First Longbow Deer

    It all started one Monday at work. I was driving around right at dawn to see what was going on at the park and I am glad that I did. The deer activity was absolutely on fire. Bucks were squaring up in the fields to assert their dominance, others had their noses to the ground trotting in wide circles trying to pick up the scent of any number of willing does. It was the most deer activity I had seen in a couple years and I wanted part of it, the only problem was, it was only archery season.

    I have been shooting traditional archery for 20+ years. That all started at a local Renaissance fair when I was a youngin' and I was just begging my dad to spend the $5 to let me shoot a dozen arrows. He said no and I was bummed (at least I assume that I was). Little did I know that we would be stopping on the way home at one of his buddies houses and picking up an old fiberglass youth bow that I would then proceed to absolutely wear out over the next couple of years. Fast forward a couple of decades and here we are. 

    All that being said, I had not really hunted with a bow in probably 10 years and I hadn't even shot any of my bows for the past 2 because of an aching shoulder. In the mean time, I fell really hard for slingshots because they use pretty much all the same principles but with a 5lb draw weight. I have taken a few rabbits with the slingshot and I tell ya, its mighty satisfying. That hobby and the thousands of shots taken is the only reason that I don't feel too bad about the decisions I made next...

    Back to the story, deer were active, I was out of practice, I didn't have all of my gear, I hadn't done any scouting, I had to borrow some broadheads from my buddy because mine were at my parents house. I was unprepared to say the absolute least but I had the next day off... I was gonna give it a go. The bow that I felt the most comfortable taking out into the woods was my Bodnik SlickStick, 35lb @28, probably lighter than most would consider ethical but we all know its about shot placement and getting close in. Arrows were Beman Centershots and I was shooting the borrowed 100gr G5 Montecs, total arrow weight was just over 460 grains. I was as ready as I could have been for such a short notice hunt.

    I walked out to the stand behind my house and was situated and listening to the woods wake up just before shooting light. Once there was enough light for me to make out what I might be shooting at I started blowing on a grunt tube, nothing fancy, just a burp every 5 minutes or so. I didn't expect to have such a quick reaction. Not twenty minutes into my first sit in the woods with my bow in over a decade, I have a deer coming right at me through the hollies. All I knew at that point was that I was hopefully getting ready to send an arrow through my first tradbow deer, and as luck would have it, it wasn't a spike. I stood up as smoothly as possible and brought the bow up. I drew back just as the deer was about to walk into a basketball sized shooting lane, where he proceeded to come to a dead stop. At that point, I was at full draw and my knees were knocking so much that I could have played backup maracas for a mariachi band. It felt like an eternity and I was just waiting for the deer to see my movement and bolt but as luck would have it, he put his head back down and took a step forward. Arrow was loosed and it disappeared into the side of the deer, a bit high and back... but I had done it.

    For the first couple seconds, all I could do was confirm it to myself over and over in my mind "you got it, good hit, you got it, good hit". All the while, I was able to hear the deer crash out behind me. I was elated, I knew it had to be a good hit when I heard that the deer hadn't even made it to the field 70 yards behind me. Good judgement and sound advice from my bowhunting buddy said, let the deer rest for at least an hour but I just couldn't wait. After 15 minutes, I had calmed down enough to feel safe climbing down from my stand and I walked over to my arrow which lay, absolutely drenched in blood, just under where the deer was standing (10 yards as I would later measure). I said a quick prayer, thanking our Heavenly Father for the opportunity and the ability to take a shot on such a beautiful animal then I set off to find my prize.

    As expected, I found the deer, expired not more than 50 yards from my stand, I was through the roof. I said some more prayers of thanks, took some pictures, sent them to my family and hunting buddies, walked to the house to grab the side by side and the youngin's and we set off to get my hands bloody...

View from the stand, deer came in and was shot at the 4 o'clock position

Turned out to be a liver hit with a major artery severed.

