Leeds Creek--An angry Land

“Brethren—you and yours shall travel to the new Zion, to the southernmost region of our new lands, and ye shall farm the land, and tame the land, and multiply and be fruitful.” I can see Brigham saying something like this to newly converted young Mr. Tobler, fresh off the boat from Switzerland. He is ready to do his part for God’s new chosen people. So he loads his young family in the wagons, and pull carts, and makes the painstaking journey south, to a land blistering with heat, prickle pear cactus, Sage, Angel Wing Cactus, Agave, Thistle, Desert Sandwort, among other hostile flora of the land screaming—“go ahead and touch me, I dare you, see what happens!” 

This is the land of Dixie, the southernmost region of the Mormon pioneer, that despite its extreme heat, deep cliffs and angry hostile plant life, the Mormon pioneer did manage to tame, and bend this land to his will.  If you pay close attention, you see a “Rebel” inside the modern Dixie men & women of St. George—an attitude that was perhaps shaped by the harsh land, independence and separateness to the inhabitant of southern Utah. I’m not even going to get into a discussion about the Pligs or Monster truck confederate flag flying hillbilly.

Our journey to the land of Zion is of a much more light hearted and playful nature--the pursuit of a true native to the land, one not actually of the land, but a species that survived and sometimes even flourish despite very little water, and extreme heat—the Bonneville Cutthroat Trout.

Our brethren, the one we refer to as “The Oracle” selected some of Southern Utah’s tiniest of streams as a spring break get away. Our ultimate goal is to go deep into Leeds Creek and find some of its tributaries, like Horse, Spirit and Pig Creek. Now keep in mind these streams are tribs of a creek that in its entirety is considered a very small Utah stream. Put another way, most fishermen would look at Leeds and say, “Wow we drove 5 hours to fish this overgrown trickle?”

To make matters more completed, our “go to man” on this trip “The Oracle” had some family things come up, leaving us with a couple maps as our only source of information to find intricate veins that are maybe a little bigger than horse piss, running over the intimidating southern Utah land. In total we ended up with three of the Magnificent 7’s finest: yours truly, Big Daddy Tom Szalay, and one of the southern Utah’s pioneer decedents James Tobler. We met one of Tom’s buddies who drove from Sonoma county named John Hurvey—a retired teacher who now grows grapes for one of the wineries.

With every one of my blog posts, it is vitally important to limit how much information I give to my readers, and lets be honest that’s really just one person—Roger Eastman, and he already knows everything about the rivers of the western states anyhow. But in the remote chance someone other than Roger stumbles upon a posts, it’s my obligation to not guide fishermen directly to what I have painstakingly earned. I have no fear of over informing with this creek—there is a reason St. George is not the holy land for fly fishermen. Aside from freaks like The Oracle, and M.R. Montgomery, the author of “Many Rivers to Cross,” who else is obsessed with beating the hell out of themselves just to catch 8 inch Bonneville Cuts?

Just to get to the river, you have to bushwhack through some of the angriest vegetation I have ever encountered. If you’re a plant in this canyon and you don’t have huge spikes or barbs completely covering you, well, then you’re not in this canyon. Once your bloody legs reach the water, they get about 10 steps before you have to bound, duck or slither over some obstacles (boulders, logs etc.).

You have to look for every little hole you can get, little pockets, or a boulder that offers some type of shelter for a little cuttie. And don’t even think about casting, maybe every hour or so you get to what you would call a hole, and a chance to actually cast. Even at that, your couldn’t really call it casting, you are always forced to be very mindful of your back cast as well as both sides of the river. We pulled some fish out of a pocket no bigger than a dinner plate.

Who would want to do this--who would want to fish this hard in a overgrown, trickle of a stream just to catch little cuts that are at their biggest maybe a skinny 12 inches—Maybe! Who wants to work this hard just to see these little sprats slowly rise to the top of the water to take teeny dries? That’s right your already know I’m gotta say, “I do!”

I cant really even say why its so thrilling to ninja creep up on a tiny hole, get down in the water on both knees and meticulously place a bow and arrow cast with a size 22 pmd in a minuscule riffle, and wait for the slow take. You cant even set the hook, because if you miss, you back cast snags in the trees; you have to let the little guys set the hook themselves. Sometimes we were even lucky enough to keep them on long enough to remove the hook.

We fought hard to work up river to hit the little tributaries of Leeds; Horse, Spirit and Pig Creek. Not much success, but I can only imagine how small and tight they would be. How small can you go? I was fishing with the smallest rod I have, a 6ft 2wt and I would have liked to chop a foot off. I don’t even know if they make fly rods smaller than 6 feet. We worked up one canyon and found a literal dribble running through it, but all we could see was willows growing in the middle. Even a tadpole would have a hard time thriving in that water. Was that Horse or Pig Creek? Looking at the map it was hard to tell, but we could not find an area that had more than 2 inches deep of water.

Pioneer descendent James Tobler lived up to his southern Utah pioneer forefathers. Whatever the land threw at him, he fought back valiantly waving his rod in defiance to the angry land. I don’t know if we can say that we tamed the land, but I can confidently say that it did not conquer us. Even Big Daddy defied the advice of the Oracle and delicately tiptoed through the cactus despite his healthy Hungarian ankles. He may not be called a ballerina on this trip, but he was as light on his toes as I’ve ever seen.

The last day our trip our little band parted, the two Californians headed back to the land of grapes and vino; while the Pioneer and I traveled a little further south to try our hand at the Santa Clara near Pine View. What a beautiful canyon!

The river was open and much more fishable, but we got skunked on this river. I think we fished a section that is just pounded by kids/ campers and bait fishermen. All along the bank we saw empty cans of power bait, and bobbers. Upon a return visit, I will go above Pine View Reservoir.

So in the remote chance anyone other than Roger reads this post (very unlikely) then I dare you—take a shot at Leeds. In the next month or so, the gate leading up Leeds canyon should be open, and you can certainly access the tribs. Pack your smallest rod, long sleeve shirts and nylon pants. If you have a pioneer like Tobler, bring him along too.