It's Trout Season

“Well not quite. The season opens tomorrow here in New York. I can't wait.”

“Keep your shirt on.”

“Already in southern PA those fishermen are clogging up my trailheads! :)”

“It might be a while before I get to head north to fish though.
Snow Map
last edited: 3/31/08 10:25:53 AM”

“North??

Dude you already live so far north as to make where I live seem like the deep south.”

“The season in Northeast PA. opens April 12. You can fish catch and release streams all year. I went up to a stream yesterday to see if any mayflies were hatching and if any trout were out, but saw nothing exciting. It's still early and the water is very cold. The water levels are perfect right now for fishing dry flies.”

“Yeah, I hit a local stream that's open all year yesterday. The water level was still a little high, but not bad for this time of year. The water is still real cold and probably will stay that way for at least a few weeks until the snow is gone.”

“Unless we get some really warm weather, the dry fly fishing around here in the mountain streams doesn't get really good until late April or early May.”

“I'm waiting for ice out so I can troll some wobblers and do some pond fishing.”

“Trout rule!”

“If you can get it down a large (or tiny) black stonefly can work - also a large alder fly nymph - I use beaver (black) and orange collar on a 2XL hook weighted with wire from a sinking trolling line.

Water's still too high up here.”

“naw, a brown roostertail's all you need...”

“I need to work on my casting. I'm a bit of a beginner at all this - but I need to be ready for when the striped bass start running.”

“I'd love to try that.”

“I'd bring you down to come try Gremlin, I got one of the prime spots right outside the front door - but I fear I may no longer be here by early autumn.

It goes crazy when you run into a school though. I got nothing with my amateurish fly fishing, but landed a few with the spinning rod.”

“Today should be a holiday. Trout season is here again. Too bad I'm stuck at work.”

“Last Saturday in April (trout streams) for us. The big lake is always open though!”

“What happened to hockey season?”

“To every thing there is a season, MarkO.”

“Depending on what day of the week it falls, the deer hunting opener is an actual day off for some of our schools.”

“I think that's why opening day of deer season is always a Saturday here.”

“Trout season starts April 18 here. While I was out hiking over the last couple of weeks, I've been checking the streams out and didn't see any fish out in the feeding spots yet. No mayflies were out either. Normally the dry fly fishing around here, at least on the streams I fish won't get good until at least mid to late April.”

“You might be a redneck if:
Opening day of deer season is a school holiday.”

“I guess we're rednecks.

Opening day of deer season is a school holiday in our district.
last edited: 4/01/09 10:57:58 AM”

“LMAO i was thinking the same thing marko..

conk we already knew you was red..”

“Full on trout season opens April 18 here, too.”

“
TROUT DEATH BY PORT WINE


It was not an outhouse resting upon the imagination.

It was reality.

An eleven-inch rainbow trout was killed. Its life taken

forever from the waters of the earth, by giving it a drink of

port wine.

It is against the natural order of death for a trout to die

by having a drink of port wine.

It is all right for a trout to have its neck broken by a fisherman

and then to be tossed into the creel or for a trout to die from

a fungus that crawls like sugar-colored ants over its body

until the trout is in death's sugarbowl.

It is all right for a trout to be trapped in a pool that dries

up in the late summer or to be caught in the talons of a bird

or the claws of an animal.

Yes, it is even all right for a trout to be killed by pollution,

to die in a river of suffocating human excrement.

There are trout that die of old age and their white beards

flow to the sea.

All these things are in the natural order of death, but for

a trout to die from a drink of port wine, that is another thing.

No mention of it in "The treatyse of fysshynge wyth an

angle," in the Boke of St. Albans, published 1496. No mention

of it in Minor Tactics of the Chalk Stream, by H. C. Cutcliffe,

published in 1910. No mention of it in Truth Is Stranger than Fishin',

by Beatrice Cook, published in 1955. No mention of it in

Northern Memoirs, by Richard Franck, published in 1694.

No mention of it in I Go A-Fishing, by W. C. Prime, published

in 1873. No mention of it in Trout Fishing and Trout Flies, by Jim

Quick, published in 1957. No mention of it in Certaine Experiments

Concerning Fish and Fruite, by John Taverner, published in 1600.

No mention of it in A River Never Sleeps, by Roderick L. Haig Brown,

published in 1946. No mention of it in Till Fish US Do Part, by Beatrice

Cook published in 1949. No mention of it in The Flyfisher & the

Trout's Point of View by Col. E.W.Harding, published

in 1931. No mention of it in Chalk Stream Studies, by Charles

Kingsley, published in 1859 No mention of it in Trout Madness

by Robert Traver, published in 1960.

No mention of it in Sunshine and the Dry Fly, by J. W.

Dunne, published in 1924. No mention of it in Just Fishing,

by Ray Bergman, published in 1932. No mention of it in Matching

the Hatch by Ernest G. Schwiebert, Jr,, published in 1955. No mention

of it in The Art of Trout Fishing on Rapid Streams by H. C. Cutcliffe,

published in 1863. No mention of it in Old Flies in New Dresses by

C.E. Walker, published in 1898 No mention of it in Fisherman's

Spring, by Roderick L, Haig-Brown, published in 1951.

No mention of it in The Determined Angler and the Brook Trout,

by Charles Bradford, published in 1916. No mention of it in Women

Can Fish by Chisie Farrington, published in 1951. No mention

of it in Tales of the Angler's El Dorado New new Zeland

by Zane Grey, published in 1926. No mention of it in The Flyfisher's

Guide, by G.C. Bainbridge, published in 1816.

