Spring is short around here, and comes reluctantly. One day the temperature will be below zero and the next day it’ll read 40 above. The country road I live on, and my driveway, will turn wet, muddy and rutted – then freeze rock hard, but the ruts stay. The snow starts melting, patches of brown grass start showing in the yard and everyone is smiling ‘cause spring is in the air. Snow shovels are stowed, outdoor furniture is brought out, windows and doors left open and we step outside in light jackets or no jackets at all. People drive around with the car window rolled down. And just when we think we’ve got the winter licked, we wake up the next morning to a white landscape and deck chairs knocked over by wind driven snow. Parkas are donned again and the catch phrase of the day is a submissive “I’m sick of this.”

Spring does take over, however eventually, and when it does we find ourselves with so much to do that the immediacy of it grabs us in near panic. There are only so many perfect spring days yet there’re so many ways to fill them, and fill ‘em we must, because before we know it those pussy willows will have burst out along with the leaves and with that all comes the heat and bugs. Yeah, spring is short.

Yesterday would have been a beautiful day for dog work, sunny and just above freezing, but I had a pile of wood to split and I knew if I didn’t get it finished I’d be kicking myself next January. I suppose spending a morning with a splitting maul is not a bad thing to do and it’s pretty satisfying when it’s done, but when Molly flushed a grouse behind me while I was swinging the maul it was sure tempting to postpone the chore and hit the woods. I stuck with the task, however, with no regrets because last night the snow and freezing rain came and coated everything with a couple of inches of snow and slush. Cars were sliding off the road and snowplows were out again.

I’m thinking about fishing now and with a couple of exciting trips coming up I’m eager to limber up the rods. The lakes and streams are still frozen close to home, but there’s fishing to be had down on the rivers that feed Lake Superior, so things are looking up.  With a bit of luck there will be a steelhead or two in my near future.

The sun is setting and I’m looking out at the snow in the woods surrounding my yard, but in my head I’m hearing the zing of line in the air, the dip of oars in the water, and feeling the tug on the rod. I’m daydreaming of warm days floating bass and musky rivers and wading clear trout streams. Word is there are likely some salmon in the future. I’ll keep you posted – I can hardly wait!

29 March 2015

the shortest month... seems long.

It’s that time of year again when we all more or less wish we were somewhere else. Somewhere we could be hunting. Or fishing. Somewhere we could be outdoors without freezing our keesters off. Some warm sport filled paradise we could spend our winters at. Yes, I think I’d stay around here through deer season and then head to my winter quarters where there would be wingshooting available and water to fly fish. I’ve been to the southwest and southeast parts of the country, but I’m thinking someplace a little more exotic. Like Cuba, for instance. Hemingway wrote about the good shooting he found when it was safe to be there. I wonder what that would be like? I’ll bet I’m not the only one who dreams about such things either, and I’m betting lottery ticket sales go up in the winter for just that reason.

It was 15 degrees below zero on Valentines morning. If I remember right it was about the same last year. I suppose that can encourage some V-Day cuddling and no worries about melting chocolate hearts, but otherwise…. C’mon, it’s mid Feb, the days are getting longer so how ‘bout a warm up?

I went to town for some home supplies, stop by the sporting goods store to see who was about, and then the coffee shop for a snack and a cup for the ride home. I ran into an old skeet shooting acquaintance who is also about the most duck huntingest guy I know. Ducks and geese, that is. He told me he’d just made the long drive to the nearest Cabela’s to pick up a couple hundred more snow goose decoys to add to his trailer-full of more than a thousand. Well… if you need ‘em, you need ‘em. He likes Winchester auto-loaders and has 5 or 6 of the two models he likes best. I kinda wonder about that but have never asked. He has a lot of other gear, too, like layout blinds, stand up blinds, sit down blinds, sneak boats, and big boats. He doesn’t have a dog, but he likes hunting over someone else’s if the dog is really, really good. Heck, we all like that.

