Fly Fishing Area 4

After Wednesday's great outing in the south wilderness, my plan was to return to Blue this Friday and fish all day with my good buddy Scott Dittner of Marlow.  I went as far as telling Scott I would meet him there.  However, about mid-morning I suddenly remembered I had told Trina, the young lady that works with me, that she could have Friday off so she could spend time with her daughter.  No way I was going to go back on that.

So, with Friday out and it being horribly slow at work this Thursday I decided to take off at lunch and head to Blue River.  My thinking was I could hit the river by 1 p.m., fish a couple of hours and be back at the bunkhouse before the evening news aired.

I decided to fly fish Area 4.  Area 4 can be a jewel to the fly fisherman or it can be one big challenge.  The lower end of Area 4 is also known as Chris Pool and it can be very accommodating to the fly angler.  This part of the river is fairly shallow and quite wadeable.  Of course, the bottom of this river is quite geographic and slow wading is always a good idea or carrying a wading staff is an even better idea when navigating Chris Pool.  In front of you are pockets - pocket after pocket and the trout are within and awaiting your offerings. 

For years I fished Chris Pool, but always found myself looking upstream at that long almost totally unwadeable stretch of water that few ever fish.  Even bank access is limited and this always told me that the inventories of trout just keep on building with each passing week.  So, this year I was determined to find a way to get a fly in that stretch of water. 

The place I chose to try and cast my fly is about 100 yards upstream from Chris Pool and I have to tell you it's certainly not a picnic.  I'm talking about down in the trenches, trench warfare, standing in a mud-pit that any self respecting pig worth his weight in bacon would be proud to call his own.  If the mud is not enough then there are numerous tree roots and branches that continually catch your fly line and oh... I forgot to mention the overhead obstacles that contain you to roll casting only.

 

To fish this area you will have to own a solid and fairly strong roll cast.  With the overhead tree branches you will only be able to employ a side arm roll cast to boot.  If there is any south or southwest wind at all, then your job of getting your fly out 30 feet or better is compounded even more.  However... if you can get your fly to where the trout are staged you can have a very good day.

 

I started off with the olive Bubba Bugger yesterday.  It was amazing how quickly the river had cleared.  First cast with the Bubba and a trout was brought to hand.  The Bubba would go on and take 6 trout, but then he was lost at sea. 

 

 

Next, the red ass brown bugger went on and again on his maiden voyage he connected with a trout.  The brown bugger would capture one more trout, but honestly the community I was fishing didn't seem really all that interested in the brown bugger.  Really not for sure if it was his body color or just his red ass. 

 

 

I retired the brown bugger and decided to go tandem using an aqua green Copper John as the lead fly and a size 16 pink Frenchie would be subservient.  The Copper John would capture two trout, but the Frenchie was the real star capturing three times the number of trout the Copper John did.  

 

Yesterday I spent two hours on the river and today I would do the same.  No... I didn't capture 51 trout today like I did yesterday.  Those days are rare and come around every now and then.  I walked away from the river having met 17 trout and pretty much had to work for each one of them... as far as casting. 

 

I guess I could fish seven days a week if I only had the chance.  Here we are living in a world where we are connected by greater and newer technology coming our way almost every day.  These things are meant to connect us, but here we are living more disconnected than ever it seems. 

 

One reason I love to fly fish is the connection I feel with fish.  Fish, for me, have substance.  If you ask me whether I'd rather talk to you on the cell phone or stand next to you in the river, what do you think my answer would be? 

 

See you in the river.