reevesr1

Actually, I like that idea for kids. It would be nice if you could figure out a way to apply to any beginner, but obviously impossible to implement. I noticed how hard it was for my wife to land the fish she was hooking for the same reason. At some point in the fight, there would be slack. Though with older kids/adults they can usually tell that it will be something they will enjoy, even if they are missing fish. For the little ones, if they are not catching, they are getting bored. Anyway, glad you got the kids out. Sure is fun! I will utilize your theory of gear haulers next time I bring my brood.

Thanks hawgstoppah, already warned her. She is much more likely to fish with me down south on a camping trip, though she may now stalk the bank a little with me on the Bow. The same certainly applies to me as well. The bow don't always treat me kindly either!

Spent a week in Panorama with the family. It was a fantastic family vacation, with rafting, golf, hiking, mountain biking, etc. The highlight, other than maybe the whitewater rafting, was a guided trip with my wife to a little BC mountain lake. Told the guide I was mostly interested in her catching fish and he took us to a little lake loaded with little brookies. Well, he said it was loaded, but after I missed a fish on the first cast, it was two hours and lots of stops before my wife finally catches the first fish of the day while trolling (you could feel the guide starting to panic a bit!) After that, it was on! This was Jackie's first day, and she only ended up with 3, but missed a bucket load. I don't know how many I caught, but it was pretty fast and furious for a while there. Nothing with any size, but they sure are pretty. I was really impressed that she did not get frustrated, particularly when her jerk of husband is hooking one almost every cast. Anyway, she seemed completely taken by the whole experience. But she did say that she can't see herself getting into it enough to: A. Tie on her own flies B. Undo any tangles herself C. Unhook her own fish D. Wade wet but catching them is sure fun! But she'd love to start coming with me to the Bow and down south. Will I ever get to fish again? On the upside, maybe she will become a Donnamatrix Light one day! Anyway, the rivers were all still REALLY high and dirty both from the unnusally high snowfall this year and from a big storm that came in last week which melted a bunch of snowpack. Nothing was really all that fishable, in fact, it got so high on Toby Creek that a rafter was tragically killed. There are some very, very sweet looking creeks and rivers within an hour of the condo that I plan to check out in September, which is supposed to be fantastic time to fish that area. Can't wait. I also wanted to put in a plug for Bruce with Kootenay Troutfitters. Great guy, just a blast to fish with, and was as patient as humanly possible with my wife (and probably with me as well)!

I was going to say, yeah, like your not going to bill hours just because you're fishin! Going to Pano Sunday. Hope to fish a bit while I'm there, depending upon mood of significant other! Will take lots of pics regardless.

Lynn, Me too!!!

Damn that SanJuanWorm!!

I'm going on vacation, so figured I'd take a parting shot in the form of a story. We moved from Texas to Louisiana when I was 7 years old. My dad was the maintenance supervisor at a large Union Carbide chemical refinery. On one of his first day's, some of his crew bet him they could drown a fly and bring it back to life. Sensing a setup, but wanting to get to know his crew, he bet $10 (this is 1967, so real money). The boys take a glass of water, put a fly in, cover it, turn it upside down, flip it back, over and over until the fly is "dead". Then, they remove the fly, put it in a napkin, sprinkle salt on it, close their hand around it and say some mumbo jumbo, shake it up, open the hand and out flies the fly. (the fly obviously does not drown, just goes into stasis. The salt removes the water and voila, live fly) Dad laughs, says "I'll be damned" and coughs up the 10 spot. About a year later, another new guy shows up. My dad pulls him aside and explains the gag the guys are about to play on him. Tells him to appear very sceptical, set a bunch of conditions, one of them being let the fly stay in the water for an hour. And bet $20 instead of $10 and that they will split the money. Sure enough the old boys run the gag, agree to the one hour, drown the fly during morning break, leave it in the glass and go back to work. A short time later dad comes in and sticks a pin in the fly's head and puts it back in the water. The boys come back after the hour, do the mumbo jumbo thing, and no resurrection. They do it again, shaking harder, still nothing. Try again, starting to panic and dad chimes in with "I think that fly had a heart attack or somthin'. Now get back to work." The boys sense a setup, but don't know what happened, so grudginly pony up the 20 an slink back to work. Dad tells them about the trick about a year later. They try to get their money back. Dad tells them serves them right for tricking the boss, and to never bullshit a bullshitter!

