Who Needs Hendricksons When You've Got Pass lakes

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Hearing rumors of the Hendries coming off I headed over to the
"Mayfly" yesterday.

The water was a little high so I started fishing a Pass Lake streamer
with a soft hackle dropper. I kept getting swipes at the Pass Lake and
nothing on the soft hackle. So I snipped them both off and put on a
smaller, regular Pass Lake. I almost immediately began catching fish.

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There had been a few BWOs coming off when I got there about 1pm. As it
got closer to 2 o'clock the Hendricksons started showing up. The fish
began hitting harder than ever. I had tied up various Hendrickson
imitations the night before; Hendrickson nymphs, Hendrickson emergers,
Hendrickson cripples, Hendrickson dries, etc. etc.. But as the fish
seemed to be responding to the Pass Lake, even taking it on a dead
drift, thats what I kept on.

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None of the fish were large but there were a good number of what we
used to call "keepers". They put a nice bend in the bamboo rod. One
thing I did notice though was the bigger they were the more severely
they had been hit by black spot. Other than the speckles they were fat
and healthy, although this one was so infected that I pondered bonking
him and taking him home for supper.

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Instead I let him go. Hopefully he'll fight off the infestation and
make it through the summer.

I had intended to speed fish my way down to the section midway between
the two access points on this part of the river. But the heavy hatch
of flies and large rise of fish delayed me. By the time I made it to
my destination the Hendrickson hatch was petering out and my favored
water didn't fish as well as the water that I usually bypass. I kept
on picking up scattered trout but the tempo was slowing. By 3:30 the
Hendries had stopped and though there were several other species of
mayflies emerging the trout didn't seem interested in them. I caught
my last few in this stretch still using the Pass Lake.

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The last two hours had me trying various other flies; caddis dries,
traditional wets, soft hackles, streamers and ,yes, Hendricksons with
absolutely nothing to show for it. A humbling end to what started out
as a ego inflating day.

It was fun to get into some fish and see a strong hatch after the long
winter and spring. With gas prices where they are I probably won't be
making the 50 mile round trip to the "'Fly" very often (if at all)
anymore this year. I guess I'll just have to be content with the
short, easy drive to the River. Poor me.

Geo.C.