Troutsource
06-03-2013, 10:09 PM
I fished the Truckee on the CA side Sunday from about 9:30 to 1:30. Landed one chunky 13" rainbow on a size 16 PMD emerger on a 4X tippet fished deep as a dropper to a weighted rubberleg (and also a split shot).
However, the highlight of the trip, and what is now a major highlight from my 10+ years in California (and indeed a lasting memory from my entire 35-year fly fishing career) was the absolute monster that I hooked that got off. I hooked him on the aforementioned size 16 PMD emerger in a deep seam in about 4-5 feet of water, and after about 10 seconds of me raising him up as he shook his head, he broke me off about 15" below the surface in semi-choppy water. Since it was a clean break on the tippet (no curl at the end of the line), I speculate his teeth sliced right through it. This thing I estimate to be somewhere between 25 and 30 inches - but hard to say since I didn't get a great view of him -- mostly just saw a gigantic elongated flash. It was one of those moments where your arms go wobbly, you almost piss yourself wondering how the hell you're gonna land this SOB, and you feel completely outmatched, as if you have no business hooking a fish that big (even on my 10' 7-wt). I think I was more afraid of it than it was of me. It was so big that when it shook its head, instead of feeling like the quick pulsations of a normal trout, it felt like a tug of war with some monster from the deep. I can only assume this was a brown. It was so big it seemed out of place on a river the size of the Truckee -- kind of like a steelhead (but more slender looking, based on the long flashes I saw). My first thought was "Leviathan," since I had looked at this post from Gilligan's Guide Service (http://gilligansguideservice.com/blog/2012/08/21/leviathan/) the night before. Maybe that picture is a good luck charm... I'm still scratching my head and it feels like there's nowhere to file this memory. As if it never happened. Incidentally, this was the exact same spot where my brother hooked back to back 20-inchers a month ago (using a trick Bigfly Jim mentioned to him while loitering in Mountain Hardware). And when I first got there I saw something massive slash the surface (about 5 feet from where I ended up hooking him). I thought maybe it had been a beaver, but there was no tail-slapping sound. Plus a few minutes later another (smaller) fish broke the surface in the same spot for something. This fish was probably the second biggest trout I've ever hooked. I'm looking forward to cracking the code a little more on this river and someday hitting the jackpot. Another thing, as I was leaving a guy told me he had just seen a bear cross the river right where I had parked (maybe also a good luck charm?) -- his wife showed me the picture. He said said he has lived in the area for 30 years and there are often bear and mountain lions in that area and suggested coming either armed with pepper spray or packing heat (I've only ever used pepper spray in Alaska, and don't own a gun). No, I'm not trying to reduce the crowds there...
Now, of course a fishing partner who will go unnamed has planted a seed of doubt in my mind by suggesting that perhaps it was a mutant sucker. Of course I couldn't resist Googling this, and discovered there is an endangered sucker in the Truckee called the "Cui-ui" (http://dcnr.nv.gov/documents/documents/nevadas-fishes-2/) that grows to 26 inches and can live over 50 years. It lives most of the time in Pyramid Lake, but spawns on the Truckee between March and June (kind of like the Lahontan Cutthroats?...which raises another interesting possibility...). HOWEVER, the Cui-ui feeds primarily on zooplankton. Yet I suppose it's possible I could have snagged such a fish. There are also Mountain Whitefish (http://dcnr.nv.gov/documents/documents/nevadas-fishes-2/)on the Truckee, and these fish can grow up to 27 inches (and I've seen smaller ones caught there), so I guess that is also a possibility.
So who the hell knows? Now I'm probably going to toss and turn all night, writhing in doubt. This is starting to feel like a bigfoot sighting. Except it's a proven fact there are monster browns in this river.
However, the highlight of the trip, and what is now a major highlight from my 10+ years in California (and indeed a lasting memory from my entire 35-year fly fishing career) was the absolute monster that I hooked that got off. I hooked him on the aforementioned size 16 PMD emerger in a deep seam in about 4-5 feet of water, and after about 10 seconds of me raising him up as he shook his head, he broke me off about 15" below the surface in semi-choppy water. Since it was a clean break on the tippet (no curl at the end of the line), I speculate his teeth sliced right through it. This thing I estimate to be somewhere between 25 and 30 inches - but hard to say since I didn't get a great view of him -- mostly just saw a gigantic elongated flash. It was one of those moments where your arms go wobbly, you almost piss yourself wondering how the hell you're gonna land this SOB, and you feel completely outmatched, as if you have no business hooking a fish that big (even on my 10' 7-wt). I think I was more afraid of it than it was of me. It was so big that when it shook its head, instead of feeling like the quick pulsations of a normal trout, it felt like a tug of war with some monster from the deep. I can only assume this was a brown. It was so big it seemed out of place on a river the size of the Truckee -- kind of like a steelhead (but more slender looking, based on the long flashes I saw). My first thought was "Leviathan," since I had looked at this post from Gilligan's Guide Service (http://gilligansguideservice.com/blog/2012/08/21/leviathan/) the night before. Maybe that picture is a good luck charm... I'm still scratching my head and it feels like there's nowhere to file this memory. As if it never happened. Incidentally, this was the exact same spot where my brother hooked back to back 20-inchers a month ago (using a trick Bigfly Jim mentioned to him while loitering in Mountain Hardware). And when I first got there I saw something massive slash the surface (about 5 feet from where I ended up hooking him). I thought maybe it had been a beaver, but there was no tail-slapping sound. Plus a few minutes later another (smaller) fish broke the surface in the same spot for something. This fish was probably the second biggest trout I've ever hooked. I'm looking forward to cracking the code a little more on this river and someday hitting the jackpot. Another thing, as I was leaving a guy told me he had just seen a bear cross the river right where I had parked (maybe also a good luck charm?) -- his wife showed me the picture. He said said he has lived in the area for 30 years and there are often bear and mountain lions in that area and suggested coming either armed with pepper spray or packing heat (I've only ever used pepper spray in Alaska, and don't own a gun). No, I'm not trying to reduce the crowds there...
Now, of course a fishing partner who will go unnamed has planted a seed of doubt in my mind by suggesting that perhaps it was a mutant sucker. Of course I couldn't resist Googling this, and discovered there is an endangered sucker in the Truckee called the "Cui-ui" (http://dcnr.nv.gov/documents/documents/nevadas-fishes-2/) that grows to 26 inches and can live over 50 years. It lives most of the time in Pyramid Lake, but spawns on the Truckee between March and June (kind of like the Lahontan Cutthroats?...which raises another interesting possibility...). HOWEVER, the Cui-ui feeds primarily on zooplankton. Yet I suppose it's possible I could have snagged such a fish. There are also Mountain Whitefish (http://dcnr.nv.gov/documents/documents/nevadas-fishes-2/)on the Truckee, and these fish can grow up to 27 inches (and I've seen smaller ones caught there), so I guess that is also a possibility.
So who the hell knows? Now I'm probably going to toss and turn all night, writhing in doubt. This is starting to feel like a bigfoot sighting. Except it's a proven fact there are monster browns in this river.