I'll have you know I have not fallen in the water in about 5 or 6 trips, unless you count jumping in after Ben. I liked the sequence of the drop as well! Great expression on his face, and the point was to show the speed of the camera, though I certainly appreciate the comments.

Now that's not funny. Are you sure it wasn't a Irishman, Mexican, and Oklahoman? I'm pretty sure it must have been.

Clarki, Agreed. I did drop one myself when very near shore, but from a squatting position (no comments here Mr. Loblaw). In our defense, no fish were landed on shore all day. All from the water, sans net. But as I said, point taken. Thanks.

Saweet! Not that there's anything wrong with that.

I think I went over the limit on #of photos. Here are the rest. Here is my buddy with a nice cutt, at least for a bit. Is it just me, or are cutties the hardest fish to hold, ever? Who says I'm not a redneck? And the scenery shot:

Here are some pics of my trip to the Livingstone on July 17. Lots of fish, lots of fun. I cannot seem to get the hang of dry fly fishing as I set the hook WAY too hard. Oh well, still caught plenty, but it ain't no fun getting outcaught 3 to 1 when you are getting just as many rises! Anyway, I played around a bit with the new camera. Not much scenery shooting, lots of underwater shots. The camera takes around 5 pics per sec. on burst mode, so lots of pictures were taken to get these. Fun to play with, but I need some practice. Here are some cuttie shots:

Here's mine. Cute, but stupid. I posted this picture before and I called him part Chow, part retriever, 100% moron. Actually, not really a moron, but he used to be a stray and still has some of those tendencies. Really friendly and calm except when he gets out, or if he sees a prairie dog, bird, dog, fish, bug, etc.

Hardy har har. I like 'em both! An aggie (think Newfie, but from Texas A&M) gets a post-grad scholarship to Harvard to study law. While walking through campus he asks a east coast preppie type "Excuse me, but could you please tell me where the library is at?" The preppie replies (affect snooty east coast accent here) "Here at Haaarvaard we do not end our sentences in prepositions." The aggie replies "Is that so, ok, then could you please tell me where the library is at, ***hole?"

Ok, not a beaver story but... I was fishing with my dad and his friend Carl in Louisiana back in the 70s. It was in Jan or Feb, and we were fishing these holes that had been dredged by oil companies to build up pads for oil wells. Great places to fish in the winter. They were connected by a canal system. So we were running the boat through one of the canals, all with our waders on. No neopremens or breathables in those days, we all had plain jane rubber waders. Anyway, Carl starts shouting "stop the boat", dad does and Carl says, "Look at that Coon!!" We say yeah, so? Carl says "I'm gonna git him!" Being good southerners, we don't question the intelligence of that statment. Anyway, dad idles to the bank the coon is going for, Carl jumps out and runs up the bank. The coon is freakin' huge, like 30 lbs or so. It hits the bank at exactly the same moment as my dad's deranged friend. Carl kicks at the coon. The coon latches on to Carls leg and proceeds to shred the waders, along with Carl's leg. Carl is jumping around screaming and dad deadpans: "You got 'eem Carl, you got 'eem. Whatcha gonna do with 'eem?" (not sure exactly how to spell the southern him. Sounds like heem without the h) I swear, I never laughed so hard in my life. The coon runs off and Carl limps back to the boat. Pretty scratched up, but nothing too bad. His waders were toast and he got to fish from the boat, in pain, for the rest of the day. He was really grumpy because he had no alcohol to drink to ease the pain, or deaden the embarrasment. Dad didn't like alcohol on the boat as drinkin was for after fishin!! I also have a dog takes on nutria rat story. Pretty funny also, but not as funny as Carl and the Coon. Dog takes on Crab is pretty funny as well. I gotta write this stuff down!!

