Figured to hope for some Hendrikson action, but was a little fearful the water might still be to cold. When I first go t to the river, this seemed to be the case. There was a lot of Hendriksons coming off the water, but no fish were moving on them. Oh well. Eventually two fish started to make sporadic attempts at surface fair, and I managed a decent enough fish after a dozen casts or so on a Hendrikson Dun. After a couple of hours of watching water devoid of action, we decided to split.
As we started home, we happened by a stretch were fish were moving in steady rythyms on the duns blanketing the surface. I had already removed my waders, but figured I'd brave the slightly less then optimal water temperatures for a few casts. This was probably a good move.
So, I waded into the frigid waters, questioning my sanity, and started to work on a fish. I shortly hooked into what turned out to be another decent fish.
...........................and back it goes.
Alright! So at least there was a point to freezing off my balls! I probably could have been content with the days efforts at this point................but.............there was still some risers. I picked off a fish that was in the 13" inch or so range. Cool. I was done. A few fish were enough to make a decent day of it. I pulled my chilled ass out of the water and started to make my to the car. As I was doing this, I spotted another fish rising, and figured to make a couple of casts on the way by. Again, probably another good decision. The fish sucked up my Dun on the first drift. Set the hook, and realized I had hooked into a very decent fish.
I had a problem with this fish, in that I had an obstruction immediately below, and I could not let the fish run that way or it was game over. I was using 5X, so I could put a decent enough pressure to keep it somewhat controlled with finesse. The reality of situation though, was I was apt to bust of the fish at anytime.
Stopping a good fish that wants to run is not how I generally want to handle things. A number of times during the 5 or so minute scrap I knew I was on the verge of hearing my tippet snap. However, I learned a long time ago, you can't be afraid of losing a big fish and you have to fight it as hard as possible.
The 'knee squeeze' in the pic is not from the strain of fighting the fish.........I've got me net clamped in there. ;) The pic is snapped while I am putting the breaks on the fish. My reel hand is clamped on the reel and I'm playing a very tenuous game of give and take in an effort to keep the fish out of obstruction. Again, not the preferred way of handling a good fish.
.........incoming.
God was smiling on me today though, and I eventually got the rather irritated fish to net.
The fish was released so fresh that it broke my hold as soon as I started to revive it, swimming back to the depths from whence it came.
All in all, a pretty good few hours to start the season. Was also fortunate enough to have someone with a camera to capture some shots. This is almost never the case.
All the fish were caught on a #12 Hendrickson Parachute Dun cast with 3wt using 5x tippet.
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