Last weekend my wife and I fished a few spots along the North Shore. First observation: the weather was spectacular. Second observation: The Pinks weren’t “in” yet. I was surprised by that. We checked everywhere from the Cascade all the way down to Gooseberry and never saw one. We ended up scaling down our presentations and looking for a few trout. The little Rainbows and Brookies we found were very willing to chase down dry flies. Mona stuck with a Hopper imitation while I was using a #14 Yellow Humpy or a #18 Parachute Adams. We also fished a trout lake off the Gunflint trail and had good success with #8 Pass lake streamers.
Ever run into an “expert” ? We were standing on the bank of the temperance river when this guy stomps up, gets in my face, and blurts out “You’re doing this ALL WRONG!”. “There aren’t any more bugs in the river, you need to be using a piece of crawler right on the bottom”. I pointed out the Caddis flies all over the river and asked him if he thought those were insects. Then he started telling me about a “foot and a half long Brookie” he caught down by the mouth that he …..it bothers me to even repeat this…….that he flipped up on the bank, and it flopped into the river before he could grab it. Good lord….a Coaster Brookie is one of the rarest and most special fish found in Minnesota. And he “flipped it up on the bank”? I had to walk away.
Nice weather, a few fish, and way too many people around. We had a nice time anyway.