I couldn't be more proud of this harvest. Everything really came together for me and it has rekindled my love of traditional archery, hopefully my shoulder can keep up. Later that week, I had the opportunity to take a shot at another, smaller buck not 10' from where I shot this one but he spotted me and smartly made a 180 and got out of town.

Bluegill

     I find it frustrating at times that my mind cannot focus on one hobby at a time. If my current interest is going out and shooting flintlocks in the woods, you could probably convince me to sell all of my slingshots, modern firearms, convention fishing tackle, reloading supplies, you name it! I have a one track mind and when I am into something, I'm in it 100%, that is, until I see a random short on YouTube of a guy tying a partridge and orange. Then my mind switches tracks faster than a derailing freight train. That very thing happened a week or so ago, in conjunction with a short fishing trip with conventional tackle where the telltale "smack" of a bluegill sucking a bug off of the surface made me wish I had a fly rod with a foam bug rather than an ultralight spinning rod with a jig.

    At the beginning of this year, I decided to keep a fishing log, nothing special, just a spreadsheet to keep track of how many and what kind of fish I was catching, weather, number of outings, etc. I had been watching ultralight fishing videos all winter (thanks Fish Anything) and told myself that I was gonna get an early start with the ultralight spinning setup fishing dropshots, floats, spoons and whatever else works in the cold. Now all this being said, I have been fishing for the past 20 years solely with a fly rod. Looking back, that was kind of dumb because there is a ton of fun to be had with conventional tackle and there is no doubt that fishing warm-water bodies of water during the winter is just plain more effective with a spinning rod over fly tackle. I'm not saying its impossible but its easier to fish 20' of water with a jig than a wooly bugger. Anyhow, that is exactly how I spent the first half of this year, bringing about 120 fish to hand in 19 outings so far. Maybe not great numbers for some but that counts the 15 minute sessions as well as the 6 hour ones. 

    Alright, focus... After all that fish catching fun on the ultralight, that dang partridge and orange sparked that drive to pull out the fly rod. I grabbed my most recent acquisition of fly tackle which is a 7.5' 3wt Blue Halo fiberglass rod. There is something about a light and limber rod that just feels right. Anywho, I tied on a bit of egg yarn and took it out to the yard to tease the ducks and cats. I tell ya, casting a fly rod is just like riding a bike, you never do forget that rhythm and dang is it pleasant. The next weekday that I had off, I loaded up the "Skookum Choocher" (1984 15' Michicraft aluminum canoe) and headed off to the pond. As you can imagine, the first thing I was gonna fish was a partridge and orange albeit, suspended below a Llano bug. The soft hackle definitely got some interest but they were just as enthused about the topwater offering so off with the dropper and on with the popper! It was non stop action with that fine little rod for about 2 hours, bringing 29 decent (up to 8.5") bluegill to hand. 

    The next question is "what is better than bluegill and fiberglass?" Well bluegill and bamboo of course! And so a week later, I found myself out on the same water with a 7.5' 4wt bamboo rod and another Llano Bug/soft hackle combo. Same story, this time, the fish were only looking up though and could care less for the dropper. Started off with what could only be described as a "cute" largemouth bass, then it was almost non stop again with the bluegill. This time bringing 28 bluegill and 1 bass to hand. 

    On a side note, this was the first time I fished any of my 4wt rods with a not so new but definitely neat little reel. I found a J.C. Higgins (Sears I believe) fly reel in a junk store a couple years ago for $10 and picked it up simply for a shelf decoration. I think the old school solid spool and narrow design caught my eye and didn't think to use it until I was sitting there looking at my L.L. Bean Angler reel thinking "this just doesn't look quite right". Well the old gal was missing the drag spring but I was able to cut a hardware store spring down to fit and with a bit of cleaning and oiling, I had a perfectly functional piece of kit. I think it looks mighty fine with the bamboo too, even if its not a Hardy Perfect...

Hot and Humid

I will just never understand some people

The "Skookum Choocher" in all of her metallic glory

I hear there are big ones in this water, he ain't it, yet.

Some mighty fine 8"ers

I lied, I fished a cork popper a bit too.

