Fishing...
I've just been reading John Gierach's "Dances With Trout". He's really a wonderful and insightful author and has a way of making you really think about the experience that he's relaying to you and link it in to your own experiences. It's been bringing up a lot of memories.
I have vague memories of the first time that I ever went fishing. I must have been all of three years old and we were living in Arizona. It must have been shortly before we moved back to Oregon. I know that my older brother, Michael, had been fishing before that, because I also have vague memories of he and a friend teasing me and smearing fish eggs, freshly removed from whatever fish that they'd caught, on me as his way of making his pesky little brother go away.
I remember that there was a cliff or mesa in the distance and the sun shining on the water. We must have been camping because I have a misty recollection of tents.
What I remember most was reeling in my first catfish. To my young, un-jaded mind it was enormous. More Leviathan than mere fish and it took all of the strength that I had to bring it in. In reality, it was probably no larger than 12 inches which, for a catfish in Arizona, isn't exactly record-breaking.
I also remember cleaning it. Rather, I remember "helping" my father clean the fish. More likely, I was simply watching and playing with the fiddly bits that came out of it. I was flabbergasted by the fact that fish kept balloons inside of themselves, and didn't stop playing with the swim bladder until it deflated and stopped floating.
After that, the first memory that I have of fishing was with my father. He decided one day (or perhaps I instigated it... as I remember he didn't have a fishing license) to take me to Kirk Pond, just north of the dam on Fern Ridge Reservoir and teach me to fish.
My paternal grandfather had fished his whole life and taught my father and, I think, my father wanted to pass along that knowledge.
I don't remember whether or not we caught anything, but I do remember that I had a lot of fun and so did he. He even gave it a few casts himself.
After that, Michael and I went fishing a few times together. He'd drive us in his MG and we'd fish a creek here and there. It was always a fun ride, even the day that his car broke down and we just fished until help arrived.
The most memorable of these experiences was a springtime excursion to the Coyote Creek area of the Fern Ridge Wildlife Area.
We parked across from the entrance to Perkins Peninsula and made our way carefully down the railroad tracks and over the railroad bridge to a spot that I've not been able to find since, or at least haven't caught anything from.
We tied on a couple of crappie jigs under the red-and-white plastic bobbers, ubiquitous among young fishermen, and fished for a while. As I recall, he was much more skilled at enticing the crappie into attacking his jig than I, and we soon had a stringer full of fish.
The stringer was one of the old-type chain stringers with clips, reminiscent of large safety-pins, attached to it and it was heavy with the product of our efforts. Today, I would estimate that there were at least a dozen crappie on it.
As we walked the tracks back to the car, one of the fish twitched and flopped around, as freshly killed fish sometimes do (especially those that have simply been freshly stunned and haven't quite realized their that they have actually slipped their mortal coils and gone to swim in the Great Lake in the Sky).
As a young man of perhaps 8 is prone to do when the deceased become the not-quite-deceased, I became suddenly quite motile. Essentially, I freaked out and did the first thing that came naturally to me - I leaped a few feet into the air, shrieked, and dropped the full stringer of fish.
Unfortunately, this just happened to be about the middle of the railway bridge across the Long Tom River's entrance to the reservoir.
Needless to say, Michael was rather angry as we watched the results of our fishing trip (and his stringer) go sinking into the muddy, murky waters. He explained (as a teen will do with his pesky younger brother) that it was just reflexes and that those fish were, indeed, dead and it was stupid of me to drop them.
I don't remember fishing with Michael after that, though I spent many spring and summer days on and around the reservoir and especially Kirk Pond.
I would get up early in the morning, after gathering nightcrawlers the previous evening, and ride my bicycle the three miles, or so, to Kirk Pond. Sometimes, I'd pack a lunch... usually, I'd forget.
I'd spend the whole day fishing, rarely coming home with anything, but that wasn't the point. I was out fishing and that, in itself, was fun.
I remember one summer afternoon sitting on the "dock" at the southwest corner of the pond. Used to be that there was an arm of land that went out into the pond on which one could walk and there was a path down it. Doesn't seem to be there anymore, but between that arm and the dock, I saw something amazing.
Fishing the inflow from the Long Tom, I would often hook into bluegill, crappie, and the occasional bass and that was what I was doing on this particular occasion. I saw a Red-Winged Blackbird skimming over the water, having abandoned the bush on which it was perched to sing me it's peculiar song.
