Several hours into a strikeless shad-n-striper outing yesterday, Flys4b8 Mike and his brother Greg and I were out in the Trout Hound working a big, deep current seam on the Sacramento. "Fish" were beeping and darting on the sonar fish finder, but by then we were completely inured to that unending stream of false positives. We fished deep, medium, and surface; small, medium and large; flies, plugs and jigs; and we weren't hooking Jack Shit. Out of a bored corner of my eye I spotted an odd shape floating slowly toward us in the current.
"What the hell is that?"
It was a roundish, blown-up looking shape about the size of a pillow, and it had a sort of waterline where it was pale white below and a sickish pink shade on top. It had a longish, rudder-like thing sticking out one end, and a strange pair of curved things -- yes, they were teeth -- sticking up on the other end.
"Jesus, that thing used to be a BEAVER!"
The stench of it hit us just about then, and we motored firmly away. No sooner had we caught our breath than an excellent new piece of fishing terminology was coined. For us three, the term "skunk" just won't cut it anymore, because we know what it REALLY smells like to go to the confluence of the Feather and the Sacramento and fish all afternoon and evening perfectly catchinglessly.
Fishing without catching! It's like surfing without waves, sailing without wind, working without pay, or, worst of all . . . well, never mind. This is getting depressing. I've been beavering since I went to the Pit a few weeks ago, and I'm well tired of it. It must be a luck thing, really. After camping fishlessly on the gravel bar I came over to Cache Creek to have a look with my own eyes because I just didn't believe the guage data on Dreamflows -- how could it be running 26cfs when it was 600 this time last year? But it was running so low, pathetically dry and dribbling. Kayaking without flow? The Great Spirit Beaver decreed it would be so.
I told people that I would eat my hat if I wasn't eating shad roe Sunday morning, and so I went ahead and prepared this photo just in case they call me on it:
Sometimes this is just the way she goes, and there's no remedy but to wait for her to change direction; to wait for some things (like the Sacramento) to come down and other things (like the creeks) to come up, and then try to seize your chance again. I guess if I have to wait, then doing it here on the bank of the swimmin hole, chilling down and blogging after a sweaty-ass bike ride up to the 20 and back ain't the worst way to wait. When they're ready, I'm here waiting.