Llano Bug for the win

Big one of the day, unfortunately did not have a tape measure

Looks pretty good to me!

Battle worn and missing limbs

End to a successful trip

 

    

North Fork Thornton - April 2024

Pictures at the end.   

    Like all good stories, this one starts at 4:30 AM on the crapper. The biggest problem with planning a trip more than a month out is working with the weather. I had been watching the rain forecast like a hawk for the last couple of days before our adventure but I had failed to check the wind forecast until the day of... 23mph, with gusts up to 54. Lets go fly fishing!

    Picked up my cousin, John, just about 7:30, had a little visit with the family then we headed off to the foot of the mountain. Our first glimpse of the river showed what we had feared, the rain the night before had really clouded up and raised the water to unfishable levels. Between the high water and the copious amounts of shiny and new "NO PARKING", "POSTED", "NO TRESPASSING", and "TOWING ENFORCED" signs, we decided that it would be best to try our luck hiking in from Skyline Drive.

    As is my usual MO when driving Skyline, I wasn't paying attention to the mile markers and I drove right by our little parking lot but that gave us a chance to turn around in the lot for Jeremy's Run where an angler was packing up for the morning. He said that the water was fishable for a decent way down but the catching part of the deal wasn't worth the walk for him, a premonition I suppose. Well we turned around and headed back to the little 6-car lot and crossed our fingers that the only other vehicle there was not a fisherman who beat us to the punch.

    Waders on, we headed down the mountain in search of fishable waters. The walk down was pleasant and I was glad that we weren't recreational hikers as decent sections of the trail had been turned into feeder creeks. When we finally got to the river crossing where the water looked decent, we decided to head down as far as seemed reasonable to fish. I started off with a "Thin Mint" streamer which is pretty much a Golden Retriever tied in olive and brown. I have never had too much luck fishing streamers in the park but the water was just too high and moving too fast for me to keep track of the dry/dropper that I prefer in these waters.

    Fishing was unproductive for the rest of the morning without so much as a missed strike. The aforementioned wind turned out to not be as much of a problem as expected as we were on the east slope of the ridge but the gusts caused us to pause every now and then. A slight sprinkle turned into a significant 20 minute rain shower that had us standing in the flooded trail with our back to the driving wind and rain but once it passed, we caught some fleeting glimpses of sunshine. Just about then the tiny black stoneflies started hatching in good numbers (some dark mayflies too but in much fewer numbers). Just before we broke out the stove for some lunch and tea, John told me that he had connected multiple times with what looked to be a decent brookie who turned out to have quite the appetite.

    Lunch was cheese, crackers, pepperoni, almonds, and green tea, everything needed to brighten the spirits after a cold and unproductive morning on the water. 

    After that pool where John had some interested fish had rested a bit, John went back and hooked up a third time with whatever was lurking in this pool, after getting snagged right in the middle of the pool, he invited me to take a couple of casts. After four or five drifts, I figured the pool had gone quiet when to my surprise, an 8"-9" brookie erupted from the water to engulf my Elk Hair Caddis. I'm not sure, but I think some expletive about blessed excrement was shouted as that was the last thing I expected to see just then. I felt bad about landing the trout that John had found and played cat and mouse with so we settled on "he caught it 3 times, I landed it once".

    I let John have free reign over whatever water lay ahead and unfortunately, we were neither able to connect with another trout and at about 5PM we decided to make the long slog back up the mountain to the truck. The whole time, I was just thinking about how much I like fishing up from outside the park and getting to have a leisurely (downhill) stroll after a day of fishing but the thought of an ice cold Yuengling back at the truck kept me marching on.  

 

Here we go!

The new park fishing rules

Morning energy drink

Yep, still there

High and fast

The lair of the only hungry trout this day

My new (to me) Blue Halo 7.5' 3wt.

Nothing like finding a brick to remind you of the folks that used to live in these beautiful places.

Job done!

