Guest photographer/writer Tom Szalay

El Diablo

Lost in the river

I talked my wife and youngest Jac to go to a fly tying expo up in Heber—hosted by Four Seasons, at a park in Midway. The girls pretty much slowed down to a safe speed for me to jump out; “we’ll go waste some time in Heber, be back in about a half hour,” the wife yells leaving a dust trail.

I heard about the expo from a dad of one of my chess club kids, Alan Thomas, who is quite a fly tier. It was nice watching Alan tie. He takes his time on everything he does, and is willing to un-do something on a fly to make it look just the way he wants. I don’t tie much and when I do, I’m in too big of a hurry—surprise surprise. This is like the way I fish, trying to get to as many holes as I can instead of slowing down and just get to what you get to.

The girls picked me up and we headed home, but not until we hit the outlet mall in Park City. I did my best to let them have their fun, but the whole time I could feel the flies working their way into my brain. We all knew it was going to happen, when we got home I was going to hit “Big Cott” for a few hours. Which is so easy because I live right at the base of the canyon. I could literally walk to the river—it’s that close to me.

“Why don’t you go fish for a few hours while Jac and I finish shopping,” suggests the wife. I drove higher than I usually do. I’m trying to find a spot that’s not so damn treacherous. I know you’re thinking “Big Cottonwood is a small river, what’s dangerous about that little guy? It’s not about the size of the flow, its steep banks, wicked, jagged rocks that look stable, until you put some weight on them. Oh let’s not forget a ton of vegetation on the banks, and a moss on the rocks that’s “snot slick.” I haven’t even mentioned the deceptively deep holes that are surrounded by big rocks, and dead fall that just dares you to step on it. At any rate I have yet to find safe spot.

I parked below the entrance road to Donut Falls; which is a pretty flat area and the biggest obstacle is the growth of willows on the banks. I tried to take my time walking down to the river, touching the tall grasses, to see what terrestrial bugs are hopping. I noticed a fair amount of bees and some small hoppers.  The sides of the river had a lot of life, mostly small caddis, but I did not see a lot of fish feeding off the top.

The water level was low, but not so low that there were not enough riffles and flow. I absolutely love working that river with dries, so I thought I would just start with an elk hair caddis pattern. I was fishing like a bull in a china closet; and that river requires more of a ninja, slowly creeping and casting. I slowed down and watched holes before I started casting.

This went on for I don’t know maybe about a half an hour. I switched to a few different patterns, a stimmie, and a small hopper. I had about a half a dozen takes, but I couldn’t hook any of them. I worked up to the area where the water is glass flat. If you know the area just above the road, it’s beautiful. But keeping with Big Cott tradition, it’s still a tough river, with thick willow to beat your way through. But that’s really no big deal. I slowed down and approached the holes with slow steps, watching my shadow.

I sat at one hole and just watched. About a dozen small browns were holding about mid-level and some of them about an inch from the top. I wanted to throw the big beetle I had on at them, but I knew it would spook them for sure. I was almost thinking of moving up river and casting down. My first cast I scattered every damn fish in the hole.

Next hole I watched again to see what they were eating—small caddis. I put one on size 20 or even size 22. I have great eye site but on a riffle these guys are touch to see. But if you just give yourself a little time, you start seeing it. At this point I got completely lost; I went into that time out of time. This is the time of going back into childhood, when you are playing with your friends and you get completely engulfed in what you are doing—total focus. Getting lost in the moment is bliss, getting home late is not; it never was.

No Tell 'EM Creek

We all have our rivers that we think of as our own; waterways that belong to us. And if we see other fishermen on “our” river, we feel like they are trespassing on our land. You pause and look at them like “who said you could be here?” When we get one of these rivers in our blood stream, we often rename them with names like “Holy Water” then we name all the holes. We go to these rivers because they hold something special to us, big fish, water type, terrain whatever it may be, they rise above the rest. Every fisherman has at least one of these hidden treasures.

But let’s be honest, there are no hidden creeks, or unknown streams.  There are no flows that no one else knows about. We go into fly shops and we whisper about where we have been, and we tell our tales of splendor and grand adventure, while hiding the true/exact location of where we’ve been.   But no matter how remote the water, there are no truly hidden treasures. I hate to say it, but you know that your private holy water has many other faithful praying upon its banks.

There is so much information at the touch of a finger, you can find out anything you want about any river anywhere. You can find You-Tube footage of almost every stream. And maybe that’s precisely why there can be a river here or there that can fly under the radar unnoticed. A cloaked gem can flow right out in plain sight and go undetected.

Today Johnny and I found that treasure; actually I have fished it once before, but did not have near the success we did today. We both have our own theories as to why this river has so many big fish. Johnny thinks it’s because our newly found little honey flows into a larger tail water that is flowing really high, forcing the fish are escaping the torrent and muddy water for a calmer home. I think this river has all the important ingredients to make it healthy: cold tail water, great rocky bottom, and tons of food.

I’ve been reading about what makes a healthy river and how a river produces a large amount of big strong trout. I’m trying to keep it simple and not over complicate it (an almost impossible task for me). Trout need some basic things, a safe place to sit comfortably in cold, oxygenated water so they can eat and eat and eat. That’s what fish do, be the predator not the prey--all day long. The only other drive is making new baby fish—spawning time, and that is seasonal. So it makes sense that a river that produces a lot of bugs will produce a lot of fish.

Johnny and I are probably both on the right track, and the things we’ve come up with are basic, components that anyone would say. This would be a great river to dig into and go past that obvious top level and really find out details, information that will lead to some universal understanding of river and trout health.

 It’s not often you find big healthy fish in a small stream. But when you do, it’s time to hold your tongue, and start thinking of a new secret name for it, and start naming its holes and…