Tiny Char in Tiny Waters

There is a stream that I've taken a pass at or two over the years, a tiny drainage into a much larger river that I'd heard tell had brook trout. I caught one there after some failed attempts, then never made a cast in it again. I even neglected the remote stretch of unmanaged generally ignored bass, panfish, trout, and trophy sucker water it flowed into for a good few years, which is a shame. Though wild trout are basically non-existent in that river it is beautiful and not without quality fishing for native and non-native wild species as well as drop-back holdover trout. It was large white suckers I was after in the big river recently, though I was catching holdover rainbows instead. Away from any visible human structure and with the road noise muffled by the hemlock lined valley and heavy mist, I didn't so much mind that I wasn't catching my target species. I just kept drifting my pair of nymphs, hoping that one of the times my leader twitched and I came tight that it would be the Catostomus commersonii of my dreams.

Somewhere in the middle of that adventure I passed that tiny, steep tributary again and gave it more than a passing thought for the first time in some years. I made a few casts right by the dirt road, and sent a small brookie airborne without managing to keep the hook in it. I smirked and continued on. This wasn't five weight water, how dare I desecrate it with such heavy gear? I'd come back soon.

Two days later, the weather was different, perhaps pleasant is the word though I like a damp day more than most. I was again in the vicinity and, having once again failed to find my 26 inch sucker, I headed to the nameless tributary. Sun filtered through the hemlocks and sparkled on the crystal clear, fast flowing water. I could see brook trout in the water, feeding, darting to grab things that were much too minuscule for me to identify or hope to imitate. A simple size 16 Walt's Worm though would be all I'd need to catch these little char.

It took hardly a minute to get one to eat but substantially more to get one to hand. I didn't need to move on from the first fish I found though, these aren't wise to angling methods at all. Nobody is fishing for these little gems in this tiny creek. Just me. When I finally landed one it was a moment of elation most could never understand. So happy over so little....

To me and some others these fish are very meaningful; relics of a more natural time. The fact that these native char remain in this particular creek is unsurprising, it falls out of a minimally developed hillside, with no run off from treated roads flowing into it, under a healthy mixed forest. Vernal pools sit in the low areas between slopes, and on the warmer days of late winter and early spring marbled salamander larvae, caddis pupae, and crayfish among many other critters come out of their underwater hiding spots. Barred and great horned owls routinely call from the hemlocks, and at night a chorus of coyotes is not unexpected. In 2015 I found the prints of a large cat crossing the muddy path. Parts are missing, and that is our fault, but the wild won't be snuffed out completely in places like this. The very land itself just won't stand for it. Literally. Road and trail washouts are commonplace. These tiny native char, as it turns out, stand for something much larger in the minds of those of us who have fallen in love with them.

These tiny fish surviving in tiny places keep me from losing hope.

Until next time,

Fish for the love of fish.

Fish for the love of places fish live.

Fish for you.

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