Wednesday Fly Fishing – The Oldman Dam and more
The Oldman Dam was our starting point and also a spot we we presented with the opportunity to practice our field fix skills. Translation, broken rod tip. I was lazy the night before and set my rod in the back, flies attached. This morning I was careless and just grabbed it to move it aside so I could get started putting on waders. One of the flies grabbed and I snapped my rod tip. I’ve broken rod tips before. I knew if I wanted to keep fishing, it was field fix time again.
A small piece of Gorilla Tape was used to hold the tip in place, with about 1-1/2″ of overlap to the main rod section then winding on some 12 pound Trilene from my tackle box. Finally some quick dry LePage Gel glue. Wait about 15 minutes for the glue to set and harden while I watched Klubber fish, then time to put the field fix to the test. The first test would be casting. The second test, hopefully, would be landing a fish.
Casting felt great, same as before the break, then test 2 presented itself. An 11″ Brown Trout hit the Copper John floating under my hopper (a hopper – copper – dropper) and I brought it to the net.
This was a tough spot to wade and cast. Most of the fishing from that section of the river would be from man made fish structure rock piles. We decided to return to the Waterton where most fish were caught by Klubber. I managed a Whitefish from the Swimming Hole rapids. Klubber pulled out Browns from Brownsville Station and from a spot we hadn’t ever caught anything, which we named Brookview. A number of fish took a run at the various flies but gave up the chase short of getting hooked.
We went to the Twin Butte restaurant again. Had the bison burger this time. Felt a little guilty not ordering Mexican food but it was delicious.