Arrival time ~9am. Airtemp in the upper 20′s. With frost on the ground Carl and I began the morning hike downstream passing up over two miles of creek. I didn’t bother to stop once to look, the goal was to get to the starting point, a remote area that requires a serious hike from either direction to get to. This translates to a place where few frequent, the trout haven’t been pressured and the area is left untouched (for the most part). Places like this, far from roads, houses, people…they are rare and should be treasured. As we hiked downstream avoiding the temptation to glance at the water we were to see as our day progressed, the morning sun came out taking with it the frost and my need for an overcoat. January and I’m hiking the creek in a fleece because my traditional winter gear is simply too much for the almost 30degree airtemp at ~9am.

Once downstream I gazed upon large water with darting shadows, the shadows of trout, white suckers and the rosey cheeked creek chub. Due to the large water and not having fished this creek before I opted to swing a streamer. I fish a streamer in situations like this if the trout respond, my third roll cast saw a smaller brown chase the streamer almost to my feet, a good sign that my SMB would take fish this day. A couple casts later I had the first brown of the day on the line only to have it shake my barbless hook at the last moment. Minutes into the day of fishing and I knew my choice of fly was going to pay off. I’m not suggesting that nymphs wouldn’t have worked but given the size of the creek and not knowing the depth or location of the trout fishing a streamer was going to be the best choice for me. Upstream a bit I spied from the bank a larger shadow, clear blue water with big cover boulders piqued my interest. I opted to sit on it a bit, adding a splitshot and working my roll cast out a good forty feet I let my fly dead drift until my line came to a halt. I missed one but with the next pass my line went taught, a bit of a run and a fat splash showed a nicer 18 and a half inch brown trout, a Dogger. What a way to start the morning, second trout to hand pushing 19inches.

After releasing the larger fish I sat on that spot for quite a while repeating the same process landing two more and missing more than that. The slow lethargic strike was difficult to detect but the fish were eating the streamer and so it continued to be my fly of choice. My fishing partner Carl fished upstream from me and was doing quite well with his streamer choice, we continued to work the creek up enjoying the beautiful conditions. Further upstream the wind began to pick up a bit but not enough to make me put my coat on, we sat and watched for any rising trout. A few scattered midge were spotted hovering over the creek but by 11am we’d only seen a couple trout surface. I kept the streamer on for the next hour, by 12pm we came upon a run/pool system showing regularly rising trout. We crept up low and sat in the brush watching the trout and the midge, we swapped our large streamers for longer leaders and #20 flies. The wind made things difficult, as did the clear low water but Carl’s approach resulted in a fooled brown. I tried for another further upstream but was unsuccessful, even an attempt with a #20 Miracle Nymph was fruitless. Although a handful of fish were rising regularly they were hesitant and I opted to move upstream and put my streamer back on.

The beautiful day was made as fish chased down my streamer, a handful more came to hand and many were missed. No ice in the guides and sun on my shoulders, I can’t stress enough how wonderful these places are and the excellent weather was the icing on the cake. The rest of the day was much the same, following the winding creek upstream we ended up where we started the morning, fished out by 3:30 or so I was content to call the day successful and every bit as satisfying as any other day in the peace of the Driftless Area. Good to take full advantage of good airtemps and low wind in January, it can’t last forever.

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Winter season in Minnesota opened this morning, a friend and I proceeded to follow a ritual seen this day for the last four years. Wake, prep gear, drink coffee and drive to the spot. This spot is particular in that no matter the conditions the bugs are active and thus the fish follow suit. Some years this has worked better, some not as well but today was awesome. Windy as all hell on arrival but we found pockets of the valley void of wind and when we did get wind came in bursts allowing us to fish between gusts and see many fish come to hand. Interesting notes off the bat: the fish were very active on arrival and the fish activity tapered off around 1pm then proceeded to drop off a cliff after 2pm. Also, the creek was a bit stained, certainly not gin clear as I was expecting which perhaps benefited us. Finally, the bug activity on arrival was good, very good. My attempt with a #20 Griffiths Gnat saw many fish move for and even aggressively chase downstream leaving a wake as they came after my fly. Arrival airtemp was ~30degrees with a 26-30mph sustained wind from the WNW.

