by The Troutist, April 11, 2011

I wanted to start this week’s column with a special shout out to Mr. Wood from up Deer Creek way whom I met at the ramp at Spencer Lake. He informed me he had been spending several days a week on the lake and had been doing quite well. The stringer he had in his possession proved what he had been claiming. Although he stated nothing really big it was still a nice looking dinner he held up for us to admire. Thanks for reading. Larry it’s great to see that semi-retirement is agreeing with you. Nice to see you on the water hope you did well.

In last month’s Northwest Sportsman Magazine I had done an article on Project Healing Waters. This is a Fly Fishing for life program for wounded vets or vets from any war or branch of the service. Whether their wounds are physical or physiological to help them to adapt to the new challenges they face in life. In that article was a photo of SSG Matt Castor Fly Fishing the Yakima River. We were hooking up at Spencer Lake and I was going to teach him the art of “Blue Collar Fly Fishing”. That’s dragging a fly on full sink fly line around the lake in search of that elusive trout.

The Friday before we were slated to head out Matt asked if it was okay to bring a friend along SPC Justin Lemire. It was not a problem for me I could then act as a guide and hopefully put them onto some fish. Turns out I’m a better hand’s on teacher than a verbal one. It seems I have been angling this way for so long I forgot to mention some of the little techniques that help improve your success. But as the day wore on I remembered them and they started to get the hang of it. The fly rods they were using they had assembled and wrapped themselves. They were beautiful and you could tell they took great pride in their craftsmanship.

We worked the lake discussing a number of different topics and spent most of the day laughing. For me it was quite enjoyable and refreshing to see these young men having such good time. The day was a little chilly out and we endured showers, drizzle, and some downright intense rain but managed to keep working the lake with a smile on our faces. The lake surface temperature was holding pretty steady all day at 50 degrees and the sun even popped out once to give us a quick warm up and start a small hatch coming off the water. The fish were holding in 4-6 feet of water or at the very bottom of the lake, nothing in-between.
We talked to a few bank anglers who said fishing was good but the catching was a little slow. Folks trolling pop-gear were having success as were the still fisherman working the bottom with bait. I think we threw every fly we had in the box at them including a Carey Special, olive with brown hackle and an aluminum wrap. The two that drew the most attention were the black and black/olive Woolly Bugger. By the end of the day the guy’s had missed a couple, lost a couple, and landed a couple, not bad for their first time trying this method. Although nothing huge, Matt boated a 13-inch Rainbow and Justin a 15-inch Rainbow. Justin had bragging rights for the day and was quite pleased because this is the first fish he had caught in over three years. They made a gift of these to my better half Sheree so that we might have a fresh trout dinner. I brought them home and cleaned them to discover they had bright pink meat and were very firm. I suspect they were holdovers and to be honest they were quite tasty, thank you gentleman.


SSG Matt Castor & SPC Justin Lemire


They say there is no better feeling than making new friends and I would have to agree. To get the opportunity to take them out fishing made it even better. We are currently planning a few more outings to some local lakes in hopes that I can teach them how to master this style of angling. I apologized for such a slow day and their reply was “This beats sitting in the barracks or working”, a sign of true fisherman. I had to laugh though because you just knew I was going to have to make one last lap and naturally the wind picked up and we had sideways rain hitting us. I guess you can say I introduced them to some good old fashioned NW spring weather. So until next time may your next trout be your trophy mount.

The Troutist, “Uncle Wes” Malmberg

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