursuit of catching every fish in the river and the pursuit of the monster trout. McGuane also points out that fishing is a source for renewal. When we go to the water, we should, of those uglier motives we carry around in the world, “Leave as much behind as possible... if we expect to be restored in the eyes of God, fish, and the river, which reward you with hollow waste if you don’t behave.”

We are visitors regardless of the notions of ownership that we bring to the water and in that sense our best behavior is expected. Expected not because it is written in the fish and game laws but because it rises above law and helps us gain a deeper insight into why we fish.

Fly-fishing has evolved through the hard work of some its more ardent proponents. As a whole fly anglers have grown up. Progressing beyond the “put and take” ethic of perhaps a generation or so before, our collective understanding of the sport has been made richer because we have recognized the contributions of those who came before us and learned from them.

A generation ago fly anglers were primarily brought to the sport by mentors--a family member or friend who showed the way. Much of my early development as a fly fisher seemed mysterious. A fisher’s mentor took the time to demystify fly fishing and to pass on much more than “how to” information. The traditions of the sport and the rivers we fished were incorporated along with casting and presentation instruction and yet an understanding of how to conduct oneself on the stream was never left out.

We come to the sport differently today. Fishing clinics on DVD, the local fly shop, and a whole host of regional and local publications have revolutionized the way a whole new generation of anglers discover fly fishing. We are knowledgeable and skilled fly anglers today. The Internet has helped in ways that my mentors in the sport could never understand. Message boards and blogs, e-mail and web sites, have elevated the amount of information available to fly fishers. As a fishing partner of mine said, “You can’t be too ignorant about how to catch trout with a fly these days.” There are very few secrets and that includes where to fish. GPS devices and guidebooks have all helped pull back the curtain on the secret locations. In the rush to get the latest new technique, hot fly (don’t forget to trademark them), must fish locales, and the absolutely “cannot do without” new product, we’ve forgotten to pass along how to conduct ourselves on the water. Humanity and civility can’t be taught on a DVD or weekend class. It is the relationship with the rivers and the people who fish them that teach us over time. How to conduct ourselves, wisdom and civility take time.

Sometimes it’s better to sit and watch the river move on, let the water rest and see if something will happen. The father and son were around the turn and the smaller fish in the run had started to work again. A few of the larger fish showed themselves chasing smaller fish in the shallows on the far side of the river under the overhang of an ancient cedar.

I had taken my time to string my rod and tie on a leader and fly. I like fishing small streamers just under the surface. The low light of dusk is perfect for it. Easing into the river and slowly moving into a good casting position, I stripped enough line to get the streamer to swing under the cedar. One false cast down stream to check the distance ... a stick snapping in the bank down stream and noisy entry into the river... a pile cast short of the cedar and a large trout racing through the sand shallows and into the deep snag filled hole up stream.

The son, from the father and son pair, had crossed over the hog’s back on the opposite side of the river, proceeded down the path and marched into the river. He crossed the river and took up a position twenty-five yards downstream from me. While I watched with mild interest, the boy started fishing up stream toward me trying very hard not to make eye contact. I got the impression that he really didn’t believe I was standing up stream. When his cast got within range of the end of my drift, I reeled up and backed out of the stream. I noticed his father watching his son from the top of the path on the hog’s back. I am not sure if I was angry or just deeply disappointed.

Rules of conduct don’t always apply in every situation. The unique nature of each fishery sometimes helps to develop local etiquette. The Atlantic Salmon Fisheries of the world are notable for their regulations and their own unique fishing protocols. Our local rivers often develop their own unique protocols as well. In Minnesota on the North Shore of Lake Superior, the rivers run a short distance up stream from the lake before encountering an impassable falls. Migratory trout and salmon running into those streams stack up in a small number of holes and holding spots. Over the years anglers there have developed an understanding that they fish very close together, helping each other to net fish and reeling up and getting out of the way of an angler moving down stream to play a trout or salmon. These are understandings we come to as a community.

