A Spectacular Salmonid, and the Last Cast Phenomena

Having extra time this evening I went out to fish. I chose a section of my home river that I don't fish quite as often as the upstream stretch. It has some natives and a few browns, but you are far more likely to catch salmon parr and stockies. Today I caught salmon par, on the same pink fly the brookies liked so much on Sunday. In one riffle I pulled out four parr. That is just to give you an idea of the population. The state dumps so many in there. One that I caught in a deeper hole was probably the prettiest fish I have ever seen. If angled a certain way, this fish's flanks appeared devoid of red spots. But angle it differently and the whole fish would glow with iridescent copper-crimson dots. It was spectacular, and not what I expected. The photo just doesn't do it justice, which is very frustrating.

As gamy and fun as juvenile leapers are, I wanted to catch a trout of some sort before leaving. Eventually I came up to the pool I had chosen to stop at. Third cast I nailed into a very nice holdover Brown. It fought brilliantly. The cast after that, I caught a small wild one. Only the second wild Brown I have caught in that stretch. 

So I ended the day with two browns because of something akin to the last cast phenomena, and because of that terrific little pink fly. Tomorrow I will be out, because it is the one year anniversary of the capture of a 22 inch brown from this very same stream, and though I won't fish the same stretch maybe history will repeat itself.