There's no mention of a trout dying by having a drink of

port wine anywhere.

To describe the Supreme Executioner: We woke up in the

morning and it was dark outside. He came kind of smiling

into the kitchen and we ate breakfast.

Fried potatoes and eggs and coffee.

"Well, you old bastard, " he said. "Pass the salt. "

The tackle was already in the car, so we just got in and

drove away. Beginning at the first light of dawn we hit the

road at the bottom of the mountains, and drove up into the

dawn.

The light behind the trees was like going into a gradual

and strange department store.

"That was a good-looking girl last night, " he said.

"Yeah, "I said. "You did all right. "

"If the shoe fits....." he said.

Owl Snuff Creek was just a small creek, only a few miles

long, but there were some nice trout in it. We got out of the

car and walked a quarter of a mile down the mountainside to

the creek I put my tackle together. He pulled a pint of port

wine out of his pocket and said wouldn't you know."

"No thanks," I said.

He took a good snort and then shook his head, side to side,

and said, "Do you know what this creek reminds me of?"

"No," I said, tying a gray and yellow fly onto my leader.

"It reminds me of Evageline's vagina, a constant dream

of my childhood and promoter of my youth."

"That's nice," I said.

"Longfellow was the Henry Miller of my childhood," he

said.

"Good," I said.

I cast into a little pool that had a swirl of fir needles going

around the edge of it. The fir needles went around and around.

It made no sense that they should come from trees. They looked

perfectly contented and natural in the pool as if the pool had

grown them on watery branches.

I had a good hit on my third cast, but missed it.

"Oh, boy, " he said. "I think I'll watch you fish. The stolen

painting is in the house next door. "

I fished upstream coming ever closer and closer to the

narrow staircase of the canyon. Then I went up into it as if

I were entering a department store. I caught three trout in

the lost and found department. He didn't even put his tackle

together. He just followed after me, drinking port wine and

poking a stick at the world.

"This is a beautiful creek, " he said. "It reminds me of

Evangeline's hearing aid. "

We ended up at a large pool that was formed by the creek

crashing through the children's toy section. At the beginning

of the pool the water was like cream, then it mirrored out

and reflected the shadow of a large tree. By this time the

sun was up. You could see it coming down the mountain.

I cast into the cream and let my fly drift down onto along

branch of the tree, next to a bird.

Go-wham !

I set the hook and the trout started jumping.

"Giraffe races at Kilimanjaro!" he shouted, and every

time the trout jumped, he jumped.

"Bee races at Mount Everest !" he shouted.

I didn't have a net with me so I fought the trout over to

the edge of the creek and swung it up onto the shore.

The trout had a big red stripe down its side.

It was a good rainbow.

"What a beauty, " he said.

He picked it up and it was squirming in his hands.

"Break its neck, " I said.

"I have a better idea, " he said. "Before I kill it, let me

at least soothe its approach into death. This trout needs a

drink. " He took the bottle of port out of his pocket, unscrewed

the cap and poured a good slug into the trout's mouth.

The trout went into a spasm.

Its body shook very rapidly like a telescope during an

earthquake. The mouth was wide open and chattering almost

as if it had human teeth.

He laid the trout on a white rock, head down, and some

of the wine trickled out of its mouth and made a stain on the

rock.

The trout was lying very still now.

"It died happy, " he said.

"This is my ode to Alcoholics Anonymous.

"Look here !"


-- Richard Brautigan

”

“Ah yes, Zen and the art of Bicycle Repair and A Confederate General in Big Sur ('No tresspassing - four seventeenths of a haiku'). I was a big fan long ago, but he doesn't mention Svetonivs (3rd century CE).”

“I'll be going for a world record Brown in the mighty White river in 3 weeks time!”

“Huh??
You gonna take a crap in the river?”

“We have two ice-outs here. Sometimes we make the evening news for floods in the Châteaguay Valley that is. It will never flood up here in Rockburn, eh?

The snow melted gradually, but steadily and ice-out was no problem. We are having a second high water now because the snow and ice are melting in New York state, but it's pretty calm - more so than most years.”

“16 more days until the season starts.”

“It's always trout season here, I went a few weeks ago and we caught 10 and had to release 5 because they were in the f'nn slot....

I hate the slot...

Then this frekkled faced 12 year old walks up behind me and ses "Hey Mister, look what I caught". I turn around and he's holdning a 24 inch Walleye!”

“There are a few local streams that are open year round, but the fishing normally doesn't start to get good until late April - early May when it's ice out time on the ponds.”

“What's the slot?

Still too early up here.”

“We have a few streams here that are open all year because of the salmonids but regular trout season for the rest doesn't start until the end of April.”

“NO, NO, NO, Tiiilt...You're thinking of TROUSER Trout...this thread is about real fish!

Don't let the smell fool ya!”

“The slot is a slot limit...you have to release fish from 13 to 16 inches long....we kept catching 13 1/2 inchers”

“This thread sounds like a hooker convention.”

“I understand now. Thanks.”

“Two more days. With all the rain snow melt, all of the rivers and streams look like they're running with chocolate milk. The fishing won't be good for a while.”

“Trout season starts April 17 down here. The streams are in good shape. With it getting warm I might try some catch and release streams next weekend that are open all year.”

“I’m going to give fly fishing a try this year. I picked up an 8.5’ 5wt. Rod from Cabelas along with some other fly fishing paraphernalia. I think that rod should work well on the streams near me. Getting my other fishing gear ready for the season as well, like changing the line on my spinning reels. It’s been waaaay too long since I’ve done that.”