High Wind Warning

Fellow fish-head Josh and I payed it no attention. Sustained 25-35 with gusts to 60? Ha! Let's go fishing. Josh was kind enough to invite me to fish with him on Monday, which was good because I actually may not have gone otherwise. We fished water he hadn't been on before, but I had. A great little watershed with numerous wild browns and brook trout. Small streamers were going to be the name of the game, and within minutes Josh had hooked up and I had moved a fish.

It ended up being a pretty solid day, all things considered. No trees fell on us, that was good. It was a little colder than had been predicted. The fish seemed to be turned on but not as fired up as I've seen them there on previous trips. An interesting development ended up being the productivity of flies that included wood duck. Josh got his first fish on a gold Empie Shiner, but that seemed to become unproductive shortly thereafter. I was fishing a miniature version of Domenick Swentosky's Half Pint... let's call it a quarter pint; I was drawing a lot of strikes on that fly. Eventually, having no others of that pattern, I lent an alternative to Josh: a Wood Duck Heron. He was soon into fish again. It can be kind of funny how a trout's preferences line up. Flash-less, light and naturally colored, and barred seemed to be a key on this day.

The wind failed to impact our fishing much, though I spent more time looking for widow makers than I typically do. A couple trees went down while we were out there to keep us on our toes. But it was fun to be out on a day most others probably wouldn't have fished. Thanks Josh!