father daughter fly fishing trip

Jennie and I had a day of laughing and fly fishing yesterday! What a glorious time it was ~ from catching fish to watching dad fall in the river up to his neck! Jennie was yelling "dad don't fall in!" and I was laughing so hard I thought I was going to drown because I was already in up to my neck. All I could think was grab my $400 dollar fly rod and let me drown. Thankfully, it was a 90 degree day and I could use the cooling down. So funny.

The fishing was slow and we caught only small ones. But, we made plans to return in the fall when the larger fish once again move into the river. We did see a few large ones feeding that we didn't seem to be able to entice. And, I saw a huge bull trout that was after a small cutthroat that I had hooked. It was the largest fish I have ever seen on the St. Joe River.

My heart soared like a hawk as I watched my older daughter cast the fly line. It was the first time I have ever really stopped and watched as she fished. She has the gift! I was reminded of the time I was watching my good friend Paul Dierks fish. He had fairly good mechanics. Unfortunately, he was standing smack dab in the middle of the area that he should have been casting to ~ i.e. where the fish were apt to be. Not only does Jennie have good mechanics but she has a natural feel for the water ~ where to set the fly. She has to work on her landing of the fish, however. She has to play it off of the rod and not try to drag the fish in with the line. She'll have a heart attack in the fall when we get into the big ones! Jane Fonda better get out of the way. Jennie is a better caster and is better looking. :-) Love is when you enjoy watching your child catching fish more than catching them yourself. Now to get my daughter Katy out on the stream.

Fly fishing with Jennie naturally got us to reminiscing about grandpa Jack's fly fishing ability and what he passed on to us. I told her of my memories of my dad's fishing abilities. He was a natural also and I learned how to fly fish as I watched him. He wasn't one for giving specific lessons. He just gave me a fly rod and reel one summer and said watch what I do. So I did! And I was hooked. He would ocassionally offer me helpful hints. He would say things like "now would be a good time to use an up stream mend". I don't think he ever really used the term "mend" but he would show me what to do when you needed less drag on the fly. Now days they have fancy names for all of the techniques that we just learned to do naturally, i.e. techniques that seemed to work. Trial and error still seems to work and as a result I might add the experience is often richer. Some times you just gotta learn for yourself. No substitute.

One of my favorite fly fishing stories of my dad involves him fishing from the back of a horse. He was an excellent horseman as well as a fisherman. The second year we had the pitchfork ranch he purchased an older retired roping horse named Star. Star was a beautiful horse. He was black with a star on his forehead and three white socks. He had, of course, been roped "off of" and was unflappable. He was pop's pride and joy. One of my fondest memories is of my Dad fly fishing in the saddle as we made our way up the Greybull river to our summer fishing camp. He'd say, "Skip, let's get some fish for dinner on the way up to camp." During the summer, in place of the rifle that he carried in his saddle scabbard during hunting season he would place his trusty bamboo fly rod. Out would come the fly rod. He would assemble it and rig it up aboard Star. And off he and Star would go up the middle of the "Greybull" ~ at this point the Greybull river was more of a creek than a river. Old Star would just stand there as dad would haul up a sixteen inch flopping cutthroat trout. In fairly short order we would have enough for dinner and we would head on in to camp. Gosh those trout tasted good. They were not much more than an hour from "stream to pan". It wasn't long before I was fishing off of the back of old blue ~ riding bare back too I should add! Dad claimed he had shot elk off of the the back of Star too. Although, I was never able to witness this claim!

Jennie, do you recognize this fishing hole? This is a picture of my friend Leonard. I'm really sorry that I didn't get a picture of you "casting the line". I will in the fall.

Dad, et al