We compared notes about last season and I enjoyed recalling the times I spent in a duck boat or sneaking along a river with my spaniel at my side and my new camo-clad shotgun in hand. I’ll always have a soft spot for the old A5, but my new gun is much lighter to carry and a good shooter to boot. It’s also the kind of gun you could use for a walking stick, a wading staff, or a canoe paddle without worry if you had to. I’ve already used it once to catch my balance in some tough marsh and stuck the buttstock in the mud to the trigger. I sloshed it around in the river to clean it off and never gave it another thought. Then I took it to Dakota and shot ducks with no trouble. I didn't give it a decent cleaning until the end of the season, and I’m not sure it mattered, then.

I broke my new gun in on the river north of here, shooting wood ducks chased off the upstream lake by other hunters. A dog is essential for this kind of hunting, and Molly does the job well and loves it. It’s a mile hike to get to the river so I carried a few rounds of 7 ½ steel shot loads for any grouse along the way. It’s the only full camo, synthetic stocked gun I’ve used and I’m impressed with its versatility. I’ve always been something of a traditionalist, but it seems right to grab this gun, my spaniel, and a pocketful of different loads to hunt whatever we come upon.  I’m not giving up my double-gun and pointing dog, of course, but fitting in a little “rough shooting” now and then is just right.

still dogs...

When you’ve spent most of your life in the company of hunting dogs it hardly occurs what things would be like without one. When I was a kid I never really considered our spaniels and labs as hunting dogs. To me, they were just dogs. In the off season they were pets and companions. And they were always around.  It seemed second nature then, that when I walked or pedaled my bicycle down the road a dog would be at my side or when my dad’s car door opened a dog would either slip in or hop out, depending on if the car was coming or going. Feeding the dog after supper was a chore that I more or less assumed everyone did, though when my buddies and I got together for a whittling session with our pocket knives or a backyard football game, it seems the only dog there was mine. When autumn came the same dog flushed and retrieved every sort of game we could get a shot at. There was nothing unusual about it: just normal living.

I remember when I was in my twenties, working a tough and dirty nightshift job, I would spend long and monotonous hours in a perpetual daydream about hunting grouse over an English setter. I was getting pretty well settled in my own home by then and spent my free time hunting and fishing. I had a big liver Springer spaniel named Tyler who was a pretty good dog, but I’d starting reading a lot of sporting literature by then and I couldn’t get the vision of that pointing dog out of my head. I’d shot plenty of birds over Tyler, but grouse often flushed the wrong way and I started believing I would get shots at every grouse if only I had a pointing dog. And while I entertained that fantasy, I reckoned the right dog would make me a better shot, as well.

Even though I’d never seen a pointing dog in action, and the fact that I grew up with Labs and springers, there was never any doubt when the time came the breed for me was a setter. I didn’t realize it at that time, but the vision of pointing dogs may have been sort of imprinted in my head since I was a little boy. It took a while, but when my folks were moving and selling their big house they asked me to take what I wanted from my upstairs bedroom, which was pretty much the way it was since I’d left. There were two old framed prints that had hung on the wall all the years I lived there. One depicts a tri-color setter retrieving a grouse, and the other shows a proud boy hiking home with a trio of pheasants (including one hen) slung over his shoulder and a setter at this side. 

These were the pictures I saw every day as I was growing up. And my dad has a couple of old paintings and even some jigsaw puzzles that portray various English, Irish, and Gordon setters and English pointers locked up, oddly enough, on flushing mallards off a pond. Most of this art belonged to my grandfather who loved his spaniels, but the popular sporting art of those long past days was apparently pointing dogs. Whether I noticed it or not, this stuff was part of my daily life and I suppose it’s obvious how it impacted me. Back then I never imagined smartphones or gameboys but I was living large with a jackknife in my pocket and a dog at my side!  

A cool old gun

I’ve lately had a hankering to kill a bird with a sweet little shotgun of my Dad’s that’s been in my possession for a while now. I’ve hardly used it and had never taken a bird with it but Dad used to shoot a few ducks and pheasants with it just because he liked it. I’m not a gun snob nor a collector but there is a soft place in my heart for old guns, particularly American made guns. Over the years I’ve gotten hold of a couple of old doubles that I like and expect to use until my shooting days are over, but when I spotted the sweet little pump gun in the back of my gun safe I figured it was just too cool a gun to spend it’s days unused. How Dad came upon it is a story I’ve heard many times. The details can change a bit with each telling and I can’t attest to the accuracy but it’s still a good story.

