The North Country Slam

The 7wt and 10wt ready for action.

In my late teenage years my grandfather passed away from cancer.  He was someone I looked up to and his pride and work ethic was contagious.  He taught me to be tough, work hard, be proud, and walk my own walk.  When he was sick, and under the care of my family,  he instructed my then-together parents to, after he passes, receive money he'd saved up and take a vacation... some place nice.  And, when that time came and our grieving process wound down we scheduled a trip to Key West for some fishing--as requested by grandpa.  

The trip helped take our minds off things and it became an exciting time for me... getting to talk to top guides in the lower Keys such as the late Jose Wejebe, Bill Oliver, the Delphs, Jeffrey Cardinas and a slew of others.  These guys would become my fishing role models in the years to come and I dreamed of their lifestyle.  I was hooked.  Soon, I was chasing the ever elusive "Grand Slam" on the flats:  tarpon, permit and bonefish on fly all in the same day.  But, despite sight casting relentlessly to tarpon over 100 pounds I never did land one on fly (I did manage to catch a tagged 40 pounder late in the trip on bait in the Key West Harbor).  The permit, well they narrowly eluded me... as two giant permit rushed my tarpon fly on the edge of a flat they butted heads over the presentation; but, they never took.  The way they both tipped on the fly haunts me to this day, "How could they not have eaten it?".  And, the bonefish... they were shadows of fish moving across the flat laughing at my untrained eye.  In the end, I never did get the "Grand Slam" other than the one that was on my Guy Harvey t-shirt.  But, the experience was amazing and will stick with me forever.

Returning to the North Country, the land of my late grandfather, we too have a "slam".  Depending on the lake it will be a different mix of fish.  And, the lake I chose for Memorial Day weekend was the lake my grandfather lived on.  I got to know it well over the years.  The "slam" pursuit on this trip would consist of pike, smallmouth bass, and walleyes.  

The day started blind casting to post-spawn northern pike holding on shallow flats located in the back of mucky bays.  Using the 10 wt., I fired out a large white and red streamer I concocted many years ago.  The pattern was tied on a 2/0 Tiemco tarpon hook.  It didn't take long before there was action... within an hour and half I would catch, photo, and release pike of the following sizes:   38", 36", 38", and 40".

First fish of the day... 38 inches.

Second fish... 36 inches.

Third fish... 38 inches.

Last pike of the day... 40 inches. I could feel this fish actually had a turtle in it's gut!  

40-incher going home... you can see the turtle shape in its belly.

Content with pike fishing, I neatly reeled in my line so that it would lay on the reel in even rows.  I put the 10 wt down and pointed the boat toward smallie-ville.  We headed out of the weedy back bays and motored toward some large shallow flats made up of broken rock.  The water temperatures were a bit cool yet (52-55 degrees F.) but our bet was that prespawn smallies were starting to move shallow.  And, once we arrived it didn't take more than a few casts with the 7 wt to confirm our hunch.  We enjoyed some quick action on 17-19 inch smallies.  At this time of year it is extremely important, for the future of the smallmouth population, to fight the fish quickly and not have the fish out of the water for more than 30 seconds.  The fish pictured below were out of the water just seconds... with the camera already out and ready while they were being landed.       

Dad in on the action...  with one pushing 5 pounds.

    

After just a few hours, two of the three "North Country Slam" candidates had been boated and released.  And, fine specimens of fish they were.  We decided to float off the spot, eat our lunches, and reflect on the fishing a bit.  As we chomped on deli sandwiches the wind shifted strong out of the east-southeast.  The clouds blew out and the sun became intense.  A good chop was developing.  A walleye chop.  With lunches down we headed for a shallow flat where we had observed walleyes chasing flies in the past.  This spot also contains smallies so it was a win-win decision.  We fan-casted as we drifted over the flat.  Concern began to grow onboard.  Nothing was biting.  We made a couple passes.  Nothing.  Then, reaping the reward of fisherman's patience and persistence a fish stopped the fly half way in on its retrieve.  The fish stayed deep and had some weight.  But, it didn't fight like a bass... nor a pike.  It stayed deep and bent the 7 wt nicely.  In time, I saw color and the tell tale white spot on the caudal fin identifying it as a walleye.  The "North Country Slam" had been completed.

A nice 20 inch walleye on fly.

        

    

Frog Water Pike and Legends

A late spring in the Northland means frog water pike.  This time of year pike will be in the shallow swamp water at the back of shallow, weedy, bays.  Throw in some emergent vegetation and a slow moving river or two meandering into the lake through alders and sedge grass and you have the perfect combination--a springtime pike haven.

Growing up I heard legends of giant spring pike.  My late grandfather, as a boy, went down to a well known creek feeding into the lake to check the spring sucker run.  As the hoards of suckers made their way up the creek and into the flooded swamp and sedge above, something waited at the river mouth to feast on this seasonal spring delicacy.  Something very big.  Giant pike.  My grandfather sighted these beasts swimming around with 2-4 pound suckers crossways in their mouths.  Occasionally a big pike would swim up the creek a short distance in water far too skinny for such a fish.  It didn't take long and my grandfather had one captured.  Proud as a boy could be with such a catch, he put his hand in the fish's gill, draped it over his shoulder, and began walking home to show his parents and siblings.  The tail of the fish drug on the ground.  