Several fish were nymphed up with a #20 Miracle nymph and a #18 Beadhead PT, those were the hot nymphs for the day and Sershen did quite well landing many right after I put all the rising fish down with a couple bad hooksets on the Griffiths Gnat. I swapped to the #20 Miracle nymph with a Hot Blue Wire rib rather than the traditional copper and it got crushed. The fish were hungry and active, so much so that fishing a no indicator rig was generally easy as they tugged line rather than slowly sipping the flies. As the morning wore on we moved to a spot that has in the past given up few fish but looks so damn good that it’s hard not to spend a short period of time with. Due to the depth and potential for larger fish I opted to try a new streamer pattern that is still in the proto-type phase and is not fully ready to be unveiled but I can tell you this much… the fish certainly enjoyed it. I’m calling this fly the “Jungle Boogie” and it’s for a couple reasons but I’ll get into that perhaps down the road a bit. All you need to know is that it brought trout after trout out from dark hiding places all the way to the surface of the creek to be smacked time and time again as I watched. I like fishing a dry fly as much as the next but watching a trout come from the depths of blackness following your fly to then open wide and hit it hard is a beautiful thing and I watched it happen several times this day. White mouth then hooked trout, brilliant.

At one point fishing the same hole we saw a double as I hooked a 15 3/4inch rainbow on the Jungle Boogie with Sershen hooking into a 16inch rainbow on his #18 PT nymph, because the net was closest to me I scooped my fish up then moved upstream ten feet to land the second trout, this was the first winter double I’ve been a part of. Shortly after this occurred I hooked another rainbow and pulled a rookie move shaking my glove off with my back to the creek only to find it floating in cold creek water. Note: always have a spare set of gloves, I’m glad I did. After landing a few more rainbows bringing the count to close to twenty apeice we decided to leave the comfort of rising rainbows and aggressive stockers for less pressured water containing browns and brookies. I continued to fish the Jungle Boogie as it was still producing trout after trout and I saw no reason to argue with its effectiveness. I managed a handful of browns that exhibited the same aggressive charge on my fly throughout the early afternoon. The last brown of the day was seen but not hooked as I made a short cast stripped my fly in and watched as a ~16+inch brown darted out from a rock that I was practically standing on to smack my fly startling me thus hampering my hookset, this was another highlight of the day. I don’t mind missing a fish when I get to see things like that.

After the couple mile hike upstream we headed back to where we started to find the wind picking up, the airtemp dropping and with it the fish activity. It doesn’t take much of a change in water temp (+/-1 degree often) to drastically alter feeding behaviour. At ~2pm the trout that had been previously so aggressive and willing to chase my streamer down were now looking and if presented properly were willing to hit it but not nearly as hard. Often it was sipped and not hit with the fervor of the earlier morning. I landed three or four more rainbows then opted to hike out, the wind was continuing to pick up and I had enjoyed the opening day of the winter season thoroughly. I saw no reason to sit in the wind struggling to force feed a handful of smaller trout. It should also be noted that the fish that were willing to strike in the afternoon were consistently smaller than the morning trout, an interesting note if you ask me. Despite the lack of snow it was a good day, very glad to be fishing the Minnesota water I love so much. To the 2012 trout season, it’s here and I plan to take full advantage of the time I have. Hope some of you got out and braved the wind to touch a trout on the 1st, I love the smell of trout stink on my hands.

Post Script: My 8’6 3wt Sage Flight was sent in on Dec. 4th, I shipped it regular mail to the factory in Oregon. After discussing my need to have the guides looked at and possibly replaced I was told upon inspection that several of my ferrules had cracks in them. Sage built me a brand new rod, cork handle, reel seat, guides and all. It was shipped overnight back to me on Friday Dec. 30th, just in time for the opener. Thank you Sage.

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Fished another Sunday in Iowa, since Liz and I ended up purchasing a year license it only made sense we would use them as much as possible while the weather holds out. Arrival time: ~12:15pm, Departure Time: ~5:30pm. Airtemp was in the low fifties, the wind was calmer out of the WSW at ~10mph. The creek was a bit off on arrival but clean enough for me to spot trout hanging on redds. Trout were sipping something small on arrival, likely midge but with the recent Baetis seen Liz opted for a #18 BWO, second cast in and she was making it look easy. We hung around attempting to take a couple more on a dry fly before moving upstream but nothing was having the larger flies. I switched flies up a couple times, took a couple small Browns on a #18 Bead Head Baetis nymph I tied up for situations like this. The creek, full of weeds, full of spooky trout who bolt for cover when they see a larger or heavier nymph hit the surface are sometimes best presented something very small despite the difficulty detecting a strike. I lost three or four easily to late hooksets. I also fished the “safety” of the #16 Pink Squirrel for a while and took a handful of fish ranging from 10-13inches. Something about the fact that the trout just can’t help but hit that thing makes me want to fish it less, like it’s laced with some kind of trout chum they can smell from a mile away.

