The weather is holding and I’m making hay while the sun shines. Took another trip down to Indian Creek to fish with a friend and wound up hitting my limit at the bridge. (8 fish!)
We went downstream from camp and fished several log jams and pools. I caught several large creek chub and even my first hornyhead chub. It was a nice specimen and had several prominent horns on its face. There were two of them in the spot when I walked up and the one on the left immediately hit on the first cast. We pulled a trout from the same hole as a large school of shorthead redhorse swam back and forth ignoring everything we threw at them.
My first trout hookup was later in the day as the rain came in, and it was the largest rainbow I’ve ever seen down here. Even with such a big fish, it hit on one of the smallest flies that I carry. Just came out and slammed it like it’d been waiting all day and started running like crazy when I set the hook. I wish I’d had the presence of mind to back the spotted blur into the shallows, because as soon as there was room to maneuver it changed directions and spit the hook into the tree behind me.
So, tenkara lesson for this trip was a crash course in rigging for the right fish. I had my line way too long for the nest of bruisers we ran into. It’s tight under the bridge with a 13’ pole using a 12.5’ furled leader and another 4-5’ of tippet. I just couldn’t get the larger fish to the net when they most needed to be there. I’m thinking about using a longer-handled net but I should have rigged much shorter with an 11’ furled line and 3-4’ of tippet.
After losing fish after fish after solid fish, I finally went back to the truck and got the spinning rod and a couple of single-hook spinners and quickly caught my limit. I lost as many as I caught and I even lost 3 more when trying to get the stringer hook inserted. It was a wet, wild day under the bridge wrestling these fish. One I won’t soon forget.