Fast Rise, Anyone? (O. mykiss)

Posted on April 23, 2009, 7:22 am, by JB, under Artistic, Fish, Fishing Life.

jborger_3dom_bow

I decided to post this image partly because it’s a good match to the other North American trout below, and partly because of laziness too many other projects in the last few days.

In my early fly-fishing days (when I was a good deal shorter than I am now), I was obsessed with catching a trout longer than 20-inches. As it turned out, the first fish to break that barrier was a rainbow, taken on a damselfly imitation on a lake in the mountains of northern New Mexico. Strangely, though, that fish doesn’t stand out as much as another big rainbow—a fish of about seven pounds—that I caught on my first trip to New Zealand when I was thirteen.

The NZ fish had taken a nymph deep in a canyon pool, and proceeded to bolt downstream through a cliff-lined section of the gorge. I followed—eventually swimming at one point—before landing the trout on a sandbar around the next bend. Wearing nothing but 1982-vintage breathable waders (also known widely as “blue jeans”), the chill of the water was almost as breathtaking as the fish itself!

(I think that I’ll run with this “fish” theme for a bit and do a total of nine salmonids over the next week (two are already in place, so there will be seven more). Up next: brook trout (char)).

«
»