I've gotten out fishing yesterday and today and found myself outmatched again! Yesterday I brought my 3 wt to the most popular trout stream in Minnesota in hopes of hooking a few trout. I pulled in a few small browns before hooking into a beast. He swam up the pool then down before the Pink Squirrel of Prey popped free of his jaw. I only saw a silhouette of the beast but he looked around 20 inches...damn.
This is not where I fished today but I wanted to post this pic because I like it! Today I fished a different stretch of the most popular trout stream in Minnesota in search of a beastly brown. This section is not heavily fished as evidenced by the shoulder high weeds I wacked to get to the fish. I found fish piled up in shallow pools and willing to eat.
The Pink Squirrel of Prey caught a fair number of fish before I noticed a dark shadow lingering on the far side of a tricky cross current. I tossed my fly toward it and hooked into a trout of about 10 inches. As I pulled him near the shadowy beast took chase nipping at the heels of the smaller trout all the way to my feet. The shadowy beast must've been at least 22-23 inches. This happened a number of times before I began targeting him. After 1 1/5 hours of fishing at him I set the hook and watched him race around 80 feet upstream. I took chase but upon reaching the beast he took off 100 feet downstream. Again I took chase while reeling and maintaining pressure. He spotted a big branch hanging across a shallow riffle and went for it. The 3 wt did little to slow his run. I followed and while feeding my rod beneath the branch my line went limp. THE HOOK POPPED OUT!!! After letting out a few choice words I continued fishing at the countless decent fish still in the pool.
I continued to land the occasional fish on the Pink Squirrel of Prey. After a while I decided to head further upstream. At one point I fished a rocky run with some decent fish sitting on the bottom. I briefly hooked into one that appeared to be around 16 inches but only landed a few smaller ones. On the way back to the car I snuck around and tried a few more casts into the pool from which I tied into the shadowy beast.
They wanted little to do with the Pink Squirrel of Prey so I tied on a size 20 RS2 double dropper and presto!
This speckled trout was the best fish of the day. He put up a good fight but came to hand despite his efforts. Today was really windy and pretty cold. I wet waded and by the end of this trip I was ready for a hot shower and a whole pizza. I landed around two dozen fish today with most measuring 12-14 inches. I didn't hook into many small fish and spooked or missed a number of larger ones.
Looks like a fantastic day. I might have to visit that hog of yours with my Five Weight Sage DS2. He needs to be taught a lesson.
ReplyDeleteI'm already calculating how long it'll take for him to forget me before I return with my homespun 5 weight!
ReplyDeleteI'd say 3 days should be good as long as nobody else bothers him.
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