The Hand You're Dealt

When you are targeting sea run brown trout or weakfish in CT, you are playing a game in which nearly every hand your dealt is a bad one. Eventually you get a winning hand but it doesn't happen often. In the weakfish scenario the dealer is the local sharpie crowd. They are very suspicious and intentionally sort out a bad hand for you by not saying a damn thing when the fish are in or where they are. Surf casters are the same way, but weakfish guys... whoa boy. I respect them for it though, it takes a lot of time and effort to find CT's nearly non-existent weakfish. If I figured them out I would hardly tell a soul. So although the game itself isn't too hard, putting time in for something that may or may not happen during one of the busiest fishing seasons... eh. It may or may not be worth it. But in this game you must play the hand you are dealt.

Dan and I played our hand last night, and we lost. No tiderunners. Full out skunk, actually. Sand eels were around and the tide was perfect. But the weaks were a no show. I suspect we were just too late in the season. Was the epic blood red moon worth the long ride? Hard to say when the same moon rose over a lot of great striper spots not far away.

Go ahead and try to find where I fished. 

Oh, but sea run browns! You're playing Texas Hold'um and nearly every hand you are dealt is 2-7 offsuit. There's seemingly no chance you'll ever catch them. And every time you try weird things happen, because these are weird fish. 

I should add, this all happened before the weakfish hunt, but frankly...whatever.

Friday night I made a short trip to my closest sea run brown trout stream. Hopes were not high. The target fish was not found.

On Saturday I went to my go-to sea run brown trout stream. I've had a lot more chances there than any other stream. On this trip I caught trout almost immediately, but they weren't sea run browns... they were chrome tidal water rainbows! WHAT?!?!? Five of them... How did they get here? When were they stocked? I won't bother asking too many questions, CT micro steel for the win! In fact, the only fish I caught in water where I'd expect to find the occasional stocker were bluegills, bass, and grass pickerel. 

I did actually see some large sea run brown trout, but they weren't willing to actually eat the fly. They followed,  dorsal brushing the surface and tail waving behind. Just like sharks. It was cool to see, but I really would like to have caught one. Next time. Or the time after that. Or next year. Who knows.