I think I’ve been outed … as I had the choice of painstakingly researching today’s post or scoring free food. You guy’s lost - but that holds for the bulk of my work..

A.Wannabe.Travelwriter lured some unsuspecting landowner into thinking we represented a charitable organization, and they gave us pillaging rights to all the Black Mission Figs we could carry.

That’s not true, but embellishment always makes for a better story.

I read somewhere that a landscape shot leading an fishing article meant the guy didn’t catch anything - I use big fish pictures to draw your attention away from me scaling your back fence ..

This is a fat kid’s blog, masquerading as a fly fishing site. It’s revenge for picking me last on every sports team you captained in High School …

You ever wonder why we always have to do everything the hard way? Every trip is a memory exercise where the thousand things you need have to be rediscovered in every dark cranny of the house - then piled in the living room so you’ll remember to take them with you.

A couple of low wattage solar panels on the roof - a handful of quarters, and every nuance in fish mood, and every hatch countered.

Why not sandwich one of these between the Porta-Potties in the parking lot? You could make it eco-friendly by skipping the Plasticine container - just dump what’s owed you into your palm.

How many #16 Light Cahill’s do you think it’ll hold - and can that possibly be exhausted in a season?

The first fishing trip with an unknown angler is always a source of trepidation for both parties; you’re never sure what hand is being dealt, as prowess at the watercooler can turn into any number of outcomes when Nature’s involved.

Anything’s possible, a grizzled veteran or an utter novice, an incessant whiner, or that fellow surprised to find he’s only carrying hundreds.

It’s all part of the new-fishing-buddy pre-nuptial agreement; one or both lowers their guard and reveals the sacred fishing hole hoping they’ve found someone of similar mettle.

Those trashy Louis Lamour Westerns that I memorized described it as, “someone to ride the ridges with ..” - but Louie’s heroes never had to worry about going Dutch at Mickey Dee’s or camping with a metrosexual.

It’s worse than marriage and far more permanent - as you’re stuck with each other for the entire weekend …

Week after next it’s me and [name_redacted] doing a duet on pristine water. I’ve lowered my guard as Brownline activities have me shunned from the marble terraces of clubs, fraternities, and any real angling organizations - and fishing pals is hard to come by.

It’s not personal, I just refuse to be sprayed with 409 prior to the banquet - it plays hell with my complexion.

I open my email last night and [name_redacted] and I have finished the negotiation phase of the pending orgy; he’s doing the cooking, and I’m reclining on a divan helping, “Uh, needs more Garlic..”

I get the below update:

Got an invite to join some friends on a small Sierra
stillwater, so this past Friday night I met my brother
at his house and we headed east up into the Sierras.

We got a late start on Saturday, and saw fish rising
and the tail end of a massive midge hatch, but by the time
we got our float tubes in the water the sun was high and
the fish were down.  I strung up a pair of rods – one
with a floating line and the other with a sink tip - and
started working my way through my fly boxes. It had been
awhile since I’d fished a stillwater, and I had some new
patterns/techniques I wanted to try out.  Long story
short:  everything failed, and I eventually tied on
an olive wooly bugger and just trolled it behind me while
I kicked right down the middle and enjoyed a beer and a
cigar.  That’s when the brown hit and I was once
again reminded that sometimes easy and simple work best.

Everything’s good up to this point; punctual, adversity met and conquered - the whole astute angler bit - adapt, evolve, overcome.

Then it gets a bit … squeamish?

I had volunteered to cook lunch that day – grilled
Polish sausages with mustard, sauerkraut, and red onions - so
I kicked back to the takeout and started setting up the
new Coleman stove I’d recently purchased.  This is the
first stove I’ve owned that uses propane instead of white
gas, and I’d forgotten that you can’t attach a propane
cylinder directly to the stove without a regulator,
and the regulator was at home.  Without an artificial heat
source, I did the next best thing:  I put the Polish in a
cast iron skillet and set it out in the sun for about a half
hour or so – long enough for sausages to build up a sweat, but not long enough for any insect larvae to appear.  It was a memorable meal, but not in a good way.

