Love that song...I remember listening to Aerosmith back in the early eighties when everyone else was listening to Twisted Sister and Motley Crue. That was the pre-Run DMC Aerosmith...In fact, I think the first song I ever learned to play on guitar was "Dream On."
Anyway, this weekend I took the first trip of the season for my outfitting company. It was nice to have the interactions with clients again, to have a little pressure to produce and honestly, to have kind of a challenge in the way of weather conditions and picky fish at times. I like a challenge and I like reading water and reading bugs and I like knowing on most days, we can figure it out.
Saturday started pretty quick for us. We fished the pink stuff and caught about a dozen in the first hour. In fact, we started at Stickney Creek FAS and landed three before we hit the bottom of the Island, which is only a couple hundred yards. There were a few boats putting so we didn't take too much time getting downstream a bit just to get away from people so we weren't really even putting a lot of time into sticking in spots that were holding fish.
The fishing wasn't always great but Carol and Marc didn't have a lot of quit in them and were definitely making the most of the day. The morning was solid and like most days, we hit a lull sometime in the afternoon and had to start changing things up. With tons of midges and a handful of BWO's hatching in the sun, we went more with traditional bugs and got back into stroking fish. And they weren't the dinks that I've been hearing folks reporting in the Canyon. We were getting some real quality fish. (BTW, you need the dinks in order to keep the fishery alive.)
Getting back to Craig, I heard from a lot of folks it was pretty tough out there on Saturday, especially up higher. I think what you hear this time of the year is that fish are hungry because they are coming out of their winter slumber and that certainly can be true but weather still has a big impact. Pressure from anglers can also have an affect as well as the fact that many of the rainbows have left the main stem for spawning. The browns often follow those rainbows up the tribs to take advantage of the egg hatches as well so you don't have as many fish available. I will say though, that a lot of the fish we were catching did seem to be post-spawners so the early spawning fish are coming back and spreading out throughout the river and although they can be picky at times, they are hungry.
It definitely was busy this last weekend on the Missouri and not just with anglers. The kayakers were a force as well. I don't think I've ever seen that many rec-boats in early April. The weather is bringing people out for sure but everyone was playing nice and it was gorgeous out there. (If you're reading this JJ, you know I was just kidding. In fact, I was hoping you'd stop so I could rough you up a little more. Happy birthday you old f%#$er.)
It's getting busy for all of us and I am looking forward to it. I'm also looking forward to the turn in this weather pattern so we can see more bugs and more fish up. By the end of the week, we're suppose to see temps in the 50's and rain. That will be good for the anglers...bad for the fish.
Keep 'em where they live...
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