Thistle Nebo & Bennie

I don't think you can mention Thistle Creek without bringing up the big slide of 83; which wiped out the little town, washing it into Spanish Fork River. You can still easily see the results on the side of the hill from highway 6. The remains of a few houses are still standing, creepy but somehow cool to look at. Its amazing how long an abandoned house will remain standing. Regardless of the disaster the residents of Utah's small towns hunker into the hills, then they put up fences, a lot of fences, and they do their damnedest to keep everyone off their land.

Beezer joined Colby and I on today's adventure, first I consulted the "river oracle"
Mike Matheson aka "Math" on where to go specifically on the river. His suggestion was to go check out Bennie Creek. If you look at the pic with turkey's crossing the road it leads up Bennie Creek. However once you get a mile or two up the road, you will become a communist if you keep going. Let me explain; the owner of the bulls has posted a huge sign warning drivers that they are on his land, and that the government has violated his ownership rights by allowing vehicles to pass on his land. Well, the three of us have a decision to make; we pause and discuss--none of us really care if driving on his land will made us a communist. However we don't have 4-wheel-drive and the road has a lot of snow on it; plus those guys always have a lot of guns & ammo...

After exploring from Thistle to Nebo Creek we parked at the bottom of Thistle, and fished up stream. It's the warmest day in a longtime and I'm guessing it's around 35 to 40 degrees. On the top of the water I see a bunch of really small midge but no fish rising to eat them. We nymph for few hours with no luck at all. In fact we don't see a single fish. We get to a spot on the river that is slow moving and deep, resulting from a beaver dam. I see a rise, then another. We keep nymph, but this water requires a strike indicator.

I have been trying to teach Beezer to nymph without an indicator, so she can start out learning to feel the bottom, and sort of "Yoda master" it, as we call it. A strike indicator and little black nymphs does the trick; which is no real suprize in my mind. On the top of the water, we see little midge,and it's January, it just fits. Also not shocking they were feeding about noon to about 3:00 because that's the point in the day that is the warmest; and the heat makes the bugs get moving. We all know what happens when the bugs get moving: fish eat them!

I had a great day, and I think the kid is really warming to the world of fly fishing. I think more than she likes actually fishing, she likes just being outside. At one point in the day she said, "wow the river is so beautiful in the winter." She will get no argument from me. I have not fished Thistle since I was a teenager. It rates high with me; my only real complaint is the busy road that hugs it's banks.

W