During the mid-winter ice and snow, N. Vince Sybil and I were smitten by the urge to do some winter trout fishing. While most people turn to outdoor activities like snowmobiling, skiing, snowshoeing, or ice fishing, winter fly-fishing is a sport enjoyed by tens of hardy, if not peculiar, outdoorsmen.
The forecast called for a cold but sunny day so we assumed we would have a heavily overcast sky and mild temperatures. That would be perfect for fly-fishing. It turned out that the weather forecasters chose that particular day to give their one accurate forecast for the year. The day was the first clear day all winter. With no clouds overnight all heat had escaped the planet and the temperature was about -12 degrees. We prepared for the cold by dressing in layers, including fleece pants, stocking caps, parkas, and a flask of single malt scotch.
Sybil and I reached the Wabimakadi River after negotiating some snow-laden roads. We got out of the car and slipped our parkas on. I tucked a pair of fingerless wool gloves into the left pocket of my parka along with a chemical hand warmer. We slipped on our waders and vests, grabbed our rods and cautiously worked our way down the first few feet of the sloping path that led to the river.
Sybil figured out how to make a wide, easily negotiated path in the virgin snow by placing his butt quickly and firmly against the ground, leaning back, and screaming his way to the bottom of the path with his neoprene-covered legs in the air. I, on the other hand, recovered Sybil’s rod and took the more traditional approach, stepping down the slope using the path so adequately cleared by my partner.
Shelf ice had formed along the edge of the river wherever a back eddy had slowed the current enough for the water to freeze. The entire forest was iced and quite winsome as Sybil broke some of the shelf ice to enter the water. He said he could have sworn that hole was three feet to the left. Although he was standing in four feet of water, surrounded by ice, he was able to extricate himself in spite of my feeble assistance and raucous laughter.
Trout, being cold-blooded animals, are less active in cold water and are best fished along the bottom with egg patterns and sculpins. We rigged up with weighted slip droppers and egg patterns, similar to a spinning rig used for steelhead fishing in the Midwest. I cast the rig to the head of a run on the outside of a bend and almost immediately felt the slight hesitation of a pickup. I raised my rod tip and felt the surge of a heavy trout on the other end.
"This is a nice fish!" I called out to Sybil who was gingerly probing the river’s edge to enter the water downstream. I felt the combined surge of the current and a heavy fish. But as I gently worked the fish toward me, I saw an eight-inch Brown Trout using a discarded foam cup with a hole in the bottom to protect itself from the cold. That so young a fish understood the insulating qualities of plastic foam impressed me as to their intelligence.
After a few more casts and the associated tip-ice removal, I noticed a sizeable dark area in the stream that seemed to undulate around a light patch in its center. Being of greater curiosity than sense, I quietly approached the scene, as the cold water swept against my waders.
The dark area turned out to be about a hundred fish in various sizes and tightly concentrated near the head of the school, body against body. This crowding created a huge air bubble behind them and, in the center of the air bubble, a small fire burned. The school slowly rotated clockwise around the fire until they reached its downstream side. After a few minutes of being warmed by the fire, these fish became more active and began migrating clockwise, toward the head of the school. As one fish joined the tightly packed group, another would drop backward taking its turn to warm itself by the fire.
I called Sybil over to witness this activity. Earlier, on our way to the river, we wondered if the stocked strains of the Wabimakadi were as hardy as wild fish, but we never considered they might be so resourceful. Instinctively, we realized these fish might perish if we attempted to break up the school, or cast to them, so we carefully moved around them and continued upstream keeping our eyes peeled for foam cups lurking behind the rocks.
In all my years of fishing, I have never observed such behavior. I considered returning to the car to get my camera so I could fully document this phenomenon but Vince’s cooler mind prevailed.
"Don’t bother," He said. "Scientists already know that heat flows downstream."
Royal Dun
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