Every year, about the time the lilacs bloom in town, a phenomena occurs on the local river: the stonefly hatch. To trout who's average tidbit most of the year is a fragile little winged bug or it's larvae, these must seem like a 20 ounce porterhouse steak.
They are around 3" long, and fat. They winter over as larvae, buried in the rocks on the bottom of the river. Come June, they emerge, crawling out on the shore and up in the branches of bushes, or stalks of weeds and grass. They dry off, then fly about like small clumsy birds, fluttering and banging into things.
The large trout, usually wary and only feeding at night, suddenly and for a short period behave like drunken sailors on liberty.
Like a old streetwalker, I decided to take advantage of their behaviour. I headed downstream from where I usually fish to an area where the river splits in two for a half a mile, the flows are less and it's easier fishing from the bank.
Arriving early afternoon, this is one of the results.
I caught three others near this size, and missed or lost some others. Not bad for 3 hours of fishing. I wasn't tempted to keep any of these fellows, the once or twice a year I want a trout dinner I head up one of the tributaries and get a few pan-sized brookies.
It's beautiful, Mike! Is this a brownie? Speckled? I've never been trout fishing, so I don't know the varieties - except for rainbow and cut throat, and only those through pictures.
ReplyDeleteYou are going to eat that, aren't you?
Oops! Didn't read the last paragraph. Got as far as the last picture, then forgot everything else as I was awed by its beauty.
DeleteIt's a brown..German Brown. The smaller trout, espescially Brook trout, are much better eating. Rolled in flour and fried in bacon grease till crispy. One can even much their tails, like a potato chip!
DeleteWhat a beautiful fish!
ReplyDeleteYour post gave me the shivers, though. I once bicycled through a cloud of mayflies. /shudder/ I still can feel them in my ears, up my nose...
Pearl
When there is a caddis fly hatch, they are really thick. They crawl up your shirt sleeves, up your pants if you don't have waders on, and down your collar........
DeleteWow, that is a super catch. I stopped fishing in Germany about 15 years ago. The restrictions just took the fun out of it.
ReplyDeleteWhen I lived in Bad Kissingen, one morning I was looking at the river Saale that flows through town and saw fish rising. I asked a local, they asked me if I'd ever heard of rainbow trout.
DeleteI looked into fishing there, wow, they do have some restrictions. I passed, having some of the best fishing in the world near my home.
I'm with Pearl, except we called them Canadian Soldiers. (Probably American Soldiers on the other side of Lake Erie.) We were camping; I just kept frying them into the bacon and eggs.
ReplyDeleteMayflies (Ephemereoptera) probably just looked like pepper on the eggs, eh? Just some added protein.
DeleteMy fishing days are long since gone but I can remember catching a handful of Northern Pike once, fishing off a dock at Lake Carlyle, in Saskatchewan. I was just a kid and it was a thrill.
ReplyDeleteI've been fishing for over 60 years, don't know what I'd do without it. I've only caught one Pike, up in Alaska. I cut my leader rather than try unhooking the toothy monster.
DeleteThe only time I ever fished was when I was a kid on holiday with my parents at a northern Ontario lake. My mother probably wanted some time to herself and sent my dad and I out in a boat to fish. We both got bored after an hour and rowed back.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad to see you got good at it :)
That's a beautiful fish.
ReplyDelete