Massive “pioneer” points scored in the above, but no mention of alerting his flesh and blood to the cooking methodology or the gastronomic risk. Think wilderness, doubled over in acute pain, and a multiple hour drive to safety.

That evening the fish started rising again, but I’ll
be damned if I could figure out what they were after, and
eventually I went back to dragging a bugger. That’s when
I got my second brown (not pictured), an angry beast
that gave me one helluva fight.

Sunday my brother and I decided to take a little hike
little fish, but nothing to hand. Later that day we heard
rumors of some guys who had caught fish on the stillwater
by drifting midges under indicators, so we decided to give
that a try before heading home. There was a film of dead
midges covering the water, mixed into the mess I could
see an occasional mayfly,not much bigger than the midges.
I couldn’t see anything coming off the water, but there
were fish coming up all around us, giving us the fin
I suppose.  I tried some of the smallest stuff I had.
Nothing.  We finally packed it in and headed home.

One final note:  Igneous Rock will be happy to know
that no rods were broken on this trip, and my ass came
through unscathed.

So I’m left with the impression of an angler of uncommon skill, wit, and no remorse over feeding flyspecked food to his kinfolk? This same fellow who’s the designated cook on our pending expedition?

If it was my brother I would’ve emptied the pan near the RV hookup, kicked the sausage around a bit, then aged the result in my extra pair of wading socks, so I can overlook that crime …

… It’s the not telling part that’s pure evil.

Do I beg off, insisting that weekend was reserved for a pedicure - or should I renegotiate?

It’s been some time since I paused before releasing a freshwater fish - that hesitation that precludes stomping the life out of something, a glance at the water restored my senses and I opted to let the beast go..

It wasn’t due to some periodic male ritual, wherein we bend the environment to our will, it was an unlikely source - Singlebarbed as Locust.

Dawn had me wading through free garlic, and with 45 pounds of the Precious stashed in my kitchen, that Largemouth Bass took on new meaning.

In my youth, someone mentioned the presence of largemouth bass in Lake Merced - a pair of lakes sandwiched between the San Francisco Zoo and Ocean Beach, within San Francisco proper. It was a put and take fishery allowing city dwellers the ability to seduce trout with “Floating EggDeath” - salmon eggs and marshmallows.

About midway down the lake something shouldered aside the tules and latched onto the monstrous grape spinnerbait I was hurling. A 6lb largemouth, which confirmed the rumor - and sans camera I stomped the life out of it for proof.

While I’m tucking my napkin in place - I missed the “bitter beer face” of older brother, and stuffed that trophy fillet in my gob…

It was if I’d emptied a goldfish bowl and licked the algae off in one monstrous swipe.

20 years later, it’s the memory of that Lake Merced Largemouth that gave me pause, and while 45 pounds of Garlic may cover the initial fillet - it’s the other one I’m worried about.

Swirling green water looked back at me with the promise of flavors never tasted before … and I got cold feet, the Jungle stretch of Putah Creek looks a bit cleaner than the Little Stinking, but not worth the gamble.

I’d returned to test the X-Factor nymph on some of those huge Pikeminnow, saw one give it a half hearted bump - and then caught a pair of Largemouth and a matched brace of Smallmouth bass.

I’d tied some with gold beads and some with the traditional black, and black was the winner.

The bank side canopy allows me to poke the rod out and literally jig the fly in front of the fish - which is invaluable when testing out some silly theory or oddball prototype.

… and after Sunday’s adventure, I’ve got the resolve to explore the bizarre and absurd, leaving silliness to the guys that actually catch fish.

“You’re keeping an eye out for snakes, right?”

You can’t help a furtive glance at your feet when you hear that refrain. Here I’ve been stomping around the Little Stinking with impunity and I’m getting the real story from one of the landowners who stopped to chat.

Against my better judgement I’d taken a dawn hike up the river to see if there were any Carp above the normal spots fished. Last year I’d gone up an extra two miles and found a riffle feeding a deep pool, figuring that might block any upstream migration, and with the low water, eyeballing it might be appropriate.

