Sometimes you just hit it right....Long TR

Thursday came up very hot and very humid in northern Michigan, and the water
temps were approaching 60 degrees. An early afternoon wade in the Manistee
to familiarize myself with the changes in that particular section of river
brought forth a few little brookies but nothing more. Turns out I wouldn't
end up on that section for a few more days.

Over a few adult beverages before the community meal, it was decided that 5
of us would float in river boats from secret spot #1 to secret spot # 2.
Unlike the Ausable, the Manistee has fewer public access points where you
are able to launch and recover a riverboat and any float was going to be a
long one. We expected to put in around 9 pm and not get to our destination
until dawn was going to be breaking and this was by design. We actually got
the boat in the water at 8 thirtyish. While we waited for the trucks and
trailers to be spotted, I thought I'd play around. 1st cast, a little
brookie, 2nd cast a little bigger brookie, 3rd cast an even bigger little
brookie. I'd never done four in a row before could it be? nope, my steeple
cast didn't steeple and I lost the fly in a rather large tree. By the time
I'd repaired the leader and tied on a new fly the spottees had returned.

We launched the boats, three of us in one boat, two in the other.
Leapfrogging we raised quite a few fish in the 8-12" range with activity
picking up until it was near dusk. This time of year dusk comes late to
northern michigan, while not the land of the rising sun, it's not uncommon
for it to still be bright after 10pm. We found a spot we liked away from
wading fishermen and anchored in (the Manistee is not a wide river here and
I hate it when floating fishermen park their boats int the hole I'm fishing)
Sometimes I wish I could be underwater when the hatches that bring the
really big fish to the surface start to happen. I thought the time was near
so I put down the three weight and reached for the five weight. Before
setting off in the boat, I had cut the leader back to roughly four feet and
tied on a couple of feet of 1X tippet. To the tippet I tied on a size 6
parachute hex pattern.

Fishing the hex hatch is more about quality than quanity. If one wanted to,
they could catch a *ton* of trout during the hex hatch. But the Hex is often
the one chance the average angler has to catch a 20+" brown trout with a dry
fly and the tradition is to let the fish feed until the big fish are on.
When you're floating, you park outside the pool and then pole into the edge
of the pool when the big fish start to work. These fish don't get big by
accident and playing a smaller fish will put the big ones back down to their
hiding places. You don't see these fish, you HEAR these fish. So the angler
fights the tempation to cast to each rise they can still see or hear once
the the sun goes down and waits for the big boys to show. I don't really
know how to describe it but I've come around bends thinking I was hearing
another wading fisherman or a deer but wasn't.

From my observation it seems as dusk starts to fall the smaller fish become
very active but they begin to get active further and further out into the
shallows of the hole.because the bigger fish start moving out of their lies
and into feeding positions. by the time the hatch is really getting started
there;s almost like three - four feeding rings: small, medium, big, and
bigger. We sat there taking it in and waiting. When we finally heard the
noise(s) were waiting for. We took turns. The first angler in the boat I
was in should have known better but he was trying to cast a size 4 fly with
a soft four weight rod, Lefty Kreh he's not. I got into a 17" brown on my
second drift and landed him fairly quick (1X tippet).

As I was casting to the other another riser I missed my mark and hooked up
good into a sweeper (tree lying across the river) so I was done for until it
ended. The other boat had an angler who had never experienced it before so
we invited them to move up a little closer to the hole and to try for the
fish I was going after before my mishap. Well the rookie executed a nice
cast to the noise and got to feel a trout pull out line, he was rewarded
with a brown trout a whole lot fatter and an inch or two bigger than the
fish I had landed before snagging. After I broke off my fly, I had to
briefly turn on my head light to thread the tippet through the new fly eye
and the place was smarming with hex's, the light immediately attrated so
many to my face that i could not see through my glasses. I had hit this
hatch before but never like this. We had a ball and everyone except the guy
in back got into a decent fish.

After the fish in this hole quit feeding, we moved on down the river slowly.
Casting to risers that we heard or saw in the moonlight we had a blast,
catching several fish in the 14-18" category until the spinners came on.
That section of the river was coated with them and I made three casts, the
third cast put a serious bend in the rod and line was moving at an alarming
rate. I tightened the drag on the reel just a little too much and *ping*,
whatever I had hooked broke off where I had tied the tippet on. My partners
kept catching fish, even the guy in back with the soft rod. But like
everywhere else in the world when you have hot unstable and humid air around
you, thunderstorms often develop. Lighting started to happen and the thunder
got louder in the distance and we were a long way from our takeout point.
The storm never did come over our section but the resuting temp change
probably had something to do with the fish just *turning off* about 1 am.
But we had caught fish and spent the next three hours reaching the take out
point and enjoying the float and company in the light of a full moon.

Friday was different. I waded the upper Manistee near DeWard during the day
and caught a few brookies and not much else. It was hotter than Thursday and
even tho I was wading wet in a cold water stream, it took a lot out of me
and decided to hibernate until dark. After the community meal of crawfish
and shrimp, it was back to the Mannistee. Only this time we were wading and
just as the fish started getting active, the lightening came on and the feed
stopped. Oh well, at least the malt was good. g

Saturday was the highlight of my week. I;ve been coming up here for 11 years
and rarely fished the north branch of the AuSable. I drove to Lovells with
Ralph the golden. After finding an access point with no cars and other
visible anglers (unusual even during the hex), I let him play around for a
while and enjoyed the view of the river. After Ralph settled down I moved
upstream, the weather had cooled and it was sunny again but almost any well
placed attractor pattern will draw a brookies attention in northern MI. I
liked how they woud torpedo after the fly, their dorsal fins breaking the
surface and leaving a little wake. I caught quite a few using the same rod I
let mr claspy try in OH when I was casting to another rising fish and missed
my target by about three feet. I fought the temptation to immediately recast
and the biggest brookie I have ever seen in Michigan hit my fly. It was a
fun fight on the cane but I landed it without too much delay. I measured the
fish with a tape measure and it was just short of 18". I might never again
see one that big and I;ve heard of bigger brookies being caught up there, I
would take that over the fish I lost Thursday night.

The night and fishing ended for me by wading the Manistee again, this time
somewhere between county 612 and M-72. The weather had changed but I still
expected something but he first several hundred yards revealed no bugs and
no visible rising fish. Until I came across this big sweeper which was
acting like a broom and sweeping up every hex floating downstream resuling
in a 400' pool of hex spinners and hungry fish. I spent several fun hours
catching some decent browns but nothing over the magical 20" marker as I
just could not get a decent cast out to the really loud sounds. After a
while I gave up and climbed out, spending the rest of the night sampling
some of scotland;s finest. A most excellent time was had by all and as in
the past reaided a few grand for the resource during the annual Trout bum
Barbeque.