The Snags

July 2013

It had been a great day so far, I had landed over eight feisty cutthroat and I would end up with over a dozen by the end. However, as of now, I was releasing a gorgeous eight inch fish caught on a small bead head pheasant tail. I slid the hook out without lifting him from the water, and he looked fairly healthy as he swam away. Without any further ado, I lifted my line and made a nice overhead cast about ten feet away, in a good looking holding spot. As it drifted, I noticed a wicked looking submerged stump that I knew my fly would snag on. I tried to jerk my rig out of harm’s way, but to no avail. The hook caught and it was stuck. Since the current was too fast to wade through, and I was positive there were more trout in that hole, I tried jerking a few fast times. No improvement. Seeing as I was about to have to snap the tippet, I walked towards shore, pulling on the line above the rod. I felt it give, and I figured I had only snapped it at the fly. I then looked at my line to find all that was left of my leader was an eight inch butt of thirty pound test. I laughed genially; I had already caught plenty of fish, so I didn’t mind the inconvenience. I spent the next five minutes tying a new one, and fashioned a similar rig with a strike indicator and split shot and fly. I cast out and somehow snagged on that same log. I pulled once and the entire leader came off again, leaving me with six inches of butt section. A little more annoying this time, I tied a third one hastily, and cast a third time. I was confident that my fly was out of the reach of the snag. As I turned around to see my position on the bank, I felt deadweight again. I looked to find that the hook on my fly had somehow snagged around both of the trailing lines from my previous snags. I gave up.

August 2013

I slid the small trout back into the water. It had been a fair, not good day of fishing at the Oak Grove Fork. I had caught a few fish, but the waters were high and I had to work for each one. I continued casting along the section of the river, right next to an enormous log that extended all the way across the river. Coming down from that log was a long series of branches that held many trout. I prepared to lift on my back cast when I felt deadweight. My indicator and fly had snagged on a small branch extending off of the top of the log. I tried to free it with my rod tip, and wrapped my fly line around the branch several times by accident. Soon I was left with a helpless mess. I sighed. I knew what I had to do. Most fishermen would have merely broken the line and tied a new leader, but I was too stubborn for that. I let out enough line to let me walk to the shore, and I set my rod down there. Then, I climbed up a pile of branches onto the top of the log, which was comfortably seven to ten feet above the fast flowing, fairly deep water (about five feet deep). I have clambered over all sorts of logs while fishing here, but this one was very narrow, only a foot wide. It was also slippery from the heavy raining that had been relentless over the last few days. I carefully walked across it, my balance is usually pretty good but anything could happen. I looked down. Below me was a deluge of icy water rushing at an incredible speed. I gulped and got to work. The branch was halfway across the log, so I felt especially foolhardy. I slowly untangled my line and tossed the free end in the water. My task being done, I carefully walked back to the shore, picked up my rod, waded back in, and tripped over a rock into the water.