High Sierra Trout
Great Weekend
Ryan and George drove up from San Francisco Saturday morning for a weekend of fishing on the Truckee River. We got to the river at about 11 and headed straight for the secret big fish hole. The fishing started out pretty slow because it was still pretty cold and cloudy. I caught a few pinner trout (for those of you not from Nor Cal, that means small) but that was it. Around 12:30 the sun peeked out from behind the clouds and the fishing immediately picked up. Ryan latched onto a nice trout that hammered a size 18 Micro Mayfly near the end of his drift (pictured below). The fish fought like a champion, taking out lots of line and breaking the surface a few times.
Nice bow
After the landing of that trout, George and I resumed casting with a new sense of hope. I caught a few more small rainbows and then hooked in to the awesome trout pictured below. He was a little scratched up, but was very healthy and battled me long and hard.
Strong rainbow
This trout hit my Fox Squirrel nymph super hard and ran a long ways downstream. We landed a few more pinners and then headed up to a big pool around the bend. We struck out at this spot, so we went up to the dam area to look for some risers. When we got up above the dam we saw that the hatch was on and fish were rising so we rigged up with some little dries on 6X. I landed five right off the bat on a size 18 Light Cahill. After that I missed fish after fish for the rest of the afternoon, I missed the same fish four times- I sucked! Ryan had a few hook-ups, but none landed and George was blanked. We headed home around 5 in order to watch the Sox beat up on the Rockies.
Today we started out here in Reno downstream from Mayberry Park but like yesterday things started out pretty slow. I got one little guy but that was it, so we headed up the canyon towards Truckee. We drove down a dirt road, parked next to the tracks and hiked down into the canyon to a stretch of heavy water (pictured at top of page). The fishing here was pretty slow too, but I hooked a few fish and landed a small rainbow or two but Ryan and George were both skunked. Some mayflies were coming off but nothing was rising, so we hiked out and headed upriver to a spot I know of where big trout rise freely during a hatch. Nothing was going on when we arrived, but after an hour or so a few fish started to rise here and there. There were a few different mayfiesl flitting about and some caddis too. I tied on a size 16 tan parachute mayfly pattern and tried to cover the risers while George and Ryan took a break on the bank (pictured below).
Slackers
Through sheer perseverance I finally got one of those fish to eat my bug, and he was a fatty. The trout was super strong, and it took me more than five minutes to finally bring him to the bank. He was the biggest fish I’ve caught on a dry in a long time, and I was lucky to land him on the 6X tippet I was using (pictured below).
Big fish on a little fly
After that I missed the same fish three times on three different flies and then that was it. George landed a nice fish while nymphing, so he broke his slump, but Ryan got Truckeed today (getting Truckeed is when you fish hard all day and the Truckee denies you any trout). Even though we didn’t get a lot of fish we still had a great time fishing a great river on another beautiful fall day in the Sierras.
Sunday, October 28, 2007
