Cabin Fever

January, 2010-Year of the Big Freeze. I turn the double nickel in a few days, and the last year was amazingly disappointing in terms of flyfishing;. Oh, to be sure-it was a great year for family and career and health. I started running again, after a thirty year hiatus, and have worked my way up to about twenty-five miles a week. That's a far cry from my college years, when I could do that much in a single gulp. Nevertheless, I've lost forty pounds and feel like a new man. The kids are great, the wife is great, the new hospital is great, and life in North Texas is great. I did have one or two great days with the long rod, a few short trips, and acquired some better equipment, I just by-God didn't get out enough. Here I am in Texomaland, literally five miles from a fantastic inland fishery offering largemouth, smallmouth, stripers, and enough panfish to feed the five thousand without any miracles, and I could not find the time in 2009. 2010, though-will be different.

In 2009, I became a better caster. I have bought some new rods over the year, and have realized that equipment is far superior than the stuff that came out twenty years ago. and these are indeed the first new sticks I have used in twenty years. Notably, I have come into possession of the new short Sage Largemouth and Smallmouth series rods-the Smallmouth I can cast in to the backing. Steve Hollenshead was very helpful in teaching me the importance of timing and loop control. I also came into possession of a GLoomis Streamdancer in seven weight-unbelievable instrument. My casting and knot tying are better than they have ever been-but the bifocals make that problematic in low light.

Anyway-tonight the low should be below twenty, and it may not rise about thirty for the next 96 hours. The good news is that that should help curtail the flies and ticks next spring. The bad news is that there will be no trips to the Blue or the LMF this weekend. So, even though I am finally off with a weekend to myself, I'll have to be content with looking at my stuff. The photos show some open fly boxes-the big box is the kayak warm water box, there is the Blue River Box and two carp boxes. The reels are the big wide arbor Orvis saltwater rod that went to the Bahamas with me, the little Ross three weight, and the Orvis CFO Tammy gave me when I graduated Med School oh so many years ago. The real treasure in the photo, though, is the white popping bug with the little mono weed guard. That bug, my friends, was hand-tied and fished by the great Dave Whitlock. My friend and guide Marcos sent me that, and told me about Dave working a bug-said he could make a bass bug go forward and backwards and sideways and every which way just with little twitches of his line hand, and could literally make basses materialize from thin water with the magic he imparted. I am thankful to Marcos for his friendship, his expertise, and his diligence in looking for fish. He is, without doubt, the finest guide with whom I have fished. I hope to see him at least
a couple of times this year.

My goals for this year are really pretty simple. Hunter wants to go on a trip for his graduation-we had originally planned to go to Alaska, but I don't know if we can get that scheduled in time. If not, we'll probably go to the San Juan or maybe Colorado. I also plan to do the Brazos from PK to the Dark Valley Bridge-that's an overnighter and I've done it a few times before. I plan to do the Red from Texoma to Carpenter's Bluff-can't believe I've lived here seven years and not done that trip yet. A couple of trips to Cecil's tanks (or "pools" as he calls them), the San Marcos with Marcos, maybe even the Devil's River. We went to the Llano twice in 2009. , and I absolutely loved it. Next weekend, I'll make my annual pilgrimage to the Blue-I hear they're putting the Missouri stockers in on the fourteenth. Starting in March, we'll try my favorite tiny water-Loy Lake. I'll also put a couple of evenings in on Waterloo-the water is much clearer than Loy, and the dog just flat loves it there.

So-so much for the winter doldrums and cabin fever. Can't wait to get out again, to make a tight loop, to deliver a bug, and to feel the weight of a fish on the end of a leader. Hope you are all well. Stay warm!!!

The Home Water-Loy Lake

Now that I'm an orphan (daughter and her family moved to Houston, other daughter off to TCU, senior son never ever ever home, Zach in Denton, Tam out of town, both of those @#$*&$# dogs gone to their new home) I took the opportunity to spend a quiet evening on Loy Lake. Loy Lake is a remnant of the FDR era, the WPW to be exact, and was once the gathering place for local teenagers. There was,at one time, a dance floor built on piers out over the upper end of the lake, a concession stand, and a swimming platform. Now, the old girl lies alone and mostly untouched. This day, however, there were a few other visitors. One guy launched his bass buddy, and while he was parking the trailer, a rogue gust blew his little craft out into the middle of the lake. Good neighbor Sam here paddled my trusty kayak to the drifting vessel, and like a modern day Captain Cook took her captive and towed her to shore (under paddle power, I might add). The fishing was pretty slow, as one would expect for early evening in August on topwaters. I caught about six in the six-inch range, and then some "smaller" ones. Greens, redbellies, a bluegill, and some shellcrackers. No basses, no carps. Oh-and all those ads that tell you a Native Ultimate is safe to stand in to fish-don't believe it. Perhaps if you are a gymnast or ballet dancer guy you could pull it off, but I do know that you can't stand to attend the calls of nature. Had it not been for a nearby Bud Light can, the situation would have grown desperate. Thank God for the penchant of Grayson county residents to litter a beautiful old work of art with their empties. The rod is a fairly new TFO six-weight that I bought in Broken Bow last year when I forgot my trout stick, the reel is an old Hardy Marquis 7/8 that I bought years ago as my northern pike reel when we lived in Montana. The line is a Mastery trout floating 6 weight. The fly of the day was a black rubber spider in the rocks.

http://www.co.grayson.tx.us/Special/LoyLake/LoyLake.htm

Carp on the Fly-July 2009

Both these beauties were taken on a scorching July afternoon below the Morris Shepard Dam at Possum Kingdom Lake. Modest size carp were feeding in the shallow riffles, with their backs out of the water. I must have cast to forty or fifty of them, and landed two. I had a great big one on for a brief moment, but he took my fly and went his own way. Casts had to be fairly long, and the fly was left motionless on the bottom until I suspected the carp had moved over it. Then, a typical strip strip strip retrieve, more often than not ignored. The fly de jour was a Befus fly, the rod was the old six-weight Orvis graphite that Tam gave me when I graduated Med School in 1981. The reel was a Cabelas SLR I bought off a guy on the now-defunct Texas Fly Report. And-what trip to the Brazos would be complete without a trip to the worlds loneliest Whataburger-I met brother Jim for a Whopper with cheese.