San Gabriel Valley East Rainbow Trout Still Abound.
My life has been defined by mountains, fast clear streams and numerous lessons on how to spot trout as they dash in and out of the shadows seeking food.My love of fishing is apparently hereditary. I get it from my Mom's and Dad's families. And the place where I learned to patiently fish for trout is a little piece of unspoiled heaven about 32 miles from downtown Los Angeles.
As I got older I often heard serious anglers, particularly, the crowd in $500 Orvis outfits talking about their guided trips on the Pitt or McCloud Rivers here in California, or the Madison and Yellowstone at the north end of the Rockies. I've never really had the itch to try those fabled trout rivers, although one year I did hit the Pitt and the McCloud, without really understanding that I was fishing hallowed ground.
My fishing outfit is a pair of really distressed old tennis shoes, a pair of shorts with a seriously defective zipper and light green, washed soft, t-shirt that has vile smelling stains and a few holes. It's definitely not Orvis, BassPro or Cabellas. It is serious fishing attire though.
I hesitate to use the words "serious" and "fishing" n the same sentence. Fishing to me is not some sort of monastic zen. It's sneak up on a river, try a lucky cast that puts a fly up river of a sun dappled cold pool, let it float down stream and then gently retrieve though the same waters. You keep your eye on the fly and look for a fish to rise. if the Gods are smiling, you will be too. If you're seriously in karmic debt, you stand a good chance of being wet, cold and disappointed by days end.
I'm not a very dedicated fly fisherman. The total cost of my outfit, including flies and a selection of tippet leaders is probably about $40. In fact my favorite rod is pretty cruddy looking, has bent guides and was purchased for $5 at a swap meet 20 years ago in Azusa, my home town. My somewhat disdainful attitude to serious fly fishermen has been cultivated by about 45 years on various rivers in California, most notably the East Fork of the San Gabriel. it's always a hoot to watch a pair of citified Orvis devotees, unpack their $500 rods, tuck their custom kid leather virgin wool lined fly wallets into their nylon shirts and waddle the one mile down from the parking area near the East Fork Ranger Station down to the banks of the East Fork. As i cast from upstream I can see them dropping thermometers into the water to check the temp and then peer carefully around to see if any of the $400 worth of custom hand tied flies they had in their fly wallets match the disgusting helgramites, nymphs, tiny salamanders or biting flies that live on the East Fork in the Spring. Generally, by the time the Orvis grads are ready to flick a few casts, I've got two fish in my creel, dirtied the river and am ready to switch from flies to Pautzkies premium green label cured salmon eggs.
So, as the Orvis Boys are intently watching their expensive dry flies get water logged,i float the Pautzkies right through the pool they're trying to fish. For this technique to be really effective, you have to yank your rod jump a couple of times, and loudly proclaim "that's the third time I've missed that damned fish!" It's at about this time that the fly fishermen, notice my fly rod but don't see the seated lightweight spinning reel that's hidden from view. With any luck, you hook up with a trout when they finally see that you're not really a true fly fisherman, but rather a no account lowly bait dunker.
East Fork San Gabriel River Trout Tip Numbers 1 and 2
i stuff the rainbow in my creel, politely give the others a wide berth and go to one of my other favorite spots on the East Fork-- a deep pool against a sandstone cliff. I slide another salmon egg on the laser sharpened egg hook and let it bounce down a rill through the pool. In case you're one of approximately 100 people who have hit my sight via Google using the words "East Fork Fishing" the secret is a three to four foot leader, no weight and firm salmon eggs. I learned this from my grandfather, the late but always funny William K. Sele, master surveyor of the San Gabriel Mountains and a smiling but patient trout fishing teacher.
Yet Another useful tip
In his youngest pupil, little Jimmy Forbes, he had an apt but very gullible student. Bill Sele taught me to read the East Fork and made m realize that rainbow trout are incredibly wary. He also taught me that you can fish for fun, fish for dinner and sometimes do both. I'm a big fan of doing both, which is why I carry a light weight spinning reel, a bottle of Pautzkie's cured salmon eggs and a packet of very sharp egg hooks, as well as leader material, in the side pocket of my creel along with a film canister loaded with fly patterns I know work on the East Fork; brown midges on #18 hooks, woolly nymphs on long shanked #12's brown nymphs on #16 hooks and a couple of bee patterns on #16 hooks.
East Fork San Gabriel River Trout Tip #4
Again, for you Googlers looking for incite: the best times are just after sunrise through about 10 a.m. and late in the afternoon. During the in-between time, you're better off going down to Camp Fallows, having a burger and a cold coke and dangling your feet in the stream as you count trout flying by the pools at the confluence of the West and East Fork in the sandy flats behind San Gabriel Dam.
But if you get really tired of fishing and need a smile, try this: Dress up in a crisp button-down shirt, a pair of nicely pressed Docker and shiny penny loafers then Go to any upscale fly fishing store. Wander around a bit, test the actions of several e of thousand dollar carbon filament rods by vigorously shaking them, and then stare at wistfully at the $600 reels in the locked display case.
Pull you r wallet out and when the salesman asks "Can I help you or show you something?"
Pause a couple of beats and ask loudly "Where do you keep the night crawlers, floating bait and salmon eggs? "
I'm so bad, but hell, I had a great mentor--Jim Forbes, from my outside office on a glorious Southern California evening. Wirelessly from rural northern San Diego County
Comments