Knowing that you live on earth and knowing your street address are both important pieces of knowledge. But, if you only knew that you lived on earth; it would be tough to get by. With that said, I have come to appreciate the more refined information available to me in regards to fly fishing for steelhead. The information itself is acquired through time, research, personal experiences, trial and error, instinct and my tight network of steelhead buddies. I love fly fishing for migratory species of fish in both fresh and saltwater, because it is an eternal exercise in simultaneously applying the information that I know and learning new information. And, ultimately I am constantly realizing that some of the things I knew were wrong or at least dependant on other changing and variable factors. So, a good analogy would be that the fishing part of my brain is like an internal GPS/Fish Finder instrument. I am by no means suggesting to use and rely on a real GPS instrument because most good fishermen I meet are a natural GPS system and all of the information they need is in their head. I am constantly monitoring current variable factors such as water, wind, air temps, forecasts, reports, water temps and barometric pressure changes while referencing and updating all of the legacy information in my head. So, I have my own data to reference, store and build upon combined with access to “all” of the data that my closest steelhead buddies have collected throughout their years spent fly fishing for steelhead. (I am sure even my closest steelhead buddies; keep some information encrypted under password protection and for their eyes only). So, what have I learned from all of this? I have learned that nobody could ever possibly fully understand any river, never mind multiple rivers. In order for that to be true, they would have to intimately know each and every possible drift in every little seam, behind ever little rock and at every possible water flow. This would be an impossible task for any one man or even an army of men. So, I have come to view things in the following manner when it comes to fly fishing for steelhead or any migratory species of fish. Every steelhead fly fisherman starts their journey with a blank internal GPS unit. Through time, experiences, lessons learned and the people they meet their internal GPS unit becomes full of data that is meaningful at both a macro and micro level. But, what ultimately becomes most valuable is the refined information relating not so much to what river and what pool but more so to the exact rock or seam and the exact drift necessary for most effectively fishing that specific location under a variety of constantly changing dynamics. With that said, sometimes it is easy to go to the places I know very well and fish the drifts that I know inside and out. But, too much of that often leads to boredom and complacency and I lose the sense of adventure and the fun of trying to figure something out for the first time. I try to balance my steelhead outings by spending equal amounts of time in the drifts I know and the drifts I don’t know or need to know better. Doing this on many rivers, through passing years, has enabled me to constantly learn new things, grow my internal GPS database and pursue steelhead within the context of a variety of new challenges. This steelhead was very rewarding for me, as I was in search of a bright fish from a specific drift within a small section of a big river where I still have so much to learn.
Jeremy….great steelhead. It doesn’t suck that is is big and looks like it came in from the lake that day! Great job….i agree completly. For me the gps factor is a factor used for all species. i remember when i first met you, you made it clear to me that one stretch of river here in maine looks just like a big piece of flat water, but when you look at things on a micro level you can start to see the holding pools, riffles, ledges, etc. Anyone can fish in a certain spot, but it takes experience and knowledge to know exactly where the drift is.
jeremy,
beautiful fresh fish! in the salt i often bypass where i know there are fish in search of one big one. its hard for most people but the rewards can be great. well done brother.
-Ed
Looks like you have been putting in the time and learning a ton nice job brother… refinement makes great wine …as refinement makes great fishermen..
Alex
exactly .. you know what i am talking about ed … it would be foolish to think, “oh, i want to catch a big striper .. so all i gotta do is go to rhode island with some featherwing patterns” .. there is ALOT more to it than that, as you know … and if a person went on that information alone, even with a handful of generalized areas and spots … it’s very possible they might catch nothing, never mind a big striper …. even if the spot they are at was producing big fish a week ago .. that same spot might be totally void of fish/bait etc… due to a number of factors such as tide, moon phases, wind, movement of bait etc… that’s what makes fly fishing for migratory fish so much fun, and we sure had a blast chasing the hard tales around this year .. certainly learned, many times the hard way, that yesterday’s news was old news and how important wind and tides and bait and all those things were and how they affected the different spots we were fishing … fun stuff, can’t wait for next summer already .. in the meantiime, good luck chasing the steelhead and building up your GPS steelhead database! ….
tell ya what … when i come to argentina i am relying on your gps system, and when you come to maine or steelheading .. you can rely on mine … cuz i certainly know that argentina is MASSIVE and i would not even know where to begin …. that’s where your gonna come in 🙂 ….
Nice looking fish! I’ve done the same thing this year where I’m searching alot of new spots. I’ll never tire of catching steelhead but it’s like new again when you stick one in a new spot. Then you put that coordinate in the memory bank for a later date. Oh, feel free to forward those mental waypoints over anytime. 🙂
That’s a beautiful fish. You guys in the US seem to get quite a few of those big, silver-sided salmonids. Both my supervisor for next year (going to do post-grad), and another fishing mate of mine love fly-fishing for trout and salmon. I’ve never done it, but the more I listen to those guys talk about it, the more curious I become. Such large fish on flies as small as No. 24s and 4lb leader. How bizarre…Maybe one day I’ll get a shot at it.
awesome fish dude! hard work and persistance works every time!
Old White Finn, that thing was a monster…That is a nice little pocket he was living in, alot of people would walk right by that water. Nice work j-bone.