Upstream scoping the riffles I watched one trout rise, then another and another. Shortly after a #18 BWO flew past, I dropped the nymph instantly and swapped to the #18 BWO pattern again. I watched the riffle for another ten minutes, four different trout in four locations rose but they didn’t lite up the way I was hoping they would. There would be no major BWO hatch for us. Thinking I could pull a couple out I made close to two dozen casts with only one botched hookset on a 6inch Brown to show for it. We moved upstream and I looked at my flies and put on one of a couple dozen newly tied #8 Sprinkle Me Baby’s. Something about fishing this fly, I have so much confidence in it and my ability to fish it well that it just made sense. Trust Your Gut.

Working the later portion of the afternoon I was roll casting to deeper faster water, swapping a split shot for none and back again, working the weed lines and the dark spaces between them, the BNT were coming to hand quickly. I managed over a dozen in the first hour with a few misses between. They smack this fly so damn fast sometimes it’s hard to set the hook and make it stick. We got upstream to find a couple nasty deep looking pools, faster current feeding the far side. My gut… my gut was telling me to hit each with a down and across approach letting my fly sink then rise at a steady rate as the line tightened up. The second pool gave up the reason why I trust my gut, a nice 18inch Brown. He hit deep and I didn’t know what I was in for until he gave me a big flying leap from below, this was the Iowa Brown I’d been looking for these last few trips.

Upstream all of a hundred yards and I see one of the biggest, gnarliest beaver dam’s I’ve come across in my Driftless career. Standing close to five feet tall just pouring trout water from a weak portion in the center. We hiked upstream and spied dark deep trout water but few fish. I was concerned that their might not be much around but if there was something it might make the last fish look puny. I dropped a couple bombs in the creek but saw nary a flash, my gut was telling me to move on. A guy can spend all day casting into the darkness and get nowhere, I’m guilty of it from time to time but the day was growing short and with it the light so we moved on. Out of the beaver dam and into one of the sexiest pieces of trout water I’ve seen in Iowa. I was concerned that after the beaver dam it would be kaput, pitiful creek, I was dead wrong. I tossed a fly down under a boulder offering some excellent habitat for any trout and landed two smaller browns that proved there were fish above the beaver dam. This was motivation to keep going, Liz was doing her own thing, figuring her cast out and working a streamer, I was content to dissect the creek for the spots I knew would hold fish.

I got to a riffle with a bunch of overhanging branches, took one look and knew there had to be something tasty laying in wait. The first cast was too far up the riffle and got stuck on a rock, my fly came back covered in creek sludge. After a quick clean up I made a second attempt and planted my fly on the smallest of the overhanging branches, the sun was going down and I didn’t see it until it was too late. Something was on my side, my SMB popped off the branch instantly. My gut said one more… it was right again. By now I’m thinking, damn I should be telling Liz where to put her fly but I didn’t want to stand over her shoulder being overbearing. I landed the brown and sent him back to the creek with just enough daylight to work upstream another couple hundred feet. The sun was gone, the sky was lighting up with pink and orange colors. I saw one last spot that just screamed for a fly, first cast and a fat, I mean gutty fat holdover Rainbow came out. The picture doesn’t do the gut justice but damn I was taken back a bit. By this point the ground was looking black, I left the headlamp somewhere not in my gear and we were forced to hike over a mile back as the very last of the light left us.

Additional Notes:

• Watched a Bald Eagle fly overhead at less than a hundred yards.
• Observed a noticeable change in the creek vegetation above and below the beaver dam.
• Spent fifteen minutes chasing down an evening Caddisfly.
• Watched over a dozen deer silouetted by the sky chase through a herd of cattle down a bluff side.

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Took a friend fishing the other day, woke early and drove for more than an hour to get streamside. That’s an hour for me… and over three for Paul. Coming from St. Paul this guy woke at 3:30am to get to my place at a good hour for the drive to the stream. Boots hit the creek at 8:05am with a water temp of ~52 degrees. The creek had very minimal stain bordering on clear but the deeper holes were a bit off providing good conditions to pull trout out with heavy streamers. I stuck on the fly of the month, a #6 Black Kiss My Leech and put Paul on the first hole we came to. A couple missed strikes and we moved on, I put my leech on the tail end of a pool allowing it to sink a couple feet before picking my line up. Again I can’t stress enough how many fish I have taken recently  just by simply raising my rod to bring my streamer up and out slowly, often an aggressive fish is following close behind. This morning my leech was trailed to the surface to be crushed by a nicer 15+inch brown. Shortly after Paul landed his first fish of many for the day and we busted ass to cover as much creek as possible in a single day.