Kevin, Not so sure about the great father bit, but thanks. Also, never had a problem with discussing my failures. Figure if I can screw up, other people probably do to. Part of the deal about learning. Hopefully people learn from the mistakes of others! Take you son, but just be smart (though others may disagree on taking your son on the Bow). There are plenty of runs to fish from the bank or in quiet water to teach him in. But really pay attention. Also, try to excercise LOTS of patience. Fly fishing is tough enough for adults to learn. Really tough for kids. Think lots of tangles! You won't get to fish nearly as much, but it is way fun when your kid hooks up!

Pigl, Thanks. Actually more stories than you could imagine! Maybe I will write some of them up. It's pretty cathartic (I probably spelled that wrong) for me. Funny story about the "never leave fish to find fish". He did say that, quite a bit actually. But to him, it applied to everyone but himself. He was absolutely the worst for leaving when the fishing slowed even a little bit. He was the ultimate quick strike fisherman. Get in, get out, next. But had no problem chastising me or my brother if we did the same! Sort of a do as I say not as I do thing with him!

I imagine that the lower bow is somewhere near it's carrying capacity now. If some fish move upstream and there is no major change in the river itself, there is no reason to believe that the lower bow would not return back to it's carrying capacity fairly rapidly. I may be wrong about the number of fish the bow can carry, but it's hard to imagine it would be more than th 3000/km or whatever it is now.

Hey Brett, Sure agree on the great minds part. Pretty big of us to recognize each other's brilliance. $407.00 is a good deal. Less than anywhere I found. On the underwater pics, did u use the underwater mode or just leave it in auto? Try underwater macro yet? I am going to either the crow, castle, oldman, livinstone or some small creek down there tomorrow. Will definitely take some underwater shots. Going with Max, and he is pretty good at setting up shots. I'll give him his reigns on underwater photography and post pictures probably Wed.

Try riding a couple of rides at Stampede with your kids. Made me feel all icky inside.

Pigl, Not to change the subject, but fish with your dad as much as you can. I think you know that already. No telling how many times I fished with mine, but hundreds for sure, and now that I can't I miss it terribly. Had a couple of close calls with him over the years. I always remembered how calm he stayed when things were going to crap. Now I know what it must have felt like to him! I told Ben after our event Saturday that since we both still had our rods, we were never really all that worried (or maybe not worried enough). Once my father and I got in over our heads, literally, in a big tide rip. We both thought it was funny at first, then realized it was a bit more serious than we thought as we were being swept down the beach. I didn't think it was that big a deal still, until he started to struggle a bit and chucked his rod (he was 55, I was 23) and when I saw that I knew things were really serious. So I chucked mine and swam over to help. We got out of trouble (he had tossed the rod to take his jeans off so he could swim better) and after we got home, we went to the local sporting goods shop (Academy for all you Southern boys) where he bought me a new rod and reel. Never said a word about it, but I knew what it meant.

So a new week begins: Sunday evening- rained off the bow. 3 strikes, 0 fish. Monday morning-2nd cast hook up with something BIG. Makes a blistering downstream run, I get to the bank and catch up and coerce him into the quiet water. 5 minutes later, I think he's finally tiring, then gone. Never got a look as he stayed deep the whole time. Oh well, I think, plenty more where you came from. Uh, not so much. That was it for the morning. Got on the stupid C-train smelling like Off. Realize I forgot my stupid computer in the car. Go back, get the computer, continue to work. Get to work and realize my stupid pants look like they'd been ironed with a rock because of my stupid waders. I hate this stupid town. Until tomorrow anyway.....

Nah, I just planted a little section of primacord at the landing point. dryfly, Too funny. I particularly like the one boot and a helmet!

I did not use motion compensation when I took the rodeo pics. Is the motion compensation more for the person holding the camera, or the subject?