Rain - Pain - GAINS

PART I - Rain

Skinny Water Hunting

It's an early, rainy, windy September morning. A perfect time to re-introduce a friend to creek fishing, right? Right! In my mind it's the perfect weather to chase some Southern Alberta Brown Trout. However, I am not too sure my buddy was so keen when I arrived at his house at 7 am.

I give him a pump up speech about, "No Pain No Gain!" and how the weather is going to change during our two hour drive. I also distract him with the fact that we are going to be fishing private water that hasn't been touched since June. So he starts to come around, maybe it was the coffee that perked him up or maybe just maybe my solid story telling skills got the juices flowing. Regardless, we were on the road and what we were about do was worth the early start.

Since my buddy, Derek, has never been to this part of Alberta. I had to treat him to a warm up lap and see if he was WORTHY, ha ha, of "private water." So off to a section of the Raven recently opened by the conservation society to the public for an explore. I had only been on this stretch of the rive once before and didn't get to fish it as the water looked more like Chocolate Milk than Gin. So as it was a warm up for Derek it was also somewhat of a re-do for myself.

River side we gear up and notice that there were a few foot prints from the day before, not an ideal sign but kind of expected on a weekend. If you know Brown Trout, they also tend to sulk for a day or two if they've been stung by the barb of a Fly Fisher. One thing that was more concerning was the fact that the river level was quite low. Being less familiar with this section of the river, I was a bit concerned on how many holding pools we would actually come across.

That's exactly what we found, two maybe three fish holding pools. Not all for a loss however, it was still good go over some river basics with Derek and review the elements of drag vs. drift so that when we did hit the "private" water he would be set.

As we depart the first section of the river only to have seen a few small Browns dart out from logs as we crept up stream. My take on this section of the Raven is it's likely best fished early season from April to end of June. This way you'll be sure to get into some Golden Stone hatches and the water table is more favorable for active fish. Will I be back? Yes, but it will be a week day trip before the summer holiday crowd starts to move in, ha!

PART II - Pains & GAINS!

I normally tie my own fly's but I happened to be at Reid's Fly Shop, in Edmonton, and they had some purple "Chubby Chernobyl" fly's that I just had to give a go. Great thing about the chubby is that they are made from synthetic materials so a little fly goo goes along way. Doesn't hurt that the nice big white wings are easy to see at distance for when a fish sips your dropper.

With a quick warm up beer, sandwich and rig change it was back to the task at hand, finding Derek his first Southern Alberta Brown. We get creek side and I let Derek take to the first pool while I string up my rod. I get distracted watching Derek and end up breaking my rod tip...insert profanity here...UGH! However, we are only two pools away from the car where I have a rod already laying in wait for such an event was to transpire.

So now I turn from fishing buddy to guide and give praise to good drifts while poking good fun at the bad to keep the mood light. First fish of the day came to Derek, thanks broken rod, a mere 8" eager Brown. But the skunk was off the board and I could sense a change in luck was in the air.

Back in the game after a rod swap, we hit the third pool and I can see about eight to ten Whitefish nymphing so I lay out a cast. First drift I am on the board. Not a Brown Trout but a fish none the less. Some trout purists call Whitefish a trash fish even though this species is the O.G.F. (Original Gangster Fish) aka native to the Raven. Too bad for them, I will take any fish on they fly over zero any day of the week. You can have your zero fish walk in the woods all you like, I will still out score you and laugh while you post some trash about how nice it is to just be in nature. Okay, now that my mini rant about the IG (Instagram) crowd is over we can move along.

Like on the first section of the river, some early fish holding pockets were barely boot deep. So in order to not stress fish in skinny water we quickly made our way up river. Once we reached the prime section of the river there was no stopping us from working it hard. At least I knew that there were at least five really good pools ahead of us and all that we needed was for the fish to turn on.

Thankfully they did! First pool we could see Browns and Whites so we held back our casts to see how or if they were feeding. Lucky for us we saw a nice Brown sipping something so I let Derek take the first drift. This pool is maybe the size of four mini vans but with one heck of a log jam at the back end providing perfect cover for holding fish. Sure enough a nice Brown darted out from the logs, an even better trout than the one we saw on the surface, and I start telling Derek to wait as the fish was about to snub his presentation. But just as the fly was to touch the log jam the trout must've felt safe enough to take a swipe at the chubby. That's when Derek set the hook and the fish was on! The trick now was to get it in the net before it broke off in the logs. As I was on the net, as soon as the fish got close to me I swiped him up and Derek let out a bellowing hoot of excitement!

A quick picture of the buck Brown in the net and off it was back into the log jam to sulk while Derek and I shared a congratulatory high five. I picked off a couple more smaller Browns on our way up river and Derek still in a haze from the big buck did not. So when we reached the next big pool, I gave the lead back to Derek. Not seeing any fish I told him to stick his cast close to the far bank as it looked like the deepest part of the run and wouldn't you know it, out from the under cut bank another nice Brown appeared.

It was like the whole next five seconds went from super slow motion to fast forward in a matter of six feet. As the Brown Trout drifted past me, while giving the chubby a real hard stare, I thought to myself that Derek better not mess this up. Just before the fly reached Derek's feet the fish slashed at it, missed, but then got hooked up on the dropper fly on it's way down. That's when everything sped up and the adrenaline kicked in for it was on me now to net this beauty. No problem for me, fish had no place to run to and no fear in losing it to a pile of logs. Quick stab of the net and this gorgeous fish fish was in hand for a brief photo and back on it's merry way.

As we closed out the rest of the day, no more big buck brown's for Derek, but I did manage to get a really nice looking hen on my last cast of the day. So what started off as a dreadfully looking start ended with blue sky, smiles and a cold brew to soak it all in. I felt like a proud papa being able to treat Derek to this amazing fishery. I also told him not to expect this of Brown Trout and that he was truly spoiled. Time to bring on the 2019 season and see what adventures I can talk Derek into, tight lines to all!