Tenacious and a "D"

I recently had the opportunity to test out a product that is new to me, although apparently not that new to many other outdoor enthusiasts. The product is called Tenacious Tape and it is produced by McNett , which sells oodles of similar products for all outdoor activities. I have permanently stashed my roll of Tenacious Tape inside my waders' zip-pocket, as my in-the-field go-to for whenever I might spring a leak. The tape is about 2.5 inches wide and you get 24 inches per roll.

I tested this stuff for an Ebay retailer, Discount fishing , from whom I had also bought a pair of Chota Tellico Shoals bootfoot waders, last summer. They were nice enough to send me a roll of this tape, along with replacement waders, when my Chotas began to leak prematurely after only very light usage. The caption above gives you an idea, but more on this later.

My mission with the tape was to see how well it could stand up to punishment. Although I was advised to put the tape on the inside of my leaky waders, I decided to really go for it and I stuck it to the outside seams. The result: I fished for 4 days out of 5 at this year's opener and only began to experience dampness on the 4th day - on which I walked well over 7 km's in the bush, tracking steelhead in a relatively small creek, festooned with obstacles as well as bank-clambering and climbing opportunities.

This may not sound so incredible, but for anyone who wades a lot it should jump out at you as outstanding. Although urethane sealants such as Aquaseal (ironically also made by McNett) are the most effective way to plug up leaks long term, they can take hours to dry; whereas the tape goes on in minutes, making it an invaluable stop-gap in the field. If your waders develop a visibile tear that doesn't accomodate a tractor trailer and a circus-troop of elephants, all you need to do is let the spot get dry, brush off any sand etc., and slap some Tenacious tape on. You'll be good for the day, at least, and if you put it on the inside of your waders you'll probably make the whole trip.

Now to the "D" section of this review: those Chota Tellico Shoals bootfoot waders. I was deeply disappointed to find that the seams on these waders lasted less than twice as long as the tape I used to repair them. Specifically, the seams inside the knees took about 8 or 10 trips to wear out. By comparison, I have an old 4 year-old pair of Orvis Silver Label bootfoot waders which are STILL useable and took well over 2 years of much more punishment than I ever gave the Chota's, to develop any kind of leak at the seams. To give you a better idea of what this means, the original Silver labels retailed for about 1/3 the price of the Tellico Shoals - and lasted many many fishing trips longer.

My disappointment did not end there. When I contacted Chota about these waders, the response I got was that they were discontinued & that I should go back to the retailer (i.e. Discount Fishing) - which I refused to do, based on principle: your product, your problem. No matter how much I argued, the reply was always the same: we won't replace this obviously defective product. Luckily for me, they did forward my complaint to Mike at Discount Fishing, and he resolved the issue of being wader-less on the eve of the opener, by sending me a brand new pair of Hodgmans.

The Chota's only avoid a complete "F" grade because they do have one redeeming feature: quick lace boots. I found these to be the most comfortable bootfoot design I've tried, the most stable and the easiest to lace up. I imagine that their wading boots are similarly practical. You basically just pull one lace, then hook it up to handy little notches on either side of the boots. Voilà, all laced up and ready to go. It's just too bad about the water that leaks in. That sort of thing does affect comfort negatively - especially in early March!

So if you're thinking of Chota waders, be warned! But you'll definitely need McNett's tape with them, because it's as tenacious as tape can get!

p.-

It's OK! It's OK!

Well, it looks like my camera will be ok, for now. Other than a few water stains inside the lens, I should still get some use out of it.

Also, the memory card that was inside the camera when it got wet survived. I include footage of my brother in-law in an epic struggle with a large male from the day after the opener, and less than an hour before the venerable Minolta Z1 was to take its impromptu mini-dip.

p.-

Opener 2007 or Fish, Camera, Hook!

At the very least, the 2007 opener was better numbers-wise for me than 2006. A late spring and water temperatures that are still relatively low for this time of year, coupled with a decent rain the day before, made for very good opening day festivities.

I was lucky at every turn, where fish are concerned, as I had enough rain and room when I needed them. I fished four tributaries, and only one was low and clear when I fished it. Otherwise, the conditions that greeted me were always good.

I got to fish with my father again this opener, as well as my good friend Khalid for at least one day. We all caught fish and are very satisfied with our opener.

The only one that is not satisfied is my camera. My camera did not enjoy this opener as much as it normally would have, nor did my blood pressure or my centrepin reel for that matter. What? you say... Let me explain.

First, on day two, fishing the upper reaches of one of my favourite Lake Ontario tributaries, my reel began to feel as though something were grinding inside. As any good fool would do, I proceeded to remove the screw that keeps the assembly together, dipping the reel in the water to remove whatever grime was causing the problem, and dropping the screw into about 3 feet of fast moving water.