Shortly after Dad left the Navy he and his brother walked into Haskell’s Hardware and spotted two Winchester Model 42’s on the rack and had to have them. My uncle was shorter than Dad so he took the 26” barreled full choke model. Dad’s has a 28 inch modified choke. The year was 1947 or ’48 and they each paid $37.50 for their little .410’s. Dad proudly showed it to his pheasant hunting companions and they quickly kidded him about his little popgun. Then he turned his spaniel loose and promptly filled his limit without a miss. Over the years I’d heard the two guns had consecutive serial numbers, but my uncle’s 42 was sold or traded or somehow disappeared long ago.

The 42 doesn’t fit me very well and I don’t shoot it very well, but if I bear down and concentrate I can hit with it, sometimes. I took it to the skeet club a few years ago and the boys lined up to try it. Fit or not, it’s fun to shoot but I have guns I do better with and never really thought about taking it out to shoot birds. I wouldn’t consider changing it, but the modified choke is a little too tight for our grouse woods and it’s hard enough to hit with a .410 in the best of conditions. I’ve killed ducks with a single shot .410 when I was a kid and we used lead shot for waterfowl in those days, but those days are long gone.

Paul called and reported moving good numbers of grouse and woodcock near his shack and thought we should get together for a hunt. Sounded good to me and a good chance for the Model 42. With enough chances I may have some luck. I loaded Jack and the little gun in my truck and went for an afternoon in the woods.

We turned Jack and Scarlett loose in good looking cover but the dogs hunted hard with no results for the first half hour and I started to wonder if I was gonna get a chance to try the .410. Even Paul said he was eager to hear the popgun go off. Things started to heat up when Jack pointed off to the left and Scarlett stopped in the cover to the right of the trail we used. As I moved in front of Jack I must have passed close to the grouse that flushed behind me and was fast escaping when I found the safety and swung the gun around to shoot. Thank goodness for a good forearm to grip, I believe that thin little shell-shucker could fly right out of my hands! My shot was way behind and I had to remember to chamber another round so by then it was too late. The grouse flew off unscathed.

When I was in high school I bought a 12 gauge pump-gun, a used 870, and it was my meat and potatoes gun for a long time. I shot small game, ducks, birds, varmints, critters and furbearers with that gun. It was the days before choke tubes so I bought another open choke barrel for it. I shot on a trap league and skeet with it and I still have it. I was pretty good with it but now I have to think to work the action and you know what that means. 

It didn’t take long for Jack to lock-up again and I approached with my finger on the trigger-guard safety button so I wouldn’t have to search for it when the time came. A woodcock went up and offered a very good opportunity climbing for the treetops. I threw the featherweight gun up and shot too quickly and missed. But I jacked another skinny round into the chamber just as the bird topped out and the woodcock went down! The good thing about those skinny little shells is you can fit a lot in your pocket. I was going to need them. Scarlett showed up at the action and beat Jack to make a lovely retrieve. I’d killed a bird with the .410 and was feeling pretty good. We took a break then to water the dogs and I took a couple of photos. The afternoon went on and we had chances at a few grouse and more woodcock.

 I’d started out hoping to kill one bird, but when I dropped another I was suddenly thinking “limit.” And I had chances for a limit, but of course I missed. Again and again.

It was near sundown when we were walking the logging road out and a grouse surprised us from the side and flew straight down the trail. Paul called “take im!” and it was a great chance to kill a grouse with Dad’s little 42. My finger searched painfully long for the safety in its unfamiliar location and when I finally found it I snapped the firing pin on an empty chamber. I’d forgotten to cycle a fresh round after shooting at the last bird! I can still hear Paul chuckling.

That Model 42 is a neat little gun and I had a fun afternoon with it. I can’t say how often I’ll use it – I know I can bag more game with another gun, but… then again, now I’d kinda like to take a grouse with it. 

fall muskies...

A couple of weeks before, we’d had a musky up to the boat that we couldn’t get in the net. It had hit my big articulated dual hook red and black streamer and came halfway out of the water on the take. Minutes later and after a comedy of errors that had me jumping out of the boat, the fish under the boat, and my line wrapped around the boat sawing at my leader, the fish broke off. It was the biggest musky I’ve had on my fly rod.