Suddenly, from nowhere, the water exploded and the biggest bass that I have ever seen (to this day) erupted from the still water and, for a brief moment, hung in the air like a scaly raptor before snatching the hapless blackbird from the wing, and vanishing again into the murky waters.
I invested in a deer-hair mouse lure and spend weeks trying to tease that fish up again. I think that deer-hair mouse is the reason that my father decided to buy me a fly rod. I didn't wind up making use of it until many years in the future, but I'm glad that I've got it now.
For some reason, at some point, I forgot about fishing.
I haven't the smallest clue as to how or why, but it happened. I forgot the love that I had for the sport, the time that it gave me to reflect on life, the freedom, the fights, the fun, and the fish. I forgot all of that, and went for nearly 15 years without a fishing rod in my hand.
Thankfully, Airie helped me remember fishing. One day as we drove along the McKenzie, she mentioned that she'd like to go fishing sometime. The next Independence Day, we decided to do just that and found ourselves at the EWEB park on the south shore of Leaburg Lake.
I think that, between the two of us, we caught one trout that day before being pushed out of the area by a bunch of kids who were there with some church group to go fishing.
It reminded me, though, that I really loved fishing, and we made sure to do it again... and again.
Since then, it's hard to keep me from picking up a fishing rod at any time of year unless I'm busily hunting waterfowl, big game, upland birds, shellfish, or mushrooms. Even then, I've ALWAYS got at least one fishing rod in the truck and am ready to wet a line any time.
Sadly, this winter hasn't been the best for me in that regard. With the price of fuel so high, I've been opting to spend my time in the goose fields (15 miles) rather than on the Alsea (50 miles or so) or the Siuslaw (40 miles).
I really miss having a big silver streak on the end of my line, though. I'm having steelhead withdrawals in the worst way. I remember the first steelhead that I was actually able to land (not the first one that I hooked... or the second... or third... or fourth... I got really GREAT at losing steelhead... often in conjunction with the loss of a $3 steelhead jig or complicated and time-consuming rig to boot).
It was January of last year, I believe, on the Sixes. Yes, my hair looked crazy and wild in the photos, but MAN was it awesome.
I think that one day very soon, I'm gonna have to bite the bullet and go get some steel... maybe next week, now that goose season is done... We'll see, now, won't we.
I have vague memories of the first time that I ever went fishing. I must have been all of three years old and we were living in Arizona. It must have been shortly before we moved back to Oregon. I know that my older brother, Michael, had been fishing before that, because I also have vague memories of he and a friend teasing me and smearing fish eggs, freshly removed from whatever fish that they'd caught, on me as his way of making his pesky little brother go away.
I remember that there was a cliff or mesa in the distance and the sun shining on the water. We must have been camping because I have a misty recollection of tents.
What I remember most was reeling in my first catfish. To my young, un-jaded mind it was enormous. More Leviathan than mere fish and it took all of the strength that I had to bring it in. In reality, it was probably no larger than 12 inches which, for a catfish in Arizona, isn't exactly record-breaking.
I also remember cleaning it. Rather, I remember "helping" my father clean the fish. More likely, I was simply watching and playing with the fiddly bits that came out of it. I was flabbergasted by the fact that fish kept balloons inside of themselves, and didn't stop playing with the swim bladder until it deflated and stopped floating.
After that, the first memory that I have of fishing was with my father. He decided one day (or perhaps I instigated it... as I remember he didn't have a fishing license) to take me to Kirk Pond, just north of the dam on Fern Ridge Reservoir and teach me to fish.
My paternal grandfather had fished his whole life and taught my father and, I think, my father wanted to pass along that knowledge.
I don't remember whether or not we caught anything, but I do remember that I had a lot of fun and so did he. He even gave it a few casts himself.
After that, Michael and I went fishing a few times together. He'd drive us in his MG and we'd fish a creek here and there. It was always a fun ride, even the day that his car broke down and we just fished until help arrived.
The most memorable of these experiences was a springtime excursion to the Coyote Creek area of the Fern Ridge Wildlife Area.
We parked across from the entrance to Perkins Peninsula and made our way carefully down the railroad tracks and over the railroad bridge to a spot that I've not been able to find since, or at least haven't caught anything from.
We tied on a couple of crappie jigs under the red-and-white plastic bobbers, ubiquitous among young fishermen, and fished for a while. As I recall, he was much more skilled at enticing the crappie into attacking his jig than I, and we soon had a stringer full of fish.
