Mid-Week MO

Weather Tuesday was back to sunny and breezy with a few afternoon clouds blowing through.  Fished the islands across from the Ladders in the morning, but it never happened.  Moved to slower water for the late afternoon, and there were some fish up, per usual.  Above the bridge, and Lone Tree.

No risers

Packed with pods

All over

Wednesday was the day to fish the "D-Gate."  (That's an inside thing, and you would have had to be there.)  A few nice finally appeared on the high bank, and tried to take me to school.  I finally won, sort of, though I only netted a couple of 'em.  I did get them all to eat, the last taking over an hour.  I think it was a misplaced Fork fish, but a little CDC loop-wing biot emerger finally did the trick. I tried 7 or 8 other bugs without even a refusal right down the lane in perfect timing.  It took the loop wing first drift.

That first look coming down the hill always gives me a goose bump or two

This was the area where they came up

One in particular right in the middle of the mess, next to and under the sticks

It took this one, size 20.

He wouldn't keep his head up

Thursday was one of those, "be careful what you wish for" days.  It started out as the dream scenario.  Cloudy and flat calm.  An epic day on the horizon.  I got to the Ladders at 10 am, just in case.  There were a couple of fish eating something on the inside of the riffle in the upper side channel, and I got 'em to eat.  But there weren't really any bugs until, well, 12:46, per usual.  But that cloudy day I've been wishing for ushered in some light rain showers and a gusty cold north wind that kept the fish and bugs down except for a couple of chosen spots.  The same inside seam in the upper channel, and the fast riffle/hole at the top of the lower channel.  Everything else was blown out.  Temperature dropped to 42 by late afternoon.  It was good, and the bugs came off, but the cold wind dropped the fun meter.  On the way back to camp, Lone Tree was full of risers all up and down it, but I was warming up again by then, and just watched.

Perfect conditions on approach

Lots of waiting and watching until afternoon

Fish rose in this faster riffle and bucket despite the wind

Too cold to hold 'em

Had some love on the softy

Wing on this was dark dun, necessary for visibility

Black Adams shined again today

This is the seam that had constant risers.  Catch one, two more move in.

The Glare was murder.  Black wings needed, and still blurry and cross-eyed after a while.