On another occasion, a group of my father's childhood friends were in a small wooden boat near one of the major river mouths during this same magical spring period.  One of the teenagers noticed a large dark shape discoloring the water near the boat.  And, it was slowly and deliberately moving toward them.  With all eyes fixed on the shape the local teenagers collectively dropped their jaws as they realized it was a huge pike.  Clenching the gunnels of the boat, they silently watched the fish swim under, observing the head emerging on one side of the boat while the tail was still visible on the other side.  My great aunt has a similar monster pike story... a sighting which also indicated a pike longer than a small wooden rowboat was wide.

It's stories like these that get you thinking.  Yes, we live in a different time where pike like these are rare.  And, the legendary stories always seem to be told by individuals 1-2 generations older.  So, I wondered if pike like this still exist... or, should we grow apathetic and accept those days are over with nothing more to catch than hammer handles?  Armed with a 10 weight fly rod and some big pike flies I sought to find out.  And, a late spring would set the stage nicely.

Top to Bottom:  Enrico Puglisi Minnows, Reynold's Pike Flies, Foam Diver, and a very chewed up red & white deer hair/rabbit strip diver.

We launched the boat on a calm and overcast day with rain in the forecast.  The light wind we had came from the south, which in my experience has always been a good esox wind.  With the boat in the water, the 10wt. threaded up, and the bow pointed in the right direction, we hammered the four stroke and headed for the frog water.  Water temperatures were in the low 50 degree F. range and things looked good.

Once in the bay we slowly came off plane and eased into the back of the bay.  The depth finder read

three feet deep.   The bottom was soft.  Muck.  Occasional broadleaf cabbage stalks.  Emergent vegetation on the shoreline.  We cut the engine and deployed the bow-mount trolling motor into the lake.  Then, under electric power, further eased into frog water.  The depth finder fluctuated between 2-3 feet.  Soon, we were within a good cast of shoreline veggies.  Mallards and goldeneyes swam the shoreline.  Red-winged blackbirds chattered in the marsh.     

I stripped the line off the reel and stretched it.  It lay coiled on the deck.  The stretching procedure takes out any unwanted memory in the cold fly line allowing for rocket casts without tangles.  I flicked the fly into the water and let it soak.  Then, worked three false casts and fired the diver into the shallows.  On the third cast I was hooked up.  After some defiant fighting the fish came boat-side and was carefully landed and released.

First pike of the day.  A tad under 30 inches.

This ritual would repeat itself for the next 1-2 hours.  Roughly ten pike were boated and released.  Of the ten boated, three made it into the 30-inch club.

A skinny 30-incher.

31-incher.

30-incher.

I still hadn't sighted any pike of legendary status.  Yes, there were the 32-36 inch pike that would follow the fly to the rod tip, only to turn and spook back to their lair when the retrieve ran out of room.  And, I can't tell you how frustrating it is to witness that (at least a musky might swing on a figure 8).  But, really, no pike of true legendary status were seen.

The rain started to fall steadily now and the nice south wind we had earlier had switched around to an east wind.  And, it started to blow harder.  The pike bight began to slow down.  Knowing there are a couple of similar bays on the lake we pulled the trolling motor up, fired up the big motor, and charged through the rain to the next spot.  This would be the setting where two of the three previously told stories of monster pike had occurred.

We arrived to the marshy inlet bay.  Again the depth finder read 2-3 feet.  Muck.  Emergent vegetation all around the river mouth.  We started in an inside bend with the intent that the east wind would push us across the back of the bay giving us ample casts in the right spot.  A large Tamarac stood lonely on the swampy shoreline.  I fired my cast toward it.  The large deer hair diver landed softly near the shoreline in front of the Tamarac.  I stripped the fly back.  The deer hair diver with its rabbit strip tail worked like an undulating jerk bait on the sink tip line... an action reminiscent of the old suick jerk bait that might have been cast in this same spot with a steel rod some 70 years ago.  The fly neared the boat on retrieve.  Then, I noticed the water alongside the boat was changing color.  The color was moving.  Moving toward the fly...  My jaw dropped and my knees began to shake.  The pike of lore had shown itself and its nose was just inches from the diver on the other end of my line.  It came as close as it could to nudging the fly without touching it.   Then.... the retrieve ran out of room.  I had stripped in all my line.  The retrieve was over.  The pike turned its massive body.  Its tail spread broadly fanned to make the maneuver away from me.  The fanned tail had to be the size of a dinner plate.  The girth of the fish gave me no doubt it could have eaten one of the previous members of the 30-inch club.  I desperately swung my rod into an L-turn and started a figure eight with the fly.  The fish slowly and unamused sunk to the mucky bottom and slowly disappeared into the stained water as if it were a ghost.

Silence fell upon the boat.  I sat down.  My knees were weak and quivered.  I looked into the dark water.  I looked to the marsh.  I looked back out to the main lake... and at my fly, then back to the Tamarac on shore.  A steady rain fell onto my head.