I had another on later that struck at the bank and held on until it was at the boat. Then it just let go and swam off. A nice musky rolled at Scott’s big fly but no hook-up. Then we watched an even bigger one chase a sucker across the shallows right up to the grassy bank. After a splashing attack the musky swam back to and under our boat with the big sucker crossways in its jaws. Scott's biggest flies were no match to that kind of meat.

Those big predator fish start hitting in the fall, right? Everyone knows that. We saw those four muskies in the morning. Things must be starting to get good. There was still time and we’d get after ‘em again. I went home and tied a couple more jointed flies. Scotty got a bigger net. A plan was devised.

It couldn’t have been a prettier autumn day. We were rigged and ready. Likely the last trip of the year and muskies were the target. Big Autumn Muskies. Yes! Some seven hours later we found the take-out in failing light. Shoulders hurt from casting big flies in stiff breeze. Shoulders hurt from rowing. Sore shoulders from fighting fish? Hands sore from palming the reel? Nope and nope.

The worst day fishing is better than the best day working, we all know that, too. This was the only trip of the year where no one got a strike. Maybe it was fitting. Maybe a good way to end a season’s fishing. Sure was a pretty day, but we were both glad it was over.

 Let’s go hunting.

Opening Day, again

I started hunting when I was a youngster. Dad had me following him around the woods and fields when I couldn’t come close to keeping up, but he was patient and kept the pace easy even if it meant missing out on some shooting. Sometimes we’d walk slowly through the shadowy hardwoods looking and listening for gray and fox squirrels. It became a favorite kind of hunt for me because occasionally I’d get the chance to pick one off a limb with the old Stevens .22 rifle I carried. Compared to trying to hit a fast escaping pheasant with my .410, that squirrel hunting offered a much greater chance for success. In the duck blind I’d get cold and bored but Dad would pour hot chocolate from his red plaid thermos bottle and keep me entertained with hunting stories. We’d eat fried egg sandwiches and toss bits to Queenie or Boots and laugh as they snatched them from the air. The next thing you knew there were birds coming in and shooting to be done. I could hardly hit a thing and I think Dad sometimes gave me credit for his kill, but I loved the excitement of it all and watched proud as our dogs hit the water and worked the cattails for the retrieves. 

I found an old, scratched black and white photo of Dad and me with the first snow goose I shot. Mom proudly took the snapshot with an old Instamatic in our basement. Actually, I'd knocked the goose down with my single shot .410 but it got up and off the water again and Dad finished it with his 16 gauge. It was a great day and bagging the goose was neat, but I sure admired my hunting partner. We were a team and I wonder if I’d become an outdoorsman if I hadn’t had my hero to show me how.

Then came that predictable period when I was between living at my folks’ home and having a home of my own and a few years’ worth of opening days lost some significance. It’s not that I’d forgotten all about them, of course, it just that I was at an age and a state of mind that had me chasing other pursuits. It would be well into the season when it struck me to grab a gun and get out there.

I’ve seen a lot of opening days since then, but it’s been awhile since I’ve lost much sleep in eagerness for that first morning. Though there were days when I greeted the sun at a good bird cover so I could be the first one there, the years have taken some of that edge off. Those types of mornings are pretty much reserved for ducks and deer, anymore. There were years when I was more prepared, too, ready for it to begin. I worked the dogs hard before season and had them and myself in some kind of shape. I shot clays year-round once, but now I haven’t visited the skeet range in years, and my shooting often shows it. I know some good hunters who don’t even bother going out on opening day because the first day of bird season is often too warm, too thick, and too buggy to really enjoy it. But I always go out for at least a little while because, heck, it’s opening day!

I drove up the forest road north of here mostly because it’s close. There is also some good cover with more coming due to some recent logging. I wouldn’t, and couldn’t, began to recount all the grouse and woodcock I’ve taken from the covers along that road. It’s also become well-known and can get kind of busy so I move to different covers as the season goes on. There was frost on my deck that morning and at 9 a.m. the truck thermometer read 36 degrees. It was sunny and cool, unusual for the first day of the season and I was ready to enjoy it.

