The Editor’s Note

The editor’s origins as a bait fisherman while targeting trout started with marshmallows and salmon eggs. These days it’s PowerBait products and nightcrawlers. (CHRIS COCOLES)

THEEDITOR’SNOTE

There are some visuals you just can’t forget. Even 40–plus years later. And when you factor in the smell, it becomes even more nostalgic.

So it goes with my earliest fishing memories. My first rod and reel was one of those Zebco spincast combos with probably about a 5½foot rod. John, one of my oldest friends, and I used to trout fish a lot around our Bay Area homes, and he would mock my equipment since he had a more traditional spinning rod. “You ready to shoot?” he’d quip before my casting action of pressing down on the button of the Zebco reel before releasing it on my follow through. “I have the same chance as you of catching a fish,” I’d fire back. That was usually how our outings would go. It was all in good fun.

But what John and I had in common was the approach we used to tempt the planted rainbows: half a marshmallow and a salmon egg smashed together and placed on a No. 10 Eagle Claw hook off a sliding sinker/swivel leader. Live bait like nightcrawlers or mealworms? Never a consideration (though we both discovered worms were a great way to entice catfish at Clear Lake, a Northern California staple vacation spot for both of our families).

And did I mention the aroma of the egg and ’mallow tandem? I can smell the odor of that salmon egg as I type this. I also rarely ever went back home as a kid without the red juice of the eggs on my shirt or jacket.

But bait fishing for trout was always something special, particularly on the days when I managed to land a rainbow from Lake Merced in San Francisco, San Pablo Reservoir in the East Bay or the now closed pay-to-play waters like Lake Isabel near Livermore and Parkway Lakes south of San Jose.

Cal Kellogg’s report this month on his favorite trout baits (page 25) has me eager to get out and try my luck again. You can bet I too will be fishing with some kind of bait.

These days, while I acknowledge how well a Kastmaster, Rooster Tail or Thomas Buoyant will work, I still can’t get away from a rolled-up scoop of PowerBait or one of those nightcrawlers I’ll regularly buy on the way to a local lake. Ironically, what I haven’t fished with is one of those marshmallow and salmon egg hooks in years. These days, my best action with the fuzzy white treats has been when squished between two graham crackers and a piece of chocolate over a fire pit. Now I can smell the s’mores as well as I can the salmon eggs. -Chris Cocoles