A GUIDE’S LIFE
•
BY HAYDEN MELLSOP
Pools and Rapids: A Fish Story
T
he wind blew steadily downriver, biting at any flesh not appropriately cocooned—in my case, six layers of thermals—fleece and Gore Tex, topped off with a sturdy lifejacket. Arcing low in a clear sky, the sun offered scant warmth. My fingertips felt rough and clumsy as I rebuilt Pete’s leader and tied on a fresh rig—an attractor with a small soft-hackle nymph behind. I silently hoped he’d manage to keep these on for longer than the ten minutes he’d been averaging so far. Pete’s buddy sat in the front
of the boat, hands tucked deep between his chest and lifejacket, staring off into the distance. I turned and handed the rod to Pete, then pointed across the river. “See that patch of foam over there, in the back eddy between those rocks?” Pete nodded. “There’s a fish working the underside of the foam. Every now and then you’ll see its tail or fin break through the surface.” The foam patch—the color and consistency of a head of freshpoured Guinness—was about three feet in diameter, nestled in the lee of a small bluff jutting into
the river. Dark flecks marred its surface—blue-winged olive mayflies, blown to the fringes of the river by the wind, and trapped in the foam like ants in treacle. The fish worked the foam leisurely, confident in the knowledge its prey was not going anywhere, itself safe from predation concerns of its own. As if on cue, a dorsal fin split the foam as it rose to take one of the blue wings. Pete nodded again. “I’ll row us over there and hold the boat out from the eddy while you chuck it in there. We’ll only get a few seconds drift before the current pulls the line out, but that
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High Country Angler • Spring 2020
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