dryfly

Thanks flyslinger. Will try WSS on Tuesday. I was thinking along your lines too. My boots been in the water perhaps 200 to 300 times in 4 years. They own me nothing. One of the lace loops has broken as well and I'll never get new cleats attached. I'll price the soles and decide what to do. Need good boots for the next four months. If all goes to plan I should get 60 more trips in before October's end. And then there is winter fissin'.

KF.. yeah, looks good. Give us a report. My comments are that it is a tad "chunky" ... damsel nymphs are skinny. The eyes might be a tad smaller. Still, they fish won't likely care. Let us know. Clive

Hey Taco, I am a baetis nymph too. Must be preparation for my reincarnation. There should be an "old fart" class ... no actual membership quals ... just have to be an OF. PS: How'd you make out with that little storm on Friday? Man I was actually thinking of you. (Hard to imagine.) Dave Spence showed the cell on the six o'clock and we could see the cell outside the trailer headed to CH.

Was down at the trailer for 4 days this past week. Fished two days on the Crow and it is fishing well. All wet one day and all dry the next. Sweet. Fish are scrappy and healthy too. (TerryH won't post here that I dropped my rod on one vicious hit! ) Some weather came by on Friday night--must have hit Taco's place--or close. Wicked light show for one hour. Too bad it wasn't darker and the cloud closer. Was still very cool. Caught a few flashes. . .

Paul .. I am away so can't post images. I assure you that the eyes of totally relax unstressed trout (swimming in a pool) are straight sideways--versus down. Will post images next week. Clive

Centered pupils = no stress or DEAD. This one was very alive. Downturned pupils = stress.

DSLR uses interchangeable lenses. This has one fixed lens. I'm going fishing now. Poof.

As Taco noted you will be hard pressed to find a DSLR for $500 with a lens. The best you can expect is about $1,400...polarizer filter, two lenses (you won't be happy with one), tripod, carying case, stuff, more stuff. Consider one of these (or similar models from other companies)... http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/panasonicfz8/ All-in-one features with powerful zoom. I am not sure about macro capabilities (bugs, flies) but it has good telephoto power. It will take great shots (my bro has one). However, it is still a P&S with a smaller sensor which means it will get "noisy" in dark areas and at high ISO -- sensitivity. It allows some control over aperture and speed. A good camera for genera photography. This one .... is $449 at London Drugs.

Fisher26..."consistency of fishing" That's a great question. And the answer is: it is not consistent. It's fished quite well this past four weeks--especially when the water was very high--up to the banks. They were hugging the bank by the campground but have since moved elsewhere as the flows are (were) way down. I probably landed (what?) 15 fish in four, 2-hour tours...not great, but included 3 or 4 bows between 18 and 21 and one 22 bull. It's at about 50cms today -- way down-- and so that could be good as you should be able to fish the N banks and work a lot of water with streamers or dries. It's not normally a spot where you will see consistent risers--but it happens. There's a ton of water way down past the day-use area too and all of the boulder run above the bridge. Clive

Rob: What does your camping outfit look like? We are headed to the trailer (N of Cowley) tomorrow and will be there till Sunday or so. I expect to fish at Cottonwood at least once--sort of depends on the Crow. It's a fun trip ... Fish Cottonwood...go to Pincher and get various: cigars, groceries, ice cream -- and do emails. The Shell has great ice cream. Get the small ice cream in a cup--huge portions if in a cup. Fish are spotty at Cottonwood, but I found a cool pool of trout last week and landed several there. It's a half decent place to toss bull trout flies and SJW will tell you where to fish for those...upstream ...past the CW bridge. Oh oh. It's a secret ... I forgot. Clive

Thanks. I liked the picture too. Took three..they can be tricky since you can't be sure you are getting the fish in the picture--blind shooting. Fish needs to be in sun and water has to be clear. This worked okay. A swell day.

Monger: It is a great little spot. We camped there in 2003--during the fire. Shady and quiet. No power or water hookups. Clean concrete public toilets. 200 feet to the river. Bulls and rainbows. 20 minutes to the Crow. One+ hour to the Gap. There are rarely more than one or two rigs in the c/g. Last Thursday there were about six rigs there. It will be a more crowded on the long weekend. (Duh! ) Not sure about reservations....here's a phone number...not sure if current. http://www.canadianrooms.com/mem/44808.htm This says no reservations.... http://gateway.cd.gov.ab.ca/sitefac.aspx?id=90#campground Parks stuff... http://gateway.cd.gov.ab.ca/searchparks.aspx Clive

He may wanna hike her up to Barnaby Ridge for some goldens then.

