January 14, 2021 – Went for Broke and Broke One Off – Brodhead Creek

My consolation prize.

As I promised myself earlier this week, I committed to fishing some bigger water today with big stoneflies in the hopes of tangling with a pig or two.  I pretty much did what I did last week on Penns and fished 4x on a mono rig with a big heavy stonefly on the anchor and a size 14 soft hackle on the dropper.  I had exactly four hits, I believe.  I landed one approximately 17 inches in pocket water, and I battled a monster almost to the net before he broke off.  I had so much adrenaline running through me that I nearly threw up again, and it took some self-control not my toss the rod into the woods or worse. I had three big deep runs in mind when I arrived today, but I never left the second one, which produced the only action.  I arrived about 10:30 AM, and fished spot one, which is a deep hole and eddy.  I probably spent a good hour here, losing some bugs, so I know I was getting down, but not getting a tap.  Using the wading staff, I made a “safe” crossing and even fished the other side for a while, but I could not rouse one.  I was disappointed because I was hoping this easy to access spot would prove to be good this time of year, as it does on paper, but instead I had to make the aforementioned crossing and take a hike to more challenging and possibly treacherous waters down river.

In pocket water, at least 2 of them....

I actually saw another fly guy working in behind me at the first spot, and a spinner fisherman was on the opposite bank from me as I walked to the second spot.  He may have even been in range to see me land the long skinny female that opens this post.  She was not in an expected winter spot, though I did expect a fish to be here anyway.  There is a deep bowl in pocket water behind a mid-stream boulder here, and I have caught fish in many different seasons here—I can now add the middle of winter to that list.  Because the water around the pocket was shallow, she actually jumped three times before digging for bottom.  Once in the net, I could see the fish ate Sam’s big golden stone.  I had been fishing a couple of Eric’s gold and black stoneflies earlier in the day until I lost them because I really wanted to land a good fish on one of them.  I only landed one at Penns with Eric’s golden before I lost the last one I thought I had with me.  I found one more last night, along with two black ones, but I sacrificed them at the first deep woody hole earlier in the day.  I eventually lost a couple more of Sam’s big stones, as well, so I tried one of Eric’s big buggy, rubber-legged hares ear concoctions after 1 PM.  I think he tied them as small stream buggers, but with a big tungsten bead, I thought they could do just fine as a stonefly and they may even get eaten on the swing if it warmed up and the fish woke up.  The water temperature was 37 at most, so an extra degree would have been a lot to ask with no sunshine today.  The only thing working for me were those clouds, which kept the overnight air temps in the low 30s instead of 12 or something.

Not a day to swim.

I got bounced pretty far out in current and did not connect here, and I even tried a big bobber for 30 minutes, but with no room for a backcast and no place to wade that was not over waist-deep, I had to abandon that notion eventually.  I committed to making a climb over some outcroppings and massive boulders to get to two final holes in this stretch—it is impossible to wade past them for most of the year.  On the way back upstream, I actually free-soloed across the face of one such outcropping, which is not wise in January, of course, especially in wading boots.  I usually fish down here in the summer when it is easier to get around, but I caught a wild brown on a Rapala here one autumn close to 20 years ago that was all of 25 inches, so I do know that the trouble can be worth it.  While fishing around some of these rocky ledges and gnarly rocks, I hooked a massive trout on Eric’s big bug. 

Big bugs, gray skies.

Surprisingly, even though action was slow, I was ready all day, fishing every cast like it could produce, so I got a solid hookset and even kept this pig from getting into current and possibly into the backing.  I saw him clear as day no less than three times, basically a rod’s length from my perch on the rocks.  He was a big male brown trout and fought like a wild fish.  He knew every piece of structure in this hole, including a submerged shopping cart I had almost forgotten about—the remnant of a blue tarp, ever-present after creeks roll through backyards it seems, was surprisingly easier to avoid.  I steered him out of all that nonsense once, then he took another run and I let him go a few yards.  When I got him back in front of me again, I even made a couple tentative steps downstream to try and stay below him for a possible net job.  He was well over 20 and just thick.  I could not wade in front of me, stepping in would mean floating in 6 feet of water, so I just had to hope for the best.  The worst happened in the end, however.  Well, not the worst, as I did fool and fight him.  He made one last dig for a rock ledge between me and him, and all I could do was keep the rod high and put pressure on him to keep him out of there.  Picture me trying to stop him from going between my legs, but my legs were standing on a rocky ledge with a deep cavity underneath.  Ping.  He won.  When I examined the line, I still had the dropper tag and the most of the tippet below, so I don’t think a connection failed.   More likely that the line got nicked on the ledge or debris on the bottom and broke just above the fly.  I nearly heaved.  I fished another hour with nothing to show for it, but I did not expect to top that one.  I was pretty excited to see a wild fish close to 18 inches today until this second horse had to ruin it!  God, I hope I sleep.

Worth the work, but man....