There’s always that bit of anxiety when heading for a favorite cover, hoping you won’t find another vehicle parked there. I was a little surprised that I saw only two other trucks pulled off on trails, and those were likely bow-hunters. The cover I wanted to hit was open and I backed in carefully ‘cause the long grass hid the row of boulders that block any vehicle from driving up the trail. I hoped the sun would have dried the wet grass some and I took my time getting my gun out and strapping the bell collar on Jack. Still, I felt that common tinge of excitement in my stomach.

Jack took off up the trail and his bell clanged cheerfully ahead. I was wearing my old hunting hat and comfortable grouse boots. The shotgun felt right in my hands and I might have been smiling as we worked up the hill. When I lost track of his bell I hustled ahead to flush a woodcock from the side of the trail. I’d walked right past Jack as he was pointing the bird and never saw him. The season for woodcock isn’t open yet – another opening day coming – so those little birds are safe for now. It took nearly an hour to hit the end of the trail, and Jack had pointed three woodcock on the way in. Now and then I heard a distant shot ring out. That sort of thing always makes me wonder if I should be where they are, or if the shot was a road hunter swatting a grouse off the shoulder. 

I guess it does kind of bug me if someone else is getting shots while I’m hitting the woods and not, but I’ve long known the rewards of fair chase and wing shooting are not measured by numbers. I could have been disappointed at not finding grouse, but I'd heard blue jays and song sparrows, a cool breeze moved the treetops lightly, I looked at deer and fox sign and a flock of geese went over. It was just too nice to be disappointed in anything.

We were getting back towards the truck when Jack’s bell dropped silent in the woods to the left. I took a few steps in and spotted him motionless in the shadows. I was able to get past him when the beat of wings and blur of motion caught my attention. The grouse was high and flashing against the sky between the leafed branches. It might have flushed from a tree, but it didn’t matter. I brought the old gun up and fired once, then twice. I thought it faltered and went down but wasn’t sure. I sent Jack and he took a wrong line, of course, and overshot the bird. Then I heard the wings beating their last on the ground and I knew we were on the board. Jack soon caught the scent and make a fine retrieve. Let the other hunters hear my shots and wish they were where I was!

Molly tried hard for another hour on another cover but we moved only one grouse that I would have shot, and likely hit, a few years ago. I guess I was getting a little tired because when the grouse flew across the trail it caught me sort of flat-footed and I never raised the gun. We followed it into the woods but I heard it escape well out, unseen.

It was past lunchtime by then and I called it a day to head for the Fire Hall spaghetti feed, which was a fine idea in itself. The dogs and I had a good workout and something to show. It was a beauty of a day and a great day to be out. I suppose I’ve killed more birds on some openers, and I’ve probably taken less. Either way, it was a fine opening day and the season is just getting started. Good hunting.

august

I’d just missed two strikes on my black deer-hair diver when  Jack spun his drift boat around to head downstream. We’d launched the boat only minutes before and Jack rowed us upstream towards the dam to get Scott and me into one of his musky holes. Then we spotted another boat up there we were about to turn around, but not before I shot a few casts to the rocky shoreline. I never saw the fish that struck but they were most surely a couple of the many smallmouth bass that call this river home.

 

I hadn’t been fishing for a couple of weeks due to a home project, but when that was completed I let Scotty know I was ready and able. Scott got hold of Jack and arraigned to float the river near Jack’s beautiful cabin in the north woods of Wisconsin. Jack phoned me the day before and announced that I’d won an “all-expense paid” float trip down a river full of big muskies and bass. There’s only one answer to that kind of invitation.

 Neither Scott nor I had fished this river before so anticipation was high like it is when looking at new water. Not surprisingly Jack took the oars first and was soon pointing out likely looking spots we should cast to, but this river is so full of rocks and shoreline trees that it’s impossible to hit every good spot. It’s easy to believe there’s fish behind every boulder and under every downed tree.