Panic!

I can't see down there because the water is still somewhat murky from Friday's rain. I move away a little and begin to peer into the water. I look and look and look - there it is! Excited, shocked out of the grief that had so tightly gripped me a moment before, I reached down into the freezing cold water and came up with the screw; got it!; and a pantfull of water. You see, I usually sling my camera around my neck & tuck it in my waders for safe keeping. But it's not that safe when the waders get water in them. Wet camera. Oh &*^%&^! The camera is still sitting on top of my fridge, all compartments open, in the vain hope that it will dry up and retain some of its functionality... more updates to come on that one!

This was not the end of my keystone routine. On Wednesday, the final day of my Mykissian odyssey, I had turned from the upper reaches of a Georgian Bay tributary and was headed home. I needed to make it to the car before 3pm, so I could make it back in time to pick up my boys at daycare. I was in a hurry and got careless, which is not a good thing to do on a river with a clay bottom, and a good, steep gradient.

SPLASH! CRASH! I find myself on all fours, covered in clay, with my face nearly plastered against my reel. I sigh. Nothing seems broken. I feel around with my nerves. Toes: ok. Knees: good. Arms: yep. Hands: uh oh. Uh oh is right. My left hand is having a problem. The palm of my left hand, in particular, looks to have a hook embedded in it. Yes. The hook is in there. Right. That would explain

THE SEARING PAIN! OOOWWWW!!!!!

...Which was being exacerbated by the fact that the hook had been holding onto the wire hook rest, near the rod's handle, but had been pulled through it during my fall; and it was now being pulled back hard by the tension in the rod. Talk about being shackled! I was covered with clay and very goofily caught in my own trap. Ugh.

It took a few moments to calm down, but I finally did. Then, I slowly unwound the reel to give myself some slack, cut the line with my pliers and rinsed off both clay-caked hands. It's a good thing that the water was cold, because it helped numb the area from which I had to - with a very quick movement - rip out the hook. It was just a small hook, with a small barb. Two days later, the barest little pinprick remains to tell the story.

There's always so much more to tell, such as the immense male from a very small eastern Ontario tributary, who jumped twice at least 4 feet in the air before prying himself free; a new spot to fish, nestled in high cliffs and adorned with cedar, pine and birch; my father's amazing addiction to Tim Horton's blueberry fritters and of course, as always, Laura's immense generosity for giving up her favourite helper for such long periods of time.

This season's done for me, except for perhaps one last trip. The next rain may find me bidding my little friends adieu in a way which they undoubtedly feel uncomfortable, but which restores me to myself, nature and the fish's beautiful
ways.

p.-

Casts 1000

It is Saturday, April 14th 2007, and Mike is yelling at me from the parking lot. "Paul! Let's go!" The wide river moves around my waist, and before me it dives into a deep pool from which even the gin-clear water can't wash the pure and "foreboding" emerald stain. There are steelhead down there, I can feel it. They've been outwitting me for several minutes now - or maybe I've outwitted myself once again; but I know a fly that will make them come up, or maybe a single egg fished deep... "Paul!" I reel in quickly. It's 6pm after all, and I'm hungry too. Tomorrow morning we will leave without fishing, lured by an early arrival home. With quiet regret I turn and walk out of the Manistee river, perhaps for the last time.

Apologetically, I have to admit to my three trip companions, that I was only being facetious when I agreed to go to the Big Manistee. We had discussed it as one of our options ad nauseum for over four hours, knowing we were going to fish for steelhead 'somewhere' in Michigan, and I found myself wanting resolution more than prospects more solid (as I imagined them). And anyway, I was still not over the rain-ruined trip to Ohio that had originally promised so many fish, so it no longer mattered to me what our ultimate destination would be.

But Mike found a passage in one of Bob Linsenman's books describing some of the pools on the Manistee as "dark and foreboding." This phrase was repeated several times during our debate, like a mantra, and it guided us in our choice.

My first impression, when we finally arrived at around noon on Friday the 13th, was not very good. Enormous parking lots sit on both sides of the river, from which countless anglers descend daily to sound its great flow, like gamblers at roulette. From the dam at Tippy reservoir down at least 2 km, there is no stretch wider than 15 yards without a rod and reel dredging the depths for silver. It's even worse on weekends. Make it 5 yards on weekends. And past the first bend, a veritable armada of drift boats divvy up the deeper pools of the river's heart.



When we get down to the water, I'm immediately put off by the "combat" fishing arena that presents itself. Anglers stand shoulder to shoulder up river, down river, as far as the eye can see. Mike, Andrew and Dave move up river. I move down. I find a relatively uncrowded bend, with a couple of attractive seams knitted at its surface, then wade out and begin float fishing. Time goes by. Nothing. Up and down the river, the rods swing like clock pieces, straight, unbent and the faces of the people are blank. Patient. My float spikes down suddenly, and up comes my rod - straight. Nothing. A crushed roe bag now hangs from my hook. This happens once more, then the mysterious creature that did it lies still. Maybe it has fallen asleep.