Distances that on other streams would definitely result in harsh words are not a problem for these North Shore anglers. However, miles south of the North Shore of Lake Superior, on the Bois Brule River in Wisconsin, distances anglers give each other are considerable by comparison. How much space we’d prefer giving each other on the water is relative to the situation and the region. One fisher’s too close could be close enough but not a problem for another. Damian Wilmot, a guide on the Brule and a good friend and fishing partner said it best, “If you think you’re getting too close you probably are.” We can’t know every nuance of etiquette for every new stream we encounter. We can however try to discover them through the same resources that anglers today use to become more skilled and more knowledgeable about the fisheries we visit. We could try a novel approach and talk to each other.

I watched the father and son pull a canoe out of the brush. They both ignored me as they paddled past. I tried to make the best of the situation by waving. No response. The hull of the canoe and the paddle stroke of the father in the stern were the only visible movement. Making the turn, the canoe left only a thin visible wake as it too faded into the darkening backdrop. As the canoe disappeared it came to me that I had encroached on the water they had left. Although no heated verbal exchanges took place, being ignored was a bitter pill.

In a phone conversation with a good fishing friend the other day I heard a similar tale. This time the conflict was between two old friends. My friend on the other end of the phone drove to a series of holes in an S-turn of the river. The familiar truck in the parking lot indicated that his old friend was there already. Instead of moving on, he pulled in thinking friends share.

It is a big place with enough space for two even three anglers to fish sometimes out of sight of one another. My friend was surprised when his old friend shouted his disapproval instead of a greeting—apparently feeling he should have the place to himself. The story of their verbal exchange made me wonder about where the fraternity of fly fisherman had gone.

After further thought I realized it was still there, fly fishers have to keep encouraging it. Relationships need to be maintained. We can take for granted almost anything that gets too familiar. I have to believe that when we are agreeable and show respect and try to be inclusive we are maintaining the relationship we all have as the result of being involved with the sport. Regardless of what level of development we may find ourselves, we should always remember to share.

Fishing the Buffalo Meadows section of the Firehole in the late 70s, I felt overwhelmed by what I encountered on the water. Elk and buffalo grazing directly across the river and mountains in the background not to mention the phenomenal caddis hatches that occurred every evening the week that I was there. I struggled the first day. Wading, reading the water, casting in the wind, it all took getting used to. Though I tied my own caddis patterns, none that I thought would work actually did. I didn’t want to bother anybody or embarrass myself by exposing my ignorance. These were obvious master anglers who didn’t need to be disturbed by the likes of me. I finally mustered up and walked to the closest angler while he sat on the bank tying on another fly. As I approached he looked up and smiled and asked how I was doing.

“Not good,” I replied.

“Really?” the question had a little disbelief in it. He must of sensed my lack of self-confidence and offered to show me what he was using. It was about a size 16, dark-brown elk hair caddis. The first I had ever seen. He demonstrated how to fish it in the complex currents using a series of up stream mends. When the fly rode high in the water, the rainbows took it greedily. He gave me a few samples, and I went back to the river and caught fish. My first trip west was made memorable by the sharing of a little time, a little knowledge and a few flies.

I haven’t lived up to that example of generosity and kindness very well. I will try to honor all acts of kindness I have received from other anglers. These simple offerings have stayed with me and have remained woven among my life experiences. They have contributed to my development as a fly angler and in retrospect made me a better person. I hope I can be worthy of all those unselfish attempts to give back to the sport that has given me so much.

If you have comments for me please feel free to post them.

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien

My Baptism

2009-03-11T17:04:00.000-07:00

I come to this as a frustrated free lance. At a recent writer's workshop the discussion turned to who is the audience that we are writing for, the publisher as the gate keeper to a larger audience or kindred spirits looking to find a different audience or better yet a more flexible and fluid audience. On the trip back home it occurred to me that I had a number of nonfiction and fiction pieces that haven't been read by anyone but the editors that rejected them. Some of those pieces were fed to me by the editors themselves only to be rejected after many hours of work.

My idea is to offer some of my rejected and new work from time to time as a way of casting them out there on the river to see if they can catch a reader or two. So I take this plunge into the river of online publication without any idea where it might lead. To be swept up by the currents' push and delivered down stream somewhere has an appeal that waiting for what the mail brings will never have. If you see me float by, could you give me a hand and pull me into quiet water and let me know what you think?

Keep a tight line,

Steve Therrien