Midnight Double!
- This topic has 17 replies, 11 voices, and was last updated Nov 7, 2007 at 2:23 pm by
.
-
Posts
-
Here’s the scenario:
A dark and chilly November night with no moon, an eery hike through the timber, and thrills on the water. My brother Jay, fishing buddy John, and myself ventured out into the wilderness only to discover we weren’t the only ones prowling the river that night. Jay and John wound up cornering a huge black bear against the bank, and we had to hurry our tails out of there!… An unforgettable night.
TravisI knew my new oversized Brodin net would come in handy.
Me with the female caught subsurface
Jay with the male on topwater
The flies
Late night in an Appalachian Watershed–The three of us were wading a long, deep hole in tandem.
Tim, we almost had a triple! My slowly stripped streamer got nailed with an aggressive “THUNK!” and I knew that it was a solid fish. I hollered upstream to my brother, then in the darkness, I heard his mouse get gulped—He was hollering “Fish on!”Zach,
I don’t think I even own a rod that can throw tandem streamers…I can’t fling ’em like you spey guys ;).John was downstream mousin’, I was upstream 20 yards stripping the black sculpin, and Jay was upstream 20 yards mousin.
First off nice fish, love to catch a brown like that male.
The coolest thing that I have seen caught using a tandem fly rig was two 5+ bones in the Seychelles by Larry Dalhberg on Hunt for Big Fish. I know some guys in Ohio that have caught steelies on tandem streamers. They said it was like hooking into freight train.
Amazing.
I went to the Vols game Saturday if that helps. 😉
The point, for me, was not to emphasize a particular destination, but a style of fishing experience that’s completely new to me. All your senses become electified at night, and each strike is magnified times ten. The critter encounters just make it more chaotic.
I remember reading a fishing story in a Jack Dennis book (I think by Gary LaFontaine), were he described his mouse pattern “The Creature.” It’s a foam body core with rabbit fur pelt. He described getting busted off on 0X fishing log jams on the Beaverhead. That fly story has stirred my imagination ever since for the predator/prey experience of topwater night fishing.I fished the Beaverhead one September night, then Norfork and White in AR 2 summers ago, and I became hooked.
If you have a nearby river where the aggressive browns are a couple weeks from moving into the shallow riffles, try something on top in the deeper slow pools and see what happens on a clear, moonlit night.
We had several misses; but every tug or splash at your fly would make your heart stop.Travis
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.