mirogak

So this summer was turning out to be a bummer in terms of fishing. Work and building a "mega" shed in the backyard got in the way. I "way" underestimated how long that shed/workshop would take. This long weekend I decided to hit a favourite spot in my favourite river. Went with a couple of buddies. There were 3 holes, each of us working each hole. I knew there were smallies here but I also knew there were Brookies. I kept catching smallies on the spinning rod, none too big until I landed a 1.5 or maybe even 2 pounder. Kept that one for the pan. I had both rods with me - spinning and fly rod. I reserved the last hour of daylight for the rod and some nice fly action. Saw lots of bug activity on the surface but nothing was rising. I decided to use an old, beaten, grasshopper fly given to me by a fellow angler I met the weeekend before at the Forks of the Credit. He told me the hoppers were in season and trout love them. I noticed that my 5X leader had shortened to about 4 or 5 feet in length and I only had 5X tippet, so tying the tippet to that leader didn't seem like a good option. So I switched to a brand new 9 foot 7X leader, thinking trout don't get bigger than 2lbs in the river. So I should be good .... ***MISTAKE**** My buddies had quit fishing at that point, and I saw this nice log right next to the hole my buddy was working for a good hour. My first cast I landed the hopper right next to that log, a good 30 yards away from where I was standing. Not much current on the surface, so I decided to twitch my rod, giving some life to that hopper ... BAMMMMMMMMMMM!!! something just destroyed it. I couldn't believe my eyes. My friends sitting on top of a bridge, watching me in fly action, got up on their feet and couldnt believe their eyes, especially the dude who was working that hole for an hour. This baby jumped a good 3 or 4 feet in the air, and was running in every direction, to the right, to the left, straight away from me. I was all so gentle with the rod, giving it line. I had this nasty feeling in my gut that I was going to loose him. After about 3 or 4 mins (seemed like half an hour) it came straight towards me, coming as close as 6 feet, but as soon as it saw me, he must have said "no way", he shot back up straight away from me. One more jump but he was too far for me to tell what it was and it was getting dark. Next thing I know, he shot right towards my left side, there was a 10 feet opening between me and the bank of the river, he shot straight across by my side, only 3 or 4 feet away from me. I was letting line but he was too fast ... SNAP!!!! I stomped my feet in disappointment and felt this energy/electricity just drain out of me. Must have been all that adrenaline rushing out. I just kneeled down in the water and felt this huge headache in the back of my head. What a rush, what a disappointment. Why did I switch my leader? This fight reminded me not of the 2 pounder bass that I caught earlier but it reminded me of the salmon and steelhead fights during the fall runs. It had to be a Speckeled Trout, would you agree? PS: Two years ago, when I started chasing brookies, I had dreamt about a colorful trout on my line jumping 10 feet in the air in this very river, in this very spot. Dreams do come true? It made my summer!

Nice report Chris. Nice chair too, where did you get it?

unreal ... very cool indeed.

Nice Mike! Was this the weekend of May 10th? I was in the park that weekend too and my trip turned more into a survival trip than a fishing trip ... ice cold water, freezing rain, blizzard, big lake waves, refuge in thick bush .. lol.... and I think due to the lake stratification effect not one fish was interested in a bite... I will do a report soon .. thanks for sharing Miro

Lol so true

Don't know how I missed this Brad. No wait I do - was building my fence all weekend. next time ....

nice smokes bud

Good point re the warmer temps.

Yep pretty common in Brookie streams.

And perhaps that browns maybe feeding on the Brookies.

Oh wow - what's that second pic. I was debating between Cayo Coco and Varadero ... If i had seen this post earlier, I know where I would have gone. Next time. Thx for sharing.

That's exactly what it was. They weren't interested in flies, dry or wet. They weren't even giving the spinner a chance to spin ..... Bam after bammm

What that first picture doesn't show is a full parking lot that holds about 30 cars ... yikes!!! Passing over the bridge I saw 5 guys fishing the same hole ... don't wanna be there. I am going further up....

Right on Bill, I started doing that after I hurt the very first one ... lesson learned

Like Brad suggested in a recent post, I had been doing a lot of research to find brookie streams not too far from where I live (Toronto) for early morning or evening side trips, and it paid off. After my cottage/fishing trip for season opener got cancelled and Algonquin was out of the question due to ice out/flooding situation, I thought I'd put my research to the test. The first access point I tried looked like this Ok they're only in there for the steelheads but I want them brookies, so I am gonna go further north to the more cooler, cleaner and "solo'er" headwaters. And then I found them ... And I made a new friend up there, whom I plan to visit again... I must have caught over 20 of these little brookies, they were small but I was totally fine with that. Knowing that they live 20 mins away from where I live, I was perfectly happy. Throughout the 5 hours I was there, I ran into one person, a freindly angler who showed me pics of what he had caught in this stream. A beautiful 3 pounder brown!!!! just downstream of where I was catching brookies. My question is this - how come the resident brookies don't get as big as the browns in the same waters. What do you guys think? L8R Miro

Nice report with beautiful pics... thx for sharing.

Send me the polished version, I work for a publisher, I'll pass it on to editorial, see what they think

Bet you the end of season sails at Sail kicks butt. Stock up boys.

Try this. Who says you can't fillet them ....

Go Algonquin Park. Hit Tea lake, Cannisbay or Kearney lake campgrounds. AP is the best.

Specks in Frontenac? Get outta here!

Been to SAIL right across from them .... big BIG box store

chill out and have fun even when you get skunked

Got my juices flowing

Lovely fish there ....