This summarises my Friday the 13th. I don't even recall if I hooked a single fish, so powerful was the spell that held me in its grip. Call it what you will, disappointment or bad luck, the steelhead gods had turned their collective heads and smiled, instead (as you may have guessed), on my friends. But mostly, as usual, they gave all their love to Mike.


With disturbing regularity, Mike's rod would suddenly leave the senseless, uniform, back and forth tick-tock of the masses to perform a ritual all its own. It dipped and bent, jiggled, was jarred, bucked in his knuckled grasp. Sometimes the dance stopped abruptly, and other times a brightly coloured steelhead was coaxed to shore. Above "the Coffer" Mike was expounding the virtues of the steelhead Gods, and all within eyeshot and earshot took notice. In such a crowded place, with fish so pressured, I have seen no finer performance. The next day, we found out from one of the locals that he was "that guy who's been catchin' all the fish." I knew it to be an exaggeration, but it wasn't a big one.

What I didn't know was that the river itself had begun its work on me. Mike was only a small ingredient in her enchanted brew, her counter-spell to my deep funk. Great vistas open themselves to the eye, in the valley through which it flows. And the Manistee itself flows like a necklace of jade, emeralds and diamonds at the bottom, rich with pools and shoals. It has a powerful, melodious voice that calls the spirit down to its cold, generous caress. I was being called down, down into the valley and down the river.


I think I landed 1 fish all weekend. 1 measly fish. Actually, it wasn't measly. It was a gorgeous hen, which three of us felt compelled to photograph. But she's the only one I landed. Though I am not totally bereft of my own little piece of fame...


On Saturday, after landing that hen and hooking several others (that all got off) I heeded the call of the river and walked down her banks. This is how crowded the Manistee is: at the end of one of the parking lots, there's a large, roofed platform for handicapped anglers. There's room on that platform, for at least 6 anglers - and there are six there when I begin fishing slightly downriver from it.

My float strikes downward on the first drift, and a brightly coloured male leaps from the water as it snaps my tippet. Enthused, I re-tie and send another offering roughly in the same area.

I drift and drift again. On the fifth pass, the float comes down and the river makes its statement. It is a strong statement. It follows me up river and it crosses. It moves up the current and then back down. It flashes at me white chrome blasts of light that halo the deep green water. My rod, I see, is shaman-dancing. It wants to break. The line moans under the pressure. My arm and my shoulder begin to wither. Down the river goes the fish. It flashes again, and I feel the head bending in great, powerul sideward thrusts. I pull and gain an inch; the rod pulses and throbs; I pull again. The fish turns and again I must pull hard, and my shoulder feels like it is filled with ink, and my arm is a piece of driftwood on fire. The head shakes again, and again, and again; and again I winch it upriver, and she pulls (I can see now that it's a big, chrome hen); the hook comes free - and I am freed from my funk, and I hope -

I pray -

I will go back there someday.



p.-

Broke Back Chrome

I hate to say it, but the picture in the caption depicts a fish that was not released and ultimately (merely) contributed to my bait can.

It's a long story and I hope you can stomach it.

Last Sunday, I was supposed to join a couple of friends to lay chrome waste somewhere south of Canada and Ontario. But perhaps it's a sign of aging, that we didn't feel too inclined to go freeze our nether regions to such a degree, and the trip was called off. I still managed to do a little bit of fishing in a local spot, but it was to be a big skunk for many of the foolhardy who showed up to de-ice their guides on that day.

This past Sunday, however, was a different story and an example of how fortuitous compromise can sometimes be. The compromise of course was to let Laura choose the time of my foray into chromeland; whilst I had already chosen the ground, a nearby tributary that allows for a quick return home at need.

This was lucky, because it was likely one of the least crowded rivers in the East on that day, and by all accounts it had still been on the boring side of unfishable in the morning. By the early afternoon, there were about 6 to 8 inches of visibility in the water: just enough to fish by. The time and place were right, the water was high and the fish were in. And to compound matters to the good, despite a parking lot brimming with cars, one of the best pools on the entire stretch was devoid of fishermen.

Less than ten minutes into the adventure, I hooked into this little fellow in a riffle at the head of the pool.


In short order, I had another fish on & lost. Then a few minutes later, the strangest steelhead I've landed in a long month of Sundays, lay feebly twitching on the river bank. At first, since it had fought so sluggishly, like a log with a piece of ribbon pinned to it to look like a tail; I thought the fish must already have been caught & released.