Jack knows his fishing. It wasn’t that long ago he’d returned from a New Zealand trout fishing adventure to fish Stripers off the east coast and tarpon in Florida. He’s familiar with all the Montana waters I’ve fished and gave some valued tips the first time I went west, and by now he should be in Alaska casting for salmon. He’s smart and personable with a good sense of humor, of which I was reminded of when he stated the expense paid part didn’t include his tip and that I should bring a sandwich. Hoo boy.

River fishing bass, pike, and musky is all about fun. The flies we tie and cast are big and sometime outlandish. Colorful spun deer hair, rubber legs and google eyes, long bucktail and strung hackle tails. No need for magnifiers to tie the hook on to nearly invisible tippets. No worries about the perfect drift. Just enjoy the scenery – there’s always an eagle or osprey, deer or bear, beaver, mink, or otter somewhere along the route – and feel your rod load and the line shooting through your hand knowing the cast is a good one. And a good one lands your fly inches from the bank or cover and you strip it back in plops and jerks and dives on and under the surface. “Nice cast” “Gotta be one there” and “Fish on!” are the phrases of the day. Of course I usually put at least one fly high enough in the overhanging branches to wish there was a pole-saw handy.

Often the strikes are explosive, but when Scott dropped his flowing bucktail diver at the base of a low dock the big musky slid out and grabbed his fly without much commotion. I saw the tight line and bent rod and heard Scott say “heavy fish” before all went slack and the fish was gone! The fly was offered again but that fish had tasted enough feathers for one afternoon. It was the heartbreak of the day, just ask Scott.

All told we landed a good number of smallmouth bass, a couple big enough to brag about, and a couple of northern pike. Zip on the muskies. I’m still amazed at how strong these river fish are and what a fight they put up!

Jack had invited me to stay the night, but I had an early commitment at home in the morning so I elected to sleep in my own bed that night. I drove through Duluth and was settling in for the last hour of driving and I was getting pretty sleepy, always a downfall after a full day outdoors. I had a bottle of 5-Hour Energy somewhere close and I groped around in the dark for it while keeping an eye on the road. I felt the familiar feeling bottle in my hand, opened it and took a big gulp of silicone fly floatant. Yeah, that sort of woke me up.

 

Back home it’s been cooling off some and there’s the hint of autumn in the air. A few of the maples are taking on that red tint. It’s not far from bird hunting season, now. I’ve been seeing some broods of grouse on the roads and woodcock flying at dawn on my way to work. The dogs can feel it, too, and are whining and dancing around just begging to get out there. The other morning we woke to a cool and rainy day but a good day to give the dogs some work. Molly is always happy to be doing anything and the deadfowl dummies are almost as good to her as real birds. Jack jumped off the tailgate and ran a few yards down the trail to point a brood of grouse before I could get a bell on him. Seemed like a good sign!

 

 Bird hunting and fall fishing – good times ahead!

 

---

finally floatin' again...

I met Brent at the take-out point of one of our favorite floats on one of our favorite rivers. He’d already dropped his Hyde driftboat, along with Scott, miles upstream waiting for us to return and begin our day trip. We’d leave Brent’s rig and trailer here and I’d shuttle us up to the landing. There’re always some logistics involved on these river trips and this seems about the most comfortable and efficient way of getting the boat, gear, and us from one end of the trip to the other.

It’s a little better than a 2 ½ hour drive from my place to the river, so I had a little time to enjoy the morning cruise and sip some coffee on the way. I stopped in town for gas and some gas station coffee – not my preferred drink but the cool coffee shop isn’t open that early in the morning. The early traffic on the highway was pretty light, mostly folks commuting their way to jobs in the iron mines and the usual truck traffic. I always see some deer, and often a fox or coyote along the route. I crossed a few rivers and passed a few lakes on the way and I turned off the highway and took the little gravel frontage road along the Cloquet River, just to check the water and try to remember to set aside some time to fish it. From there I headed to the paper-mill town of Cloquet, which sits along the St. Louis River (go figure) and stop for my second cup at The Warming House coffee shop. I was in no hurry but I only wanted coffee so I pulled into the drive thru and stopped behind the SUV waiting at the window.