The stringer was one of the old-type chain stringers with clips, reminiscent of large safety-pins, attached to it and it was heavy with the product of our efforts. Today, I would estimate that there were at least a dozen crappie on it.
As we walked the tracks back to the car, one of the fish twitched and flopped around, as freshly killed fish sometimes do (especially those that have simply been freshly stunned and haven't quite realized their that they have actually slipped their mortal coils and gone to swim in the Great Lake in the Sky).
As a young man of perhaps 8 is prone to do when the deceased become the not-quite-deceased, I became suddenly quite motile. Essentially, I freaked out and did the first thing that came naturally to me - I leaped a few feet into the air, shrieked, and dropped the full stringer of fish.
Unfortunately, this just happened to be about the middle of the railway bridge across the Long Tom River's entrance to the reservoir.
Needless to say, Michael was rather angry as we watched the results of our fishing trip (and his stringer) go sinking into the muddy, murky waters. He explained (as a teen will do with his pesky younger brother) that it was just reflexes and that those fish were, indeed, dead and it was stupid of me to drop them.
I don't remember fishing with Michael after that, though I spent many spring and summer days on and around the reservoir and especially Kirk Pond.
I would get up early in the morning, after gathering nightcrawlers the previous evening, and ride my bicycle the three miles, or so, to Kirk Pond. Sometimes, I'd pack a lunch... usually, I'd forget.
I'd spend the whole day fishing, rarely coming home with anything, but that wasn't the point. I was out fishing and that, in itself, was fun.
I remember one summer afternoon sitting on the "dock" at the southwest corner of the pond. Used to be that there was an arm of land that went out into the pond on which one could walk and there was a path down it. Doesn't seem to be there anymore, but between that arm and the dock, I saw something amazing.
Fishing the inflow from the Long Tom, I would often hook into bluegill, crappie, and the occasional bass and that was what I was doing on this particular occasion. I saw a Red-Winged Blackbird skimming over the water, having abandoned the bush on which it was perched to sing me it's peculiar song.
Suddenly, from nowhere, the water exploded and the biggest bass that I have ever seen (to this day) erupted from the still water and, for a brief moment, hung in the air like a scaly raptor before snatching the hapless blackbird from the wing, and vanishing again into the murky waters.
I invested in a deer-hair mouse lure and spend weeks trying to tease that fish up again. I think that deer-hair mouse is the reason that my father decided to buy me a fly rod. I didn't wind up making use of it until many years in the future, but I'm glad that I've got it now.
For some reason, at some point, I forgot about fishing.
I haven't the smallest clue as to how or why, but it happened. I forgot the love that I had for the sport, the time that it gave me to reflect on life, the freedom, the fights, the fun, and the fish. I forgot all of that, and went for nearly 15 years without a fishing rod in my hand.
Thankfully, Airie helped me remember fishing. One day as we drove along the McKenzie, she mentioned that she'd like to go fishing sometime. The next Independence Day, we decided to do just that and found ourselves at the EWEB park on the south shore of Leaburg Lake.
I think that, between the two of us, we caught one trout that day before being pushed out of the area by a bunch of kids who were there with some church group to go fishing.
It reminded me, though, that I really loved fishing, and we made sure to do it again... and again.
Since then, it's hard to keep me from picking up a fishing rod at any time of year unless I'm busily hunting waterfowl, big game, upland birds, shellfish, or mushrooms. Even then, I've ALWAYS got at least one fishing rod in the truck and am ready to wet a line any time.
Sadly, this winter hasn't been the best for me in that regard. With the price of fuel so high, I've been opting to spend my time in the goose fields (15 miles) rather than on the Alsea (50 miles or so) or the Siuslaw (40 miles).
I really miss having a big silver streak on the end of my line, though. I'm having steelhead withdrawals in the worst way. I remember the first steelhead that I was actually able to land (not the first one that I hooked... or the second... or third... or fourth... I got really GREAT at losing steelhead... often in conjunction with the loss of a $3 steelhead jig or complicated and time-consuming rig to boot).
It was January of last year, I believe, on the Sixes. Yes, my hair looked crazy and wild in the photos, but MAN was it awesome.
I think that one day very soon, I'm gonna have to bite the bullet and go get some steel... maybe next week, now that goose season is done... We'll see, now, won't we.