Last week’s success required failure, as fish aren’t very smart - but they’re vindictive as hell. A momentary weakness for the “X-Factor” nymph means this week they’ll feign disinterest and give you the finger. Hoping to outsmart my destiny, I had a pocket full of new experimental variations of X-Factor nymphs and other beaded monstrosities.

They got the finger too.

The only bright spot was San Mateo Joe’s “Buffalo Stone” nymph. I’d been holding these in reserve for that special moment when you want to crush the spirit of the angler next to you ..

“Buffalo Stone? Never heard of it, what’s the pattern?”

“Buffalo shed.”

I figure just enough emphasis on the wrong syllable will have the guy reaching for plastic bags and a shovel… 

Black Hackle tail, shed buffalo fur for the body and thorax, with a couple turns of black rooster under the wingcase. It proved a slow sinking “change up” - which fooled a lot of bass this morning.

I spent two hours chasing a pod of six carp fruitlessly. I resolved to stop fishing for the “patrolling” fish, if it isn’t feeding, don’t cast to it. Tried every fly I had with me, including those from Minnesota and Oregon, and merely spooked a lot of large fish. 

OK, so the Carp are gone, and despite the 100 degree temperatures I feel … invigorated, refreshed even. Clay substrate is like grease - and the budding naturalist interested in Carp photos was taught a lesson.

At least I had one shot in focus … and an underwater camera.

The affect of low water is a boost to the bass population. Tules are now coming out of the creekbed and offering ample cover for hundreds of smallmouth. Most of the fish are four inches long - and should be six to eight inches by the winter flood. I’m hoping that’s large enough to survive the surge - and next year could be something special.

Remains to be seen, but that’s a lot of cover for small fish - and most should escape the herons, egrets, and mergansers. This stretch used to have only three large bass - now it has hundreds of small bass hiding under the mats of vegetation.

My inventory shows one water and a six month old “hooter” bar, the bane of the social angler. I’d found it trapped in the catch pocket of the passenger side door, knew it tasted like granulated cardboard when new - so age could only be an improvement.

“Hooter” bars are shown on TV - always some fit, smiling, office denizen skipping the fatty lunch for the pleasure of a rich and satisfying soy-laced, protein substance, glazed with a faux sugar exterior - often resembling chocolate.

What they don’t show is the percussive effects of such a hearty, well balanced treat. The fat doesn’t melt away, it bloody vaporizes … Age didn’t help the flavor, and right now some coyote is wondering what in God’s name he ate.

I go by visuals and my eyesight ain’t what it once was, he lives by a keen sense of smell, both of us should have been smarter.

The riffle and pool combination had some feeding carp that I could get to - but like the earlier fish, wanted nothing to do with flies. I flung and stripped, left them on the bottom, dead drifted over the top, and were either ignored or caused the fish to spook and run for the deep water.

Sorry, but if you think selective trout are difficult, I’ve got something much worse.

I’ve got to rethink everything, as something is fundamentally wrong with what I’m doing. Large flies spook the fish, whether bright or somber, and the only fish I’ve landed took a #14 caddis emerger.

Watching them feed is a bit of a conundrum, they’re not mowing weedbeds, rather they’re in the muddy areas siphoning the bottom like a vacuum cleaner. Outside of the “burrowing nymph” class of insects are the tiny clams - that’s the only visible prey I can see when wading the same locations.

Roughfisher has an imitation that I’ll try next week, “Clam before the Storm” - and if that doesn’t work I may try creamed corn, just to get even.

The landowner that paused his work to visit was a cheerful and informative fellow, he was astounded that I’d walked the entire length from town and lived.

“Once they flood the ditches the Rattlesnakes are all over, killed two in my driveway yesterday.”

That may be the reason my right leg is full of water, remind me to check for fang marks.

“… and we had a mountain lion here in March, big fellow ..”

Hopefully he likes Hooter bars, at least I’d hear him coming.

I’ve always been keen on innovation - perhaps too keen, as occasionally new becomes trifling rather than mainstream. Watching the influence of competitive fly fishing overseas and the evolution in fly tackle spawning from Czech nymphing, is largely unnoticed by US anglers.

While we fiddle with the fly patterns, there’s a quiet evolution in leaders, rods, and hooks taking place without our participation.

