April Fools Day - Pranking the trout!

The time 2:30 a.m.  I have now tied up 20 some flies.  My eyes are starting to slowly close.  

I made plans to head out trout fishing with my brothers early morning.  Tomorrow is calling for snow in the morning, then changing to rain later on.   We wanted to make sure we get there before the rain so we decided that, it might be a little early, but at least we will be able to fish before the stream starts to rise from the rain.  

Beep, Beep, Beep, the alarm is going off and it feels like I have only been asleep for a couple of minutes.

Jump in the shower, double up on clothing layers, and press the coffee.  I double check and make sure I haven't forgotten anything and off I go.  It is about 6:00 a.m. when I get to our local Wal-Mart.  I have to stop and buy a new fishing license and trout stamp today.  I hunt down an employee and ask them if there is anyone working the sporting goods department.  After a call on the walkie she tells me there will be someone in at 7:00.  Yeah that's not going to work.  After a few more walkie talkie chirps she tells me that there is someone there and I can just head back there.  I get back there and the lady tells me the computer is running slow.  No big deal.  I am just happy at this point that I didn't have to wait until 7:00.  Finally 25 minutes later and I am ready to start fishing again.  

I get to the bro's house and he's set to go.  Onward to the trout stream of our choosing.  We decided on a stream that has been known to hold some good size browns and rainbows.  Its called a creek but today it was more like a river.  The water was a little high and moving really fast. 

When we arrived the snow was coming down in huge flakes.  It was a beautiful sight, especially since it wasn't rain.  Luckily I remembered to wear the double layers.  We kept the music playing while we got set to hit the stream.  Beatles "Blackbird" made it seem almost sureal.  It was shaping up to be a sweet day!

I decided to take the first hole and my brother headed down to the next couple.  I decided to go with some deep bottom bomber flies, to try and coax a biggin off the bottom.  The water temp was at 41 degrees, and the air temp was probably about 30 degrees.  I figured I would just let it sit until my line darted the other way.  NO LUCK.  I decided to move up a little and threw the flies to the spot where both sets of rapids meet.  The water was moving so fast that the heavy flies didn't really have a chance to get to deep.  Whamo.
Landed a nice 14" brownie.  We continued to fish and ended up with most of our early morning luck being up in the rapids. 

It kept snowing/sleeting as we continued so I kept the camera packed for most of trip.  Here is a fish caught in slow spot of stream after missing fly then striking it again.( Caught on new fly design bright yellow and pink/ with grey dubbing)

This stream runs strong over top of big rocks and most of the fish here are twice as thick as the ones from smaller streams in the area.  The biggest fish I caught on this trip was only 15" but it still put up a great fight.  This stream holds some HUGE browns and rainbows.  I saw a picture of a rainbow someone caught out of it, and it looked like a good sized Lake Trout.  Browns over 30" have been caught here also.  
Here is a trout that was only about 8-9" and it attacked a good sized fly while still finishing a different meal from before.  HUngry Much?

That is the tail fin of a fish poking out of its throat.  I couldn't believe it was still hungry.  Who am I to judge a trout.  It must take a lot of energy to keep up with the water on a day like today.  

Has anyone ever caught one of these before?  I have lost many a fly to the infamous barb wire fish.

OUCH

My brother bought some really nice cargo pant waders recently and was taking advantage of the situation.
My hip waders just wouldn't get that deep.

This is a spot that is so quiet and serene on this part of the stream.  It is about a mile or two back in and full of birds, deer and some cougars spotted here. The person that lived here before selling it to the DNR said he had seen both cougars and wolves.  For some reason whenever asked about cougars in our area, the DNR denies that they are.  With both cougars and wolves known to be only hours up north of here, I personally believe they are around.  I swear to have seen a cougar here on two seperate occasions.  I always keep my eyes wide open. 

We usually keep a no cell phone policy along the stream, but in this case we made an exception while trying to get a hold of our other brother to see if he was going to be able to make it.  Weather conditions and not having his new license yet prevented him from being able to make it.  Bummer.  Next time hopefully the weather will cooperate a little better.  I was looking forward to seeing his brand new fly rod in action. 

We ended up having a lot of luck around 3:00-5:00 p.m.  I decided to switch up to a lighter rig and ended up catching quite a few on the surface.  I just watched for the rise then cast my flies about 2 feet in front of them then stripped my line quickly, keeping flies near surface, and bam fish on.  It never ended up raining in the long run and the sun would come out once and a while.  All and all it was worth waking up early and getting hardly any sleep.  I can't wait to get back to this stream once it has gone down and the temps have warmed up.  I will be looking to catch a lunker next time, next time...........