Sunny. No wind. A few nice trout with more than a passing interest in dry flies. Pinch me.

Click here.... Clive

Nice fishee. It's Lost on me too where that is. If it's a big hike you'd want to carb up on Dale's energy bars.

Stepping in griz doo not nice. Makes you nervous real fast. The worst part is you know you are probably being watched. One Taco = 437 gophers ... with less hair as a bonus Circa August 1-5, 1966 .. I was walking up a cutline to the Skyline Road to be picked up and came across rather fresh griz tracks imprinted in the soft mud on the trail. I set a record getting to the top of the hill. Speaking of non bear country. A friend lives near Monarch and had a black bear go through the yard two weeks ago.

My 4-year-old Chota boot soles have worn down badly--see below. Normally I'd just strip off the old felts and replace them. But the rubber stubs in which the steel cleats are (were) attached seem to be vulcanized to the main rubber sole. I presume a shoe repair shop can cut off the rubber stubs and simply replace the felts and I'd no longer have cleats. I'd like to have cleats. Anyone know if Chota or ?? sells a repair kit with felts with pre-cut holes in the soles to go over the cleat rubber stubs? That may be irrelevant anyway as I can't see getting the old cleats out as they are worn so badly. The uppers are pretty decent yet and should be good for a couple of years. Any help? Thanks, Clive

Thanks flyangler. I really like the nail hardeners as do many others. Heck, I've not bought actual head cement for years. The NYC brand is cheap and works well.

Well Stephen I am the last guy to be commenting on distance casting. When I was watching Paul toss your line at NS last week I think there was one key to his tossing 100 feet of line in two false casts with our rod. You asked about the haul on the backcast. You know what struck me about Paul's casts. It was not the haul per se, but the blistering speed. (I never photographed his cast and should have.) When he was hauling back, his casting arm was tossing back at such great speed. Or at least the speed between his two hands was incredible ...as he threw his cast arm back at great speed he was also bringing his line hand forward at great speed. The result was that even tho his rod was at 3 PM (a no no) the line was moving so fast that it straightened parallel to the ground and never dropped at all because of the speed and short time between the straigntening point and forward cast. Near as I could tell it was all about speed.

GREAT pictures Dutch. Thanks. We don't undertsand that there are a few beautiful places like this in Europe. Just for fun!

Holy crap, the things a guy can't find on his computer after 15 years. See below from "The downstream Swing "in Western Sportsman, June/July 1992. And after all these years I still use this method ... landed my two largest river rainbows in my life last October swinging a caddis emerger as described. Cheers! Clive ... Over fifty years ago Roderick Haig Brown wrote about this technique for steelhead in his treasure of a book, A River Never Sleeps (William Morrow & Company, New York, 1946): I started down the pool happily rolling the fly out into the tumbled water, mending the line upstream to give it a chance to sink well down...The fly came over the loaded place, and I held it there in quiet water at full stretch of the line...knowing how it hung, how it looked, how the water plucked at it and gave it life. I moved my left hand up to recover line, and the pull came... Despite its apparent longevity and popularity elsewhere, I don't see a whole lot of straight across and swing down casting taking place on streams and rivers in Alberta. ... The basic technique is simple. If you are casting to surface feeding fish (that refuse other offerings) use an unweighted Prince Nymph or streamer [or caddis emerger, or ????] that will [swing] through the upper layer where the trout are. Cast more or less straight across and manage the line so the lure runs through the best water on the across stream swing. If there is no surface action, and the run looks like it has a deep fish holding pocket, use either a weighted fly or attach one or two soft split shots about a half metre up from the hook. To swim the weighted fly through a deep pocket, mend the line upstream after the cast and pay out a little extra line. The weighted Prince Nymph or streamer will then sink deep for its swing through the hole. Cast, mend, swing, bump, hookup. Pay close attention to the line drag, the feel of the line, and the tip of the rod. In theory you are fishing a lure that will be chased, and therefore you might expect a hard hit by the attacking trout. But I'd guess that a third of the rainbows I caught using this method were quiet takes slow pulls on the line. Perhaps the drag and curve of the thick fly line buffer the hit, or perhaps some fish gently mouth the hook. In any case, pay attention, and react to an indefinite tug as you would a solid hit.

f/a, Oohh! Where you finding tha NYC nail hardener these days? I like it better that Sally Hansen's HAN and London Drugs no longer stocks the NYC clear. Any help? Thanks, Clive

Sounds like a lot of BULL to me ... if you get my oldman's drift.

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