I recovered and threw some more casts back into the same spot.  Nothing showed.  I continued to drift down the marshy shoreline casting.  Nothing showed.  I reeled in and called it a day.

I left this spot knowing the legendary pike of the Northland still exist.  And, with one follow to the boat-side this magnificent fish of lore had shown itself to a new generation of legend tellers.  
     

Yellow spots on a 30-inch club member.

A future legendary pike in the making?

Back to the marsh!

   

The Brown Trout Dream

Last night I dreamt about fly fishing for brown trout.  Not one of those fluffy romantic dreams... like a scene from "River Runs Though It" compleat with violin music.  But instead, one of those weird ones... which included blue ribbon fly fishing for browns in a flooded creek in the back yard (which doesn't even exist... but it did in my dream; and, the 12-20" browns that were running the creek were a pleasant surprise).  After such a bizarre dream, I woke up this morning and it was clear what my day was going to be... despite previous plans.  So I slammed a few espressos, tied some flies with shaky hands, threaded up the 5 wt., rebuilt my leader chopped down from previous streamer fishing, grabbed the trout box, some tippet material, a snack, and headed out the door to one of my favorite small driftless area trout streams.

As I neared the destination I was astonished to see new snowbanks... and how high they were!  The fields and meadows were blanketed under significant snowfall.  And then I remembered, a few days ago the area received a good foot of new snow.  My thoughts quickly turned to concern for stream and road conditions.  I wondered if the back roads would be accessible; and, would I arrive to a flood and unfishable conditions.  But, I drove on in disbelieve of the new snow which had fallen in May... it looked like I was driving to a stream during the special winter season and the whole sight seemed rather ridiculous.  Did I mention it's May?

Then,  I arrived at the stream.  And it was perfect.  High but within the banks.  Clear, but with some color.  Not muddy.  Good visibility for flies; but, just enough color to help conceal me from the fish.

I assembled the fly rod.  Then, moved the strike indicator to the proper location on the leader.  Today, I would fish with a gold-bead prince nymph with a small caddis pupa dropped below it.  Unweighted, other than the bead-head on the prince.  5X to the prince.  6X to the caddis pupa.  It looked good.  I had the place to myself.  Wonderful.

I approached the first bend pool and noticed a large rock midstream breaking the current.  Just upstream of it was a nice feature... wood.  A small tree had fallen into the stream and lay across the bend a few feet below the surface.  A good riffle dumped into the pool.  I approached carefully, measured my cast, and stripped line from the Abel.  I carefully placed the first few casts upstream from the tree--with the thought I would drift over it and by the time I passed it the flies would be at depth when they drifted along the midstream rock.  It worked.  The indicator darted between the wood and the rock; and, the first fish of the day was on.  A beautiful, wild, driftless area brown trout.  Then some more casts, same as before; and another fine trout of similar size--about 10 inches.  But, as I made more casts there were no longer more trout.  I headed upstream.

I picked up a couple more browns in each of the next two spots.  The stream improvements looked great and the fish were using them.  TU really got this stream right.  As I approached one of the improved riffles, a large fish moved out from the shoreline rocks and into the riffle.  It pushed a wake from the eddy it was holding in all the way through the riffle until it finally sunk into the head of the pool.  Only a very large trout could do that.  And my imagination ran wild with the thought of a 25 inch  plus trout in the area.  But since I spooked it I wasn't hopeful of catching it--trout that big don't get that size by being stupid.  And surely the spooked beast knew exactly what I was up to.  So, I eyed a nice, long, spring-creek-ooze-of-a-run upstream.  It was the kind of monolithic current that looks stagnant if it weren't for the random boils that would appear, indicating its flow. A great blue heron was hunting along its shoreline.  But soon, he conceded his fishing spot to the catch-and-release angler.  

I couldn't do wrong in this run.  About every 3 casts yielded a take... for the next hour and a half.  The fish ranged in size up to 13 inches; but, averaged a respectable 10-11 inches.  A perfect spot.  Mostly midges were coming off the water; however, the trout weren't too into them.  A few rises now and then; but, most of the action was happening below the surface.  All the takes were on the small green caddis pupa.  I imagine the flies were fishing about half way down or somewhere in the intermediate depths.  The trout were really locked into this presentation.

All told I must have hooked 30-40 trout in the two and a half hours I was on the stream.  I landed at least two dozen, though I wasn't really counting.  An hour into it my temperament soon synced with the pace of the stream.  The slow, laid back ooze of the spring creek.  The twitch of the indicator.  The sound of the great blue heron flying over.  The chattering pair of osprey perched above the stream.  The newly arrived warblers busy on the ground turning over leaves in search of food.  The swirl of midges above the stream.  The occasional mayfly.  The swoosh of a swallow. The riffle bubbling downstream.  A lone gunshot in the distance indicating a successful spring turkey hunt.  And a whole lotta trout.  I'm reminded why trout fishing is such a healthy addiction.

Ahhhh, dreams every now and then do come true... and the reality can only be made possible by putting in the effort.