Piney River 2022

    Sometimes, fly fishing small mountain streams can be pretty frustrating. Fighting into your waders and seemingly too small wading boots. That first stretch of walking while your waders and boots painfully “fit” to your your foot before you get to some cold water to break everything loose and relieve the pain. The first couple of clumsy casts while you get used to the weight of a 2wt rod after a throwing a 7wt for the past couple of months. The seemingly endless snags, both in the water and in the copious amounts of trees surrounding you. It can all get to you pretty quick! However, this is usually completely negated by the awesome amount of eager trout darting from the depths to absolutely pummel that big, bushy dry fly that only a little native brookie could love. It’s a fair balance most days and that’s what keeps us coming back. This however was not one of those days.

    It has been a couple years since my last trip to the mountains to chase these little beauties but in any case, I had some free time and the desire to make the 2.5 hour drive west. Well, Monday was that day! I have fished the Piney River a couple of years ago and seem to recall that it was kind of so-so. By no means a stellar day but worth a revisit. I left the house right around 6AM and rode straight through to the streamside, only stopping for the inevitable stoplights. I was getting the waders on and the rod strung up by 8:30. I have always tied on a fly or two at the car because I have never believed brookies to be super selective and because I have lost half a rod before because I didn’t have the line strung through the guides to hold it all together for the hike in. This morning I tied on a Dyret and a small non-descript tungsten bead head nymph. I have really grown to like the Dyret, especially a foam version I tie that adds just that much more buoyancy.

    The parking situation is a bit weird for the Piney but luckily I still had the spot marked on the GPS and recognized the spot and a half worth of pull off from my previous venture. I didn’t remember, however, which road to hike up to get to the first trail sign. I realized my mistake pretty quickly though and made my way up the correct trail. As stated in my last Piney River post, there are lots of POSTED and NO TRESPASSING signs to walk by on the trail/seemingly private driveway before you get to the park boundary but in any case I made it.

    

    My day probably would have worked out a bit better if I followed the tried and true advice to walk a while and not jump on the first pool that looks fishy but I couldn’t resist. I did however get out a bit later and walk up a couple hundred yards to try my luck after not even getting a rise for fifteen minutes. After another half hour or so, I was having some snagging problems on my dropper so I shortened that from 12” to 6”-8” and on the very next cast, I had a nice little trout come up and grab the nymph. I quickly got it to hand and fumbled with my phone for a bit, trying to get the camera up. If there is one thing I have learned with fishing, it is to take lots of pictures of your first fish because it may be your only one… With that one released any my confidence for the day back where I wanted it I charged forth with the fervor of a fisherman on a mission. Well for the rest of the time before lunch, I only had two more come up for a look and I missed both of them. One looked to be a pretty good size, the other one was maybe 4”. With that drive officially burned out, I decided it was time for lunch and a cup of coffee. After that, I had another hour or so before I had to start heading back to the car. I walked up a bit further and didn’t really see anything too promising but I tossed my flies into a couple of the more promising looking runs without any takers.

    With that, I decided to call it a day. I will give a list of reasons I think my day went the way it did. First was there was a lot of boot prints on the trail indicating that the trail was well used in the past 2 days. By fishermen? I don’t know but I’ll tell myself that it was. Second, the winter sun was directly behind me for the whole morning so I know I was throwing shadows. Third, the Piney is not the type of water I usually fish when it comes to brookie water, it doesn’t seem to have as much gradient and plunge pools that I am more comfortable with. Fourth, I didn’t wear my lucky boxers. Fifth, I didn’t hop on my left foot three times before my first cast. Sixth, it was a waning instead of a waxing moon… the list goes on.

 

That’s fine though cause a bad day fishing beats a good day at work, or something like that.

Best kind of parking area is an empty one.

One foot at a time.

Ready to roll

Right or left?... its right.

Wave to the trail cameras!

SNP gate is a welcome sight after all those NT signs

Didn't have my preferred foam so original flavor will have to do.

"For science!"

Instant will do

I wish I knew my minerals.

Concrete Tree

Yep, still there.

Spent some quality time with Kevin, miss ya man.

Rappahannock is much smaller in this neck of the woods.