January 12 Au Sable Fishing Report
A kind angler found a fly patch and left it. Flies are rotted now, but it’s a good clue to where we fished over this last warm-up.
With a number of days pushing the forty degree mark, fishing this past week was a must. I met up with Mike K. on Wednesday to do a little catching up and a little fishing. December was a crazy month for me. I’ve been ultra-distracted—got some big changes coming next year. Very exciting. It’s all I can think about.
Anyway, the best way to get a lot of thinking done this time of year is to lean into the tying vise, crank flies, and daydream. But the best way to get out of your head is to stretch your line on an Au Sable River trout. Sometimes you just gotta get in the river. So that’s what we did.
Nymphing the sandy edge of a nice pool.
Now you’d think that since I practically live in the fly shop, that I’d have six of everything and rods stacked in every corner of my house. Well that’s pretty much true. Pretty much. And it was actually part of the problem on Wednesday.
I started making a gear pile by my front door. All the usual suspects joined the party: waders, boots, tackle bag, nymphs, tippet, and . . . no rod! My good stuff was at the shop. But okay, no big deal, I’m no gear snob I’ll just dig out an old beater, right? No such luck. Dusty rod after dusty rod. Corner after corner. Everything was busted in just about every way you can imagine. Broken tips, cracked ferrules, you name it. Like I said, I’ve been distracted.
You know it’s a nice fish when you just toss your outfit off to the side.
So the hell with it. I just went down to the river and hung out knee deep in the river with my friend. Honestly, it was good enough. For me that’s as much a part of fishing as are the fish.
But, rosy notions aside, I’d of liked to hooked into that beautiful Au Sable River rainbow trout.
Take Care,
Andy
Nymphs:
Pheasant Tails 14
Hare’s Ears 12
Midges 20
It figures, we have been out to lunch on updating our river reports and the day I sit down to do one Andy beats me to it. No worries, more is better. This was the first time in January I got sunburn on my face that was not from the reflection off the snow. It felt like mushroom picking and Hendricksons were right around the corner but it was a cruel farce. We got smacked in the mouth with 6 inches of snow last night. I did have a few guys take advantage of the warm spell and chase some Steelhead on the Manistee River. Some days were better than others but again it was hard to complain with temps hitting 48 degrees!