By noon we covered a good mile of creek pounding each spot with streamers only lingering if fish were caught with any regularity. The trout were on and aggressively hitting a streamer all morning. I wanted to get Paul a bit further from his usual fishing haunts and cover as much of this water as possible. Rainbow bridge (a spot known for it’s stocked rainbows), gave up nothing and we moved upstream. I was a bit disappointed, I was hoping Paul would get a Brown, Rainbow and Brook all on the same creek but after striking out at Rainbow bridge I was pretty sure we’d only see a Brook and Brown. Turns out I was way off. Upstream just a bit and the rainbows were out numbering the browns which is very unusual, typically I notice Rainbows in a very specific spot on this creek but today they were everywhere, more than a mile from where I would have guess I’d find them. Paul nailed his fair share of rainbows stripping his version of an SMB back to his feet but as the day would have it the Brookie would not be seen, a goal for next time. We worked alot on roll-casting and getting a weighted fly up and out of the water with a smooth motion, this keeps your weighted fly as close to the surface of the water as possible when you go to start your roll cast. The result: less tension from the water on your fly allowing it to roll out nicely despite it’s weight. On a side note: I landed the first fish I’ve ever caught with someone elses fly stuck in it’s mouth… I promptly removed both flies and let the fish go about it’s way. Not the brightest trout…

Further upstream we busted out of the woods and found ourselves in a trimmed cow pasture, a beautiful dark dogger was seen but not caught, it moved on my fly and despite my best efforts refused every presentation. The bluff walls around us were sporting the beautiful colors of fall, many leaves were hampering drifts but the weather couldn’t have been nicer. At ~1pm we made a choice to travel into the unknown, unknown water for the both of us. A much smaller creek giving up brown trout and creek chubs as we moved upstream. My opinion of creek chubs is grim as where there is one there are usually many and they will often hit your fly before a trout can. The flipside to that coin is that where there are brown trout and a ready food source like the Rosey Cheeked Creek Chub you will find larger trout. The second creek had a few interesting attributes, the first and most notable was the swarms of #20-22 Trico’s that I was spotting at each riffle we came to, at 1pm in late September… that’s quite interesting but few trout were rising. The second notable item would be the stain on the creek that was clearly not mud but something else all together.

The final note would be that as we fished upstream we caught fewer browns and more creek chubs. I ended up loosing the one KML that had taken every fish up to that point in the day. I decided to swap to a heavy as hell #8 Hairball with a tungsten bead and nymph some deep water, then something spectacular occurred… I caught a Carp on a trout stream, on a designated freakin trout stream. It was awesome! Trout and Carp love the Hairball, my 3wt looked like I had 6lbs of Brown trout giving me hell and all from a tiny carp. This thing was so small I bet the ones on the Columbia are born bigger! This fish totally made my day and I wanted to stay and tempt more but time was running out and another hour long drive was in order so we split, and that’s how Paul and I spent the last Saturday of the season, catching many trout and one awesome carp. Crazy.

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That would stand for Super Secret Sexy Streamer Stretch. Say that five times fast… Better yet? Hike around the Driftless Area for a couple years looking for the most amazing piece of streamer water holding some of the largest trout in high quantities, then if you find it… keep your mouth shut. It’s approaching the end of the season and the trout are putting the feed bag on in anticipation for the fall spawn, this means big fish looking for a big meal. I’ve been spying a new stretch of creek for a while now waiting for the right moment to tackle some steep banks and thick vegetation, with the cooler weather it seemed like the time was right. Sershen and I got on location and made a decision to hike downstream to point A, fish up to point B quickly then concentrate our efforts from point B to point C, a thickly wooded section of creek that just looked daunting. My fly of choice was a #6 Black Kiss My Leech as I have exhausted every last Sprinkle Me Baby that I own, the only ones left sit in the ceiling of my fishing vehicle, the only real trophies other than photos I collect when big trout strike. Conditions were about as good as I could have hoped for, a bit of overcast on arrival with the creek stained a bit. We knew this could turn out disastrous with few fish caught while struggling through a thick forested mess, on the other hand the potential for hooking into large fish lay on the other side of the coin. I guess I’m a gambling man and I’m of the opinion that unless you hike it and put your flies in the drink you really don’t know what’s out there, you have to see it with your own eyes.

