The power of the group

This past autumn I joined the Indian Head Fly Fisherman Club. It is a group of men and several women of Southwest Idaho who share an interest in fishing with flies, tying flies, and promoting a clean environment conducive to good trout fishing. The club is very active and composed of genial people. I even was invited to give a program on fishing the high mountain lakes of Idaho. Papa Coyote and children have been to some of those lakes. Anyway, to the theme of this entry.

On St. Patrick's Day, the 22 club members were known to be afloat of Malheur Reservoir on a day that reached into the mid-70's. (We have not seen those temperatures since) We caught and released over 400 trout. Even Papa Coyote managed to land 20 trout with two hitting 19 inches. These fish are very healthy, strong, and fight like G getting his diaper changed.

Six of the club members went back to the reservoir yesterday and were greeted by a small front moving in that seemed to really discourage piscetorial cooperation. I fished for a few hours without a bite and with the winds causing larger, and larger whitecaps, I headed for shore. (I am out on the lake in my kick boat) On the way I passed fellow club member, J.G. who said he had landed eleven fish. (He is retired and moved from Florida saying he had his fill of hurricanes and alligators. Can you imagine a retiree moving north from Florida? This guy is heyoke! He loves Idaho and he stays for the winter. Of course, we don't have winter any more. I hope he is telling his friends in Florida what a horrible time he is having) WOW! Papa Coyote was wondering if this guy might be more coyote than I had imagined any other person could be. Then he said he brought six others to the net and lost them. Hmmm! I am thinking, Hmmm! then he said the largest was 19 inches. Hmmmmmmmm! Then he offered to me the fly he was using(he had tied several the night before). It took me over an hour to cover the hundred yards to shore because I had ten bites and landed four fish. Two were rather nice 15 inchers that each took a good five minutes to land. If I had not been fishing with a group, I would have been skunked and Papa Coyote doesn't like skunk or skunked. J.G. is very coyote in the ways of catching fish. I like this fellow coyote a lot.

J.G., P,K, myself and maybe a few other club members are going to fish Paddock Reservoir after I get out of school on Wednesday. We have reports that the steelhead smolts that were planted last spring are now 19 inches and are being caught. Bass, up to 17", are being caught. And, surely, there must be crappie to be caught. We are hoping for rising barometric conditions and warmer weather by Wednesday.

The trip from Huntington to Malheur Reservoir is a pretty drive through the Eastern Oregon desert (sorry no trees). We see herds of elk, deer, antelope, lots of range cattle, herds of horses (tame) and the lek grounds of a rather large group (0ver 100) of sage grouse booming attracting mates. I even drive by the ranch of two of my students (brother and sister) in my Native American Studies class. The girl is interesting, being a straight A-student, beautiful, a cheer leader and in the summer she rides the ranges looking after the family cattle. And it can be very, very hot on that sage brush desert.

As the Coeur d' Alene story teller would say, "This is the end of the trail."