But then it looked to me as though some other less powerful fish's musculature (maybe a sunfish?) flapped beneath the skin of her aft. The rear of the fish, instead of enabling it to launch itself into the air even from a prone position, served merely to wave bye-bye and twitch like a puppy's tail. The tail fin was misshapen (though neither this picture nor the one in the head caption really show this), with the upper part at least 1 1/2 inches shorter than the bottom. I felt badly for the fish, which I assume was a NY hatchery byproduct, or had suffered from debilitating injury or disease. But I felt good for myself. Back home, the roe supply in the freezer was dwindling...

Things did slow down, during which time I hooked 2 more, and landed another chrome bright hen. This one was in fine shape, gave me a good rendition of wild chrome early spring steelhead, and darted back into the water as soon as I had her unhooked.


The best photographic opportunity of the day occurred when a fellow from Bolton asked to fish beside me. I knew he was not from around here because he actually asked! The locals don't normally attend to such formality, although if they are feeling good they may magnanimously apologise only if by some accident (which happens too often) or lack of skill their float ends up caught in your line.

Anyway, the 12+ lbs fish gave a good account of itself, given the close confines of this relatively small creek, and the fact that it had a 15' Frontier to deal with at the other end. I asked its gentlemanly captor if I could snap a pic of the beast before he set him free, and was most graciously indulged.



All in all, it was a nice way to spend an afternoon, and finally achieve success in accordance to what I was used to before I was "papa." And it's a long story for just a couple of fish; but what the heck. It's been pent up for a while!

p.-

in Just spring

As the world outside resumes for a short time its slumber, like a lazy riser snoozing on the alarm clock, I think about Spring. Spring is so close I can see it over the horizon, sailing on the ever brighter crimson blush of winter sunsets.

And I am excited about this Sunday, when I will join up with a couple of chrome-hound buddies to finally launch my first true all-day assault since last November, upon a lucky creek somewhere. If I close my eyes and concentrate, even as I type this, I can feel the current around me and the soft fins of timorous steelhead brushing at my ankles and my calves; I am standing knee deep in them, in enormous "Chromocupia." Or maybe that's just cabin fever + caffeine (I just polished off a tripple espresso)? Mike says I'm passionate about steelhead, and I guess I am that, too - and such long abstinence, if it does not kill passion will transform it into wanton, reckless zeal.

But now I realise what it is that has been humming in my head these last couple of weeks. Not just the prescience of March chromers and steely April droppies, or the pulsing quickening of Spring, but a poem. By e.e. cummings, my favourite poet. His poem went so far as to infiltrate my last entry, and it is the name of this one. If you did in fact read my last entry; if you are one of those poor souls whose lives are so barren that they had nothing better to do; I extend you just a little less sympathy than I do to myself (who actually wrote the darned thing): and I wonder if you detected the bits of poetry that slipped into the otherwise monotonous blabla.

In any case, if all goes well and the Chrome Gods smile upon us, I shall update this space again quite soon. In the meantime, I leave it to cummings and his bright, beautiful poem. I hope you enjoy it!

in Just- spring

in Just-
spring      when the world is mud-
luscious the little
lame balloonman

whistles      far      and wee

and eddieandbill come
running from marbles and
piracies and it's
spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

the queer
old balloonman whistles
far      and      wee
and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it's
spring
and
   the

     goat-footed

balloonMan      whistles
far
and
wee

e.e. cummings

Ice Ice Baby

March is here, and the march on the rivers is on. A little pre-maturely, in my case, as I am mostly motivated to stay close to home these days and most nearby tributaries are all but choked with ice.

It's ironic, really, because after last Wednesday's rains I expected more spring-like conditions. And although I travelled far and wee I found nothing that could be described as "mud-luscious" and only one tributary had any significant ice-free stretch of water.



There were a couple of fish rolling in one of the sections of open water I found, but neither roe, nor pinkie, nor woolly bugger tickled their fancy. Either because of the frigid water or ample fishing pressure, belied by the numerous footprints in the riverside snow (most with toes pointing into the water), I went fishless.

Then the cell phone rang.

Samuel's air-siren shrieks were audible before I could even say "hello," clearly signalling the reason for the call. Yes, Laura's sanity is more important than any tangible success on the river: my fishing day was over.

Nonetheless, as ever, the simple exercise of stalking a river, looking for open water and fish; and then finally drifting a float for an hour or so, left me feeling refreshed and renewed. My blood pressure has tangibly improved; and the powerful benefit of reconnecting with the simple, primal occupation of the predatory "I," still inhabits my very cells.



My prophetic soul mentioned in my last post that hours on the river would now be more precious than ever, and it has proven true. Maybe in a week, maybe in two; whenever the merciless grip of this latest deep freeze is loosened by the soft urgings of Spring, I will venture out again.

Please stay tuned for the next update!

p.-