Fly fishing is a sport of grace. The casts are mesmerizing, the flies artistic, and the mountain streams and coastal flats are places of beauty. But sometimes, actually bringing the fish to hand can be, well, awkward.
The problem is that the fish are not always free of obstacles, and once hooked, tend to use those obstacles to their advantage.
Obstacles like these offer opportunities for some awkward fish.
You can probably think of times you have had the same problem. A trout runs around a buddy fishing next to you and wraps up. Or it might dive under your net, head through your legs, and finish the fight behind you. Anyway, we probably have shared some of the same experiences.
But I have had a couple that stand out when I think about awkward fish.
One happened on a small mountain stream on a sunny October afternoon. The hemlocks had already begun to fall victim to woolly adelgids, dying and lying across the creek. I came to a pool with the lower third blocked by a fallen hemlock. And in the shade of the trunk, I spotted a nice trout finning lazily.
I occasionally prospect under logs for fish and have had some good results waving a soft hackle in the current on the front side of the log. Patience is a virtue in such circumstances and the bites can be dramatic.
So, I tied on a partridge and orange soft hackle, swung it in front of the log, and waited. When the bite came it rattled me a bit even though it had happened before. Immediately, the trout spun and went back under the log, not stopping to hide in the shade. Instead, it sought refuge in the pool below.
Probably I should have thought this through before hooking the fish, but planning ahead has never been my long suit. Looking at the log, I also saw that my line ran between two limbs that would make it almost impossible to successfully guide the fish back through.
All these dying hemlocks add to the challenges of actually landing fish.
The log was too large for me to pass my rod under, but plenty big for me to lie on. Therefore, I did the only thing I could think of at the time. I straddled the log like I was riding a horse, kept my rod on the upstream side, played the fish until I could bring him closer, then leaned over and netted him downstream of the log. Once the fly was removed, I reeled my line back from underneath the hemlock.
Such predicaments have become commonplace for me as I take the attitude that you can’t land a fish you don’t hook. Anyway, it seems logical when you’re in front of fish.
You can’t land fish unless you first hook them.
Perhaps the most awkward landing I’ve had occurred on a mountain stream in Virginia. I was fishing some private water and had the stream to myself, partly due to the exclusivity of the place and partly due to the conditions. The water was low and the August sun bright.
I was walking down a gravel road along the creek, prospecting for a place to fish. The creek ran under the road at one point, passing through a large culvert that allowed the stream to flow through freely. In short, it was a fish-friendly passageway.
As I stopped in the road to look at the pools above and below the culvert, I saw trout darting into the culvert to hide. I had spooked them simply by being up that high. I filed the occurrence in my memory and fished on downstream.
Late that afternoon, when I came back to the culvert, I bent low and crept out on the gravel road. The thought occurred to me that fish might still be hiding in the culvert. So, I fed some slack line out and let my nymph drift back through the culvert. I felt a thump, set the hook, and then heard splashing in the downstream pool.
If you have never played a fish through a culvert, let me share that it has some disadvantages. For starters, you can’t pull line in if the fish is not aligned with the lower end. The leader will clip off on the metal edges. Or the fish will use the resistance of the culvert to remove the hook.
Bringing a nice trout back through a culvert can be awkward.
Also, it feels odd to have your line going back under your feet and having to look backwards to know how to play the fish. I could have used rearview mirrors on my cap.
The only answer was to look back over my shoulder at the splashing, keeping my rod at the front of the culvert, and only exert pressure when the fish was in line with the lower end. Finally, I managed to play the fish back into the culvert where its options were limited and I was able to bring it into the pool above.
From there I simply kept the fish out of the culvert until I could net and release it.
Neither of these awkward fish was particularly large; they simply were fun to catch. The advantage ran in their favor and my predicament was laughable. So I laughed.
And I remember those fish to this day.
Jim Mize tends to also lose a lot of awkward fish. You can purchase Jim’s award-winning book, The Jon Boat Years, at https://uscpress.com/The-Jon-Boat-Years or buy autographed copies at www.acreektricklesthroughit.com.