I had plenty of time and was enjoying the radio, but in my mind using the drive-thru at a coffee shop should be a relatively quick experience and the lone person in the vehicle ahead reminded me there should be some kind of understood, if unwritten, etiquette about grabbing a cup to go. I mean, if you’re ordering the complicated stuff that’s gonna take a while for the barista to put together, and you’re ordering a number of them for the gang at the office, and you want extra cream for one, no whipped on another, and will decide in a minute or so if you’ll have the peach-lavender cream cheese Danish or the gluten free muffin, you really ought to park in the lot and go inside for that. I shut off my truck when I saw a couple of cups passed out the window but still the SUV didn’t move. I sat listening to the radio and thinking about fishing. A song and a half later the brakes lights of the SUV brought me out of my daydream and a minute later I was on the road with a steaming cup of decent coffee. The little black car that came in behind me for coffee passed me before I got to the stoplights and I had the feeling they were more irritated than I was.

Then it was an hour of freeway driving at the speed of light: around 70-75 miles-per-hour I suppose, something like that. That’s when the radio gets tuned to the first rock station it can find. Classic BTO singing “I can’t drive…Fifty-Five!” None too soon it’s off the freeway and down to the river. What a pretty sight.

Across the river from the landing there’s a little point of land that catches current and makes for a perfect looking run that should hold a nice fish. Just below that there’s a slack water eddy just inside the seam that can’t be passed up. It’s a hopeful place to start fishing and we never pass it up. It doesn’t matter that we’ve never caught a fish there. Never even had a strike. One day one of us will hook a whopper there and it will all make sense. It just takes one.

Scotty took the first round at the oars while Brent cast his white foam blockhead to the shoreline and I worked the water with a deer-hair olive and red toad pattern. It was a perfect morning, sunny and still and we were all happy to be there. Brent scored first, a beauty of a smallmouth, and we all looked upriver after he landed it. It’s nice to catch the first fish in sight of the bridge but we were just beyond it. Brent worked his white foam blockhead long and hard with good effect as it popped along the surface like a venerable bubble machine. I switched flies several times and caught fish on my deer-hair toads and a variation of a Dahlberg Diver I call a froghawk for no good reason, as well as a proven frog pattern blockhead. Scott spent most of the day tossing his big musky flies, hoping for the 40 incher which would be a good fish for that water.

I first fished this river with Scott. It was all about the smallmouth bass, then. I used my 6 wt. rod and cast my hand painted poppers that I now call cute little things. It’s still about the bass, but the pike started nipping our leaders and somewhere along the way the muskies living in the river gained our attention. Heavier rods and lines were in order to toss bigger flies attached to wire leaders. I buy cheap flipflop sandals and chop them up to make flies. Fly boxes look like briefcases now. And is it ever fun!

The musky came with a violent strike on one of my deer-hairs. I was in the back of the boat and got a glimpse of shape and called it a pike. Brent had a better look and announced “No pike, it’s a SKIE!” and the fight was on. The fish cleared water several times trying to shake free and I was having a ball playing it. We had it near the boat several times before we could net it, and we saw the leader crossways in its mouth the way an untrained pup bites the leash the first time he feels it. Glad to have that wire leader. We didn’t measure it but it wouldn’t make the 40 inches – still a good fish like they all are and after a couple of quick photos it was back in the water.

I’ve caught a few muskies before but only a couple fly fishing. I know they are in the river, but I don’t expect them. Even on a river known for muskies I was surprised when I caught one. They’re the kind of fish you keep track of, though it’s easy for me to keep track of the small number I’ve caught. I recently watched a video about a couple of well-known Minnesota fly fishing musky hunters. Being interviewed they were asked how many muskies they’ve caught. Both were vague about the actual number, one said “less than 50, but I’m workin’ on it,” but I know he knows the exact fish that will take him over the half-century mark. I guess I could honestly say the same thing.

We kind of goaded Scott about casting his arm off with his out-sized musky flies while I landed “his” fish on a #2 hook, but that’s fishing and we all know it. Besides, he’s a skilled angler and has landed well more muskies than I have – but I’m working on it!

No one wants to see a good day end, but by the time we get to the take-out, we’re all kinda tired. I know my casting gets pretty sloppy – I suppose I don’t practice enough – and on these trips we’re either casting or rowing, which involves its own skill set, so it’s a real active day on the river. There’s nothing better.