Downstream ~45min later we were at point A. That’s right, 45 minutes of hiking through thick ass brush, weeds taller than the average man and more burning nettles than I think I’ve ever cursed before. Along the way the first of many trout was nabbed as our path forced us to cross the creek in a particularly tasty location, a deep drifted Kiss My Leech very slowly brought to the surface revealed a 14inch Brown trailing it only to strike within an inch from the surface. My experience has shown when drifting anything really really deep bring it up slowly, so many times I’ve had a fish trailing the fly all the way to the surface. I look at it like this, if the fish strikes, excellent. If not you now know a depth that a fish was holding at or at the very least that you were able to get deep enough to find a trout along the way back to the surface. If you arn’t getting your flies to the fish they will not strike. So the first fish showed its ugly face… literally. This fish looked like it picked a fight with a Heron or something, the jaw was busted in several places and was all bloodied up yet it still nailed my fly…

Downstream at point A we took turns presenting streamers to tasty looking water spending only a few minutes in each location. It’s important to spend enough time to be confident that your flies are getting to the right locations in the creek but not so much time that your wasting your afternoon. We tag-teamed specific runs and others we split and each took solo. Point A to B went quickly and a handful of Brown’s ranging from 13-15inches were caught before I managed the first dogger of the day. 18inches according to the tape, this trout caught me a bit off guard as I had pulled a smaller 15inch fish out just prior to hooking this guy and was not expecting much to come of a second pass, I was wrong. Several nice head shakes and this fish was working me over pretty well, I thought about reaching for my net as I hollered back to Sershen for assistance but ultimately opted to keep my hands on the rod and line which kept this fish from wrapping me around a tree limb. I eventually moved him to a shallow section full of mud and scooped him up with the net. Dogger #1.

We moved upstream and the #6 Kiss My Leech could do no wrong, it hit the creek and the brown trout turned and hit it just as quickly. The strike to hookup ratio was almost 1:1 by this point and things were looking excellent. We reached point B and took assessment of the thick jungle. We opted to hike the forested edge at first but I got sick of that after attempting to climb a steep bank up and out of the creek only to end up sliding face first into a bunch of nettles. Shortly after I hopped in the creek for good and made roll casts to any dark or deep peice of water basically continually moving upstream until I found something super tasty: like this, at which point Sershen and I would take turns attempting to pull something out.

This water was giving up 12-16inch Brown’s left and right to the Kiss My Leech, for a good hour I could do no wrong just put the fly on the fish, often they hit it so hard I didn’t have to do much to set the hook. As time wore on we began noticing the random aggressive rise and shortly after Sershen pegged the cause, big, ugly, flying beetles. There were so many that at one point I took more than one to the head and neck. I came to fish streamers through big ugly Driftless water so I stuck with the Kiss My Leech as it was kicking ass, Sershen opted to try a foam beetle pattern after loosing his streamer to a snag. He did manage one trout but before he could land the fish and retrieve his fly we watch the fish wrap him around a tree branch, shake once and take off. The streamer was re-applied in short order.

Bouncing through the creek bank to bank is not the ideal way to go in my opinion but some situations call for it. The fish, despite my un-coordinated trudging remained eager to eat and relatively un-affected by my presence. I managed a nicer 16inch Brown along with a handful of 14-15inch fish along the way, they were promptly released without me so much as touching them, a simple grab and twist of my barbless fly put the trout back in the creek and kept me making casts and landing fish. We worked the wooded section up and came to a couple deep spots that deserved a bit more attention but only a couple shadows were seen, it was the faster deep riffles that held the bigger fish for the day. Sershen, after putting on a #8 Hairball, pulled two nice fish from a deep riffle then turned around and landed an 18inch female sporting a serious gut. This was the icing on the cake, Dogger #2. With both of us content and promising it wouldn’t be long before we were back on this water we quickly fished back to the vehicle with Monarch butterflies following us on our way out.

Slide Show

So it went that the last day of the catch and keep season I went George hunting. I had spied this trout several times throughout the latter half of this summer season, I watched her come out twice on previous attempts but hesitate at the last moment only to slink back to the hidey hole thus eluding my net. Armed with a #6 Black Kiss My Leech, one large splitshot, 3x tippet on a 6ft leader and a big net I made three casts before I saw her come out. She moved and again hesitated, I thought I missed my opportunity but decided to cast to her again as she had not tasted hook. On a down and across swing (she had moved downstream from me after following my fly on the first attempt) I watched her come up and nail my fly ~3inches under the surface. This fish felt like a hog, I didn’t realize how much of a hog until I got her into the net. She taped at exactly 22inches and was probably the largest fish I’ve caught in terms of girth to date. And so it went that on the last day of the catch and keep season I nailed a George, smiling in the sun, knee deep in the creek I let this fish swim from my hands, splashing my face as she returned to the place she came from. Flies will take big trout around here, persistence helps, so does a big net and 3x tippet. Note: the crappy out of water photo was taken in a heart racing moment with adrenaline pumping, a typical scenario that I’ve been fortunate enough to enjoy a handful of times in my short career fly fishing the Driftless Area.

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