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March 2008 Newsletter

North Umpqua Chronicle - March 24, 2008
Pat McRae - March 26, 2008

March 24, 2008 Chronicle, 4,800 cfs, water 44 degrees F.

            It is mid-afternoon when I arrive at the cabin after 9 days absence, and I am greeted by the cry of ospreys.   The pair that built the big nest in a broken topped fir only 50 yards down river from our front porch last year has returned…Wife, Becky, will be happy.  They are noisy but we enjoy having them around nonetheless.  More trilliums are blooming behind the cabin, and high in the sky upriver I see buzzards, a sure sign that spring is truly here.

         It takes a while to haul in and put away all of the foodstuff and the other necessities that the wife has loaded me down with, but before long I am on my way up river.

          It is delightfully sunny as I drive along, smoking a horrid cigar that someone has given me…Becky would make me throw it away, but she is not here so I can do what I want.

         Before I left the cabin I'd noticed from the front porch that the river is quite a bit higher, but the color is good, and I am already formulating a plan.  I will start above Steamboat at one of my favorite high water pools.

           When I arrive at the pullout, I stamp out the remains of the stogie, and a minute or two later I am down on the stand, stripping line and laying out my first cast, and with each succeeding cast I lengthen an arms length strip.  On the fourth or fifth cast, my fly is still not down to the holding lie, but there is a powerful grab, and a really big fish charges off down river.  It comes to the surface several times along the way, thrashing angrily, like a raging bull trying to rid itself of a pesky rider…neither bull nor fish have much patience for such distractions.

        There is no way I can follow it downstream from here, short of jumping in and floating after it, so I clamp down on the line, hoping somehow to turn it and begin winching it back up.  The line burns a deepening groove in my finger, until finally, sixty yards or so downriver it rages on the surface one more time and then it’s free.  Hot damn, these big winter fish are really something!  We absolutely have to find the way to protect them permanently with a wild catch and release regulation!

Cruising slowly back down river, enjoying the afterglow, I fish the 8-Pull…nothing there, and then Mill Run.  Haven’t touched a fish there yet this year, but today is my day I guess…I make half dozen or so casts, and be doggoned if I’m not into another one.  It is immediately obvious that this one is not big.  Turns out to be a very pretty bright little hen.  Not bad for a couple hours out on the beautiful river.  As I cruise down the straight stretch below Susan Creek I am treated to one of the canyon’s beautiful fiery sunsets.  It is so good to be back on the river.

P. McRae