New Year's Day 2021

 2020 was an unusual and at many times unpleasant year, so there are many of us who were glad to see it go. Unfortunately, the turning of the calendar couldn’t rectify many... or frankly any… of the problems brought forth during and before the year 2020. The most obvious of those is this damn virus, which we are all so ready to be rid of. Because of coronavirus, a group of small stream addicts had to hold tradition a little bit differently on New Year’s Day. 

The New Years’ Day crew was a creation of a few guys on the Fly Addict Forum quite some time ago- an idea of Alan Petrucci’s. Pete and John joined him on January 1st of 2011 and the tradition started. Kirk joined in 2012, Mark in 2013, and Alan first invited me for January 1st 2016. This year, Mark was in Massachusetts, Kirk was in Florida, and the virus was obviously going to be a problem regardless. So NYD 2021 was going to have to be a bit of a different situation. John and I decided to meet and fish our late friend Pete’s home waters, Mark would fish a brook trout stream in Massachusetts, and Alan spent the day on his home stream with his wife. 

John and I met in an abandoned parking lot next to the stream of our choice: a river with mostly brown trout but some brookies, that runs a very long distance. It was a little intimidating for that reason. There was so much of it to fish and access was spotty. Pete had lived not far away and fished this river for years. He passed a few years ago. We all miss him. Though my time with Pete was short and limited, I’ll never forget him. The first time we met was incidental, on a river close to my house. We chatted for a while, and just before we parted ways he said “You are a fishing fool, Rowan.” Neither of John nor I had ever fished Pete’s river. John had done some research and Mark had given me some tips, so we fortunately weren’t working with a completely blank slate. It looked good and we saw fish just moments after our first glimpses of the water. Unfortunately those fish seemed to be in a cold and distant mood. 

We fished through the first stretch, seeing some good deep gravelly runs, cut banks, and bends, but also some long and flat silty stretches. It clearly had fish but there didn’t seem to be loads of them. They also weren’t at all snappy. I had one swipe from a small brown and nothing more. We moved downriver to a different parking place and found what to me looked like some even more exciting water. There was still a long, flat, silty bit, but there were a bunch of great runs mixed in. I was a bit surprised neither of us caught a fish out of this section, but someone else had already fished through a bit of it. We ran into him on our way out and chatted for a while; the guy lived not far away and he’d caught one fish. He was nice enough to give us some recommendations on places to try. We drove around a bit, found no parking at one spot we’d wanted to try and people fishing at another, then we decided we’d part ways. I wasn’t all that far from home and there were some streams I’ve wanted to fish for a while on the way back, so I decided that my day wasn’t over just yet. 

Up in Massachusetts, Mark was having a pretty good day. He played a chess game with one brookie that eluded him and caught his first fish of the year. About an hour’s drive from where John and I were fishing, Alan was also catching his first brookies of the year. 

One of Mark's brookies from NYD. Photo courtesy Mark Whittman

I found a park on the map next to a stream I’d heard rumors about and headed that way. When I got there, I liked the look of the stream. It was very clear and running well. I couldn’t really tell if it would water year round enough for wild salmonids to thrive but it was also larger than many streams I fish, so I wasn’t too concerned. The first half hour seemed to indicate that it might not have trout, and seemed not to have many fish at all. Then I found a nice twisty stretch with some really deep holes and got the first fish of the year. Not a trout, but a fallfish: a native species and one I’ll never say no to. 

As I continued fishing, it became clear that the holes in this short stretch were all loaded with fallfish. I was soon catching them hand over fist. Though it wasn’t clear if there were any trout in this stream at all I was happy as a clam. In one faster run, I had a suspicious feeling grab from what seemed to be a large fish. I suspected that might have been of trutta variety but wasn’t sure.

Soon I’d caught well into the double digits of fallfish and decided to make one last bid for a trout before dark. I thought I could make it to a stream I’d caught one beautiful wild brown at a few years ago. I didn’t make it there before dark, but I was determined. I cast my Ausable Ugly into the same deep, swirling plunge pool I’d caught the fish in that last winter day three years ago and caught my first trout of 2021. 

May this year be better than the last. Keep your head up, there’s plenty to look forward to. 

 Fish for the love of fish.

Fish for the love of places fish live.

Fish for you.

And stay safe and healthy.

Thank you to my Patrons; Erin, David, John, Elizabeth, Brandon, Christopher, Shawn, Mike, Sara, Leo, C, Franky, and Geof for making Connecticut Fly Angler possible. If you want to support this blog, look for the Patreon link at the top of the right side-bar in web version. 

Edited by Cheyenne Terrien