The People Met

When fishing, particularly on popular rivers, you sometimes meet people. These people may not be fishermen. Sometimes they ask what you are doing. This is often the case for me as I fish trickling streams for brookies. I've had plenty of people say "There can not be fish in here". My answer that, not only yes, but that some I had caught were in the ten inch range, gets a surprised look. This is also usually accompanied by a puzzled "huh!".

Other times they are more experienced fisherman then you. One time on the handicapped access pool at the Salmon River; shortly after I had taken up fly fishing; a gentleman politely explained to me what I was doing wrong. He was in every way right, and this year, in the same pool I gave a rather abridged version as politely as I could muster to a man who had just waded two feet away from the fish I was working.

Of course, in new locations knowledge from those in the area is valuable. Many a time I have met other fisherman in my travels who gave me tips on the best locations and what they held. Most of the time they ask to keep things hush hush. I now know a first class bass pond because I happened to stop to talk to a man walking past carrying a rod. If I hadn't started conversing, I would have written it off as a typical shallow pond full of dinky Bluegills.

Today, I talked to a spin fisherman on the opposite side of the pool. We discussed our surprise that there were so many bass there. He said he had caught a 14 inch salmon parr there once, and explained that his buddy landed a big Atlantic farther downstream. This was a surprising fact. I mentioned that there had been a big trout cruising around. He said that it was one he had seen several times, and that it was probably very smart. I agreed.

Whoever it is that you meet in your day to day activities, see if you can't learn from them, or teach them.