Hotspotting

Time for a rant! On a local fly fishing forum under the "stories and reports" board I wrote of my buddy catching his first fish with a fly rod and gave a short report about the river conditions and how it was fishing. I think I wrote something like, "the Weber above Coalville." From Coalville upstream to Wanship the distance is approximately 8 miles, that's straight line distance! I immediately got attacked for "hotspotting," telling the "lurkers" out in internet land and all the people who may see my post where the fish are biting. My response is go fuck yerself! I don't understand how you hotspot a section of river that is the most popular reach of water for flyfishers. There is a long, straight, dirt road about a mile in length that has 4 or 5 access points onto private land. Each access point has a fence hopper (ladder over the landowners fence) with a sign that reads something like, "blue ribbon trout fishery," and "the owner of this land has graciously allowed fishing here, please respect the property," or something to that effect. And this is a secret?!? How am I hotspotting a river that has trampled down trails from the fence hopper to the water, signs everywhere, earth tamped down from all the cars and people who park and fish...As Hunter S. Thompson said, "there is nothing more helpless and irresponsible than a man in the depths of an ether binge." The forum cops that accuse people of hotspotting an area like this must surely be huffing ether! The funny part is how many people viewed the post...one post had 5000 views and 80 responses but was started 2 years ago. My post? After only 1 day it had over 2000 views and 70 responses! Now, I can understand the whole argument. There is an area an hour from here that not many people know about. My first time there my buddy and I had the entire stream to ourselves, loads of slutty fish rising to any dry we threw, and, after awhile, we both thought we were trespassing, the fishing was so good (we were legal). I won't go posting about that place, I'd like to keep it on the downlow. But the Weber River? There ain't a section on the Weber that hasn't been hit by every type of fisherman, bait, gear, and fly. After awhile, the whole argument got funny...people getting mad online...typing in all caps...douchebags. I threatened next time I may just post the GPS coordinates of where I go, that'd really bring on pain from all the asshole forum cops. Surprisingly, I didn't get booted off the site. Done, glad to get that off my chest, sorry for the language...the image above, by the way, must be why all these turds are afraid of hotspotting. Combat fishing the Kenai River.

Works in progress...

This is one in progress I'm working on for my mom. Have never done snow before this one. I've been learning some about underpainting with acrylic and really like the idea of starting this way. When it's finished I plan on spraying it so it looks like it's snowing. That brown thing in the front is gonna be a bench overlooking the stream. Happy with the way this one is turning out but I wish I could get myself to be a little more "free" and no try to put so much detail in the background.
This is the first acrylic I've done, followed along with Jerry Yarnell on TV...I'm so past Bob Ross and his little coke nail! I will do this one again and add some cattle in the grass. I know, the cut banks look a way too symmetrical, but, hey, it was the first try! When I do this one over I'll underpaint in acrylic and finish the whole thing with oil. I like the sheen from oil and the way the colors hold...acrylic, I have learned will dry a little darker.
This one is from a photo I took on the Kenai River in Alaska a couple years ago. This would be just above the Russian River Ferry boat crossing looking upriver. Still gonna do some work on it, especially in the foreground. Really happy with the way the trees on the far bank turned out. I was also pleased with people knowing where it was...I showed Sterling a picture of this painting I took with my phone and he knew right where this was taken. Instead of painting on a regular canvas I went to home depot and bought a 2'x4' sheet of 1/8" masonite. I had them cut it into 12"x12" tiles and scrubbed each one down with acetone after giving them a rough sanding to remove any oils in the wood. Costed me 3 bucks and got 8 canvases out of it. I plan on doing this more with smaller pictures...seems like any bigger and they may start to warp. I don't know if my technique of prepping the board was proper but it's working so far.

MUDVAYNE

My favorite band and one of my favorite songs. Fished the Weber yesterday. Weather was perfect, a little chilly but didn't freeze the guides of my rod. There was another car where I wanted to fish so I went down river a good ways. It turned out he went way up river. Caught a nice brown on zebra midge, followed by a few average whities. Still very low water. As I moved upriver I switched to a golden stone #8 with a zebra below. First cast got a small brown. Moved to another area and it was tough, hard current and couldn't keep the fly where I wanted. I moved below the hole, changed up the rig and spanked the whities. I got them on the zebra in black and the rootbeer neon gnat. All were pigs out of this hole. As I left I met the guy in the other car as he left. Seems he fished on top with midges and while I saw plenty of midges on top, didn't see anything rising. Good day.

Weber 3-1-10

Got out and hit some fish today on the Weber above Coalville. This was Brents second day fly fishing...the first day didn't go too good. We were on the water at 0915. The temp in the truck read 24 degrees and when we left read 45. Georgeous day and, despite the iced up guides we both stayed warm...I got some very SEXY thigh high wool sock...yeah...I looked delicious in them! The Weber was super low, fish were stacked up in the deeper pools. Started out with neon gnats in pink and olive and lime green serenstupidies. No luck early on so I put black zebra midges on for both of us and we finally started hitting fish, even if they were whities. I got Brent squared away with his rig and decided to explore downriver a ways. I got a couple whities and a brown on the zebra. When I hooked back up with Brent he had his first fly caught trout, a 12" brown, on his stringer (Brent is catch-and-kill guy, not catch-and-release...yet). We moved up river and were gonna go when I put on a different midge emerger pattern. I hit 4 whities and 2 15 - 17" browns in one hole. We kept them for the frying pan. Brent got a couple more whitefish out of the same hole. I figured we'd keep moving upriver til we got to the truck. We crept up the shore and saw a pod of fish actively feeding in the middle of the water column, all looked to be trout. I got another couple browns right away followed by more whities. By this time I figure it's been a good day and time to leave. I decided to throw some of the big articulated bugs I'd tied up, starting with the brown one. This area was super deep, had a real steep, log choked bank on the far side with a slow current and foam line across the river. My second cast I got nailed, and was hooked up with something big! I yell at Brent to get the camera and then realize I've snagged a f*ckin' whitefish in the dorsal...wishfull thinking! I threw each color of articulated bug I had, had 2 light strikes, but hooked nuttin'. Brent had a little mishap with the camera...I held up a nice brown to get a pic of and apparently Brent didn't push the button hard enough...by the time I'd figured that out I let the fish go. This same thing happened with my buddy Sam on the Beaverhead in Montana...Sam landed the biggest brown of his life and the biggest I'd seen out of the 'Beav ever. As I was scrolling through the digital camera I got the pic of him running down the bank chasing the fish, him fighting the fish after a 70 yard run downriver, and then a pic of his daughter...didn't get the pic of him holding his trophy before releasing it. Now mine wasn't a trophy like Sam's but at least I have a witness. A good day to be on the water and good for Brent on his first fly caught fish(s).