I’ve always been a long rod fan, the additional reach offered by rods longer than 10 feet, offers a number of welcome advantages; longer roll casts, the ability to mend more line, holding more line above the water rather than in the current, longer casts, and the extra reach when using either Czech or “HighSticking” nymphing styles.

It hell to string a rod in midcurrent, but we should’ve done that on the bank anyways.

Hardy is following Modern Fly of Italy in introducing the Marksman 10′ for #4 - and with the today’s lighter, higher modulus graphite should be able to avoid the “willowy” action of older graphite rods, and have crispness available to set the hook on the deep nymph.

As our lads return home it’s likely one of our US vendors will start filling the breach and introduce the 10′ and 11′ light line rods currently dominating the European circuit and Fips-Mouche.

In between grumbling about how “fly fishing is no place for competitive sports,” don’t be surprised when next year’s catalogs tout “extra length” as the latest revolution. Rod makers insist on obsolescing your equipment each year so they can sell you more - it’s the other unwelcome facet of our sport.

Imagine the little golden haired angel tugging on your sleeve, you point dumpling towards the rest room while holding her Barbie Rod between thumb and forefinger, with the same enthusiasm you hold your spouse’s purse, scanning the horizon for any of the known “gossips” from your fishing club.

A minute later Sweetpea’s forgotten as you’re wrestling the North Carolina state record Channel catfish - armed with sequins, a pink bait caster, and little else.

“Hayes took the fishing rod and seconds later the toy hooked a state-record channel catfish, at 21 pounds, 1 ounce.”

Naturally when the cameramen show - you elbow Dumpling out of the way - forgetting, in your haste, that all your buddies will be taping every move on the 6:00 News.

That pained expression says it all, the sudden realization that your erstwhile pals will be calling you this evening when they decide on your new nickname.

It’s not going to be “Killer” or “BarbedWire,” and I don’t think it’ll be pretty.

Worse yet, how do you explain to the child, “it’s all downhill from here?”

The old email address expired last week and the new one is available in the “About” page at the top of the screen. If you’re having trouble contacting me - it’s not in my nature to be a standoffish SOB, I’m merely a victim of Technology, as we all are.

… and you thought my excuses were limited to fishing …

kbarton10@single(removethispart)barbed.com

The (removethispart) is necessary to prevent the harvesting of my email address by automation - rendering me ineligible to receive thousands of offers touting economy size Viagra.

Merely omit that section and everything should work fine. All email addresses posted to web pages are harvested regularly by ‘bots and crawlers - it’s one of the easiest ways to find you.

I hear the logic but remain unconvinced. Barriers to coed sports have been breached on many levels, but fly fishing requires us to drop all the advances of the last 100 years and isolate women from men?

I think it’s a farce, led by canny vendors and abetted by guides doing “high five’s” as next week is “the Amazon outing, wo0t…”

Women haven’t embraced fly fishing with any real vengeance, and while inroads have been made in other leisure sports,  I’m thinking part of the problem is their introduction and exposure to our silly notion of segregation.

It’s hard enough to instruct your spouse, but after she’s been mauled by a bunch of louts from the local shop, the memorable part of our sport is the stuff that sucks blood, and stuff that sucks … period.

Women can be vicious wags at the watercooler, their voices grow silent as you approach and animated as you depart. Guys do it too - we’re certainly no saints, but why would we introduce them to a supposedly restful and relaxing sport, when they’re subject to the haughty glare of whichever female clique takes possesion of the lodge and its environs?

Guys go fishing, it’s not “Special Guy Week”, it’s some gaggle of oversexed, overfed, and overbearing fellows, vying to impress others by how long they can go without bathing. Casting classes are not “for Guys Only,” yet somehow the “for Women” label seems to crop up at every opportunity.

I think it’s a setup. A “puppy mill” for hopeful boyfriends, desperate spouses, and avaricious vendors hoping they’ll dump their overstock of claret fishing vests and petite waders.

Guides, shop owners, and lodges don’t clear the decks of males to “ease the learning curve” - nor is their staff suddenly chaste, they’re giggling amongst themselves while the gals endure the presentation attempting to get some “rise” from a participant - and reluctant to acknowledge any “refusal.”

This ain’t a “Lonely Hearts Club” - and most are there at the urging of partners, boyfriends, and husbands. Likely they’d feel a good deal easier if there’s a friendly face to explain some of the technical detail, rather than having to strike up a friendship, and absorb the lesson all at the same time.

I’d want to be there when the instructor mentions her Shakespeare wasn’t as good as my Sage, supposedly the gear was split equitably - and now I’m the callow, gear hogging spouse that’s not to be trusted.

Having taught fly tying for 20 years, women aided the proceedings immeasurably. It keeps the machismo crap to a minimum, and most fellows watched their language - something they never did around kids. The ladies felt welcome - and were catered to politely, never pestered, and made comments that were insightful and welcome. It didn’t matter if they were 13 or 86, they had the same calming effect.

Women are the better novice, guys are too enraptured of the technical detail and reluctant to ask questions and take instruction, as they’ve been taught it’s not masculine to appear helpless. Mixing the sexes at the novice level is a good match - it’s liable to steady both participants; he’d stop whining and she’d have someone to break the current when crossing the deep spots.

Given the choice, I’d rather fish with women. They smell better, are less vain, tell the truth with only minor embellishment, share the fish equitably, and are as gracious in victory as in defeat.

Guys, well … they aspire to that.

I don’t expect some enmasse migration to the Brown water, but I’d expect a steely set to her jaw when I explained the fish wasn’t fit for Man nor beast. It’d be a sharp contrast from her trout loving boyfriend - who’d be dancing around the shallow end hoping I’m there to take the fish off his hook.

Brownline authors are a sordid lot, living a half-life of darkened ritual, half truths, fawning groupies and poor diet..

Lectured repeatedly on how much Sodium my beef jerky contains, how the chocolate Old Fashioned is the work of Satan, and how countless well meaning health buffs with an unnatural interest in my colon would liberate me from chocolate and sprinkles. 

Now, a little payback is in order:

The Wake Forest School of Medicine report found that farm-raised tilapia contained higher levels of omega-6 fatty acids than foods like doughnuts and bacon.

Excessive levels of omega-6 fatty acids have been linked to a number of diseases, including heart disease, arthritis, osteoporosis, cancer, and depression.

So, after a long productive life enhanced by leafy greens and whole grains, you’re wheeled into my room - and while we both wait to expire -I assault you with tales of the glazed obscenity you should have ate instead of the eco friendly cardboard foisted on you at the health food store?

Sure, I’m headed for the “hot” place - but they got bacon there too ..

I followed up on last week’s find early Saturday morning, big brown fish roaming unmolested in a pea green bayou held promise, although I couldn’t find any sign of them this morning.

Plenty of human sign, as the proximity of the roadbed means you can empty your truck of trash with no one the wiser. It explains the multitude of “No Trespassing” signs - as it appears this is prime dumping ground.

Before you start blaming us Brownliners - and bringing up contentious issues like “watercolor-profiling”, think again. We obviously welcome the additions to the landscape, and only Angelina Jolie and Madonna adopt more orphans than we do.

We take most of this stuff home, usually it’s better furnishings than we’re accustomed to - and after you sanitizing it with a quick kick off the bridge, we get years of value from your gravity-me-downs…

The Ditch ended in a forebay which was a pumping station for another nameless brown creek that parallels the Sacramento River. Lots of families were present and everyone was fishing worms and bobbers. 

I hung around hoping to see someone land something but other than the excited chatter of kids, it was slow fishing. It’s traditional August weather, which means it’s 100 degrees by 10AM, so I started thinking about the chores I needed to finish before going fishing tomorrow. 

The goats agreed, seeking the shade of the railroad trestle before their workday starts. These four legged eating machines clean all the flood control dikes so they’re not compromised by vegetation and roots. It’s a great untold symbiosis of the Central Valley, the herdsmen get free graze - and the folks in the floodplain sleep soundly knowing the earthen barriers protecting their homes aren’t weakened by forces of Nature.

The goats get to become a burrito, which is an ignoble end for such heroic service, but I always observe a moment of admiration before plowing into one.