What a weird spring. We have late snow today, and I will take any amount of colder and wetter weather we get. Weird is fine, we get used to weird out here. The fish are settling in with the front change. They hit all of us the other day with a cold hard curveball shutting off and have changed their tune a bit with the cold snap. Still gotta eat, just means we gotta change the game up.
It is part of the gig. Dialing in, adjusting, changing tactics and programs. Not to much trips me up these days, save for maybe boat and angling pressure. I enjoy the challenge and a lot of the days I do have it dialed and I can just fish, the river is making us work for it a bit again which is typically when I get a little hungrier for it as a guide. The angler comes out in me a bit more. I am only really ever competitive with the river.
Springs like the one we are having is also making me somewhat giddy for our summer time fishing. Typically June and July are raging flows with cooler water temps than I would like for fishing. This season will be different with less flow coming out of the dams than normal. This makes me hope and expect that we will have better for fishing flows this summer. Lower irrigation flows means better and more consistent flows for fishing until late summer. When we will give them a break like we usually do and target other species. That is just kind of the normal now. We just have to lean into it a bit more this season. Late summer is for Lake fishing, Getting into the mountain lakes, and bass and bluegill ponds. It is also a time for teaching which we will be doing more of this summer. Also summer is for fishing for me. And we have plans to fish this summer.
That just means dates for guiding are limited. June and July are going to be good months this year. With flying ants, yellow sallies, golden stones, caddis, and terrestrials into late July. With better flows for fishing. the June and July months are going to be a good time to come fish.
The past year plus has been a lot of in our faces, shit is falling apart, fuck all expensive, we all know it, we all are feeling it. We are out here doing our best to heal and cope while on the river. I know, everyone who comes out shows it one way or the other. After years of working, watching, and interacting with people you get good at seeing things. The way people open up after a few fish or beers on the river also is pretty telling. We have a lot of emotion in the fish this season. You can all try and hide it from me. But I know…trust me I know the power this activity, those wild animals, and these spaces have over us. What they make us feel, how they help us heal, cope, find hope, self realization, respect, reverence, peace…Trust me I know.
I have a lot of energy, and I am loud and boisterous, and I get very excited when fish are around. It is raw, not doctored, or done up for show. It is how I always am whether you are in the boat, the live stream is going, or I am alone on the river. My reaction to fish is always the same. Pure adrenaline, energy, joy, and raw ecstatic emotion. It is my direct line to the thing I want more than anything in the world…an adrenaline fueled connection to the energy of the natural and wild world. No matter the extra stuff, the noise, whittle everything away…fly fishing is still the way I want to experience the world and my connection to it. I find most of the rest of the world to be boring and a way to pass time between these experiences with nature, animals, and people.
I feel, the older I get, the more that we keep losing the plot as people. Maybe it is the old millennial in me, or the years of being a trout bum, or just coming into 40 with a different perspective, but ya, humans have lost the plot a little. This grind does feel like its is finally ending a bit. Shit is pretty fucked…and I think that is really all I have to say about things. We don’t need specifics, we all can think of the ones that matter and are having causing us stress and problems. Many out of our control, some not, we all know what we need to do. So we just do it. That grind we do can be turned into something for us.
It feels like its coming. That glimmer of hope I see in the people I fish with and talk to. It is there…in the corner of the eyes as the fish swims away. I can feel it in the air, that soft but heavy, brief moment as the fish leaves, the angler breaths, and has that brief moment of feeling the connection…its fade as the moment ends, and the joy and desire to experience it again. The look of appreciation that comes when we shake hands or bump fists in celebration. I see it all there, surely as the fish that ate your fly, those emotions, feelings, and moments are like reading any river in front of me anglers. That is what makes me good at guiding. Not the fishing, which I am good at, but the people. It has always been 80% people 20% fishing. The other reason I love fly fishing. It makes me connect to people. Which is something I would probably not do if I did not guide. Fly fishing keeps me human. It keeps us all human. Humans that understand a little bit more of the plot….at least in my opinion.
See ya riverside anglers. We can find the plot and tell our own stories there.
Tamarack's Guide Service 
Hey Man,
From a fellow empath who is also an old Millienial – I see you, I appreciate you. You feel the individual AND collective weight of it all, but still remain positive and know how to heel others. That load adds up though. It’s almost like what John Coffey (Michael Clarke Duncan) can do with physical ailments in “The Green Mile,” but then is very much affected by it himself and it adds up for him.
I live in Spokane now (last 4ish years) which is the only reason you haven’t seen me in your bow seat. I’m going to make a trip over this summer though. If you ever need or want to come over here to fish, I would be honored to host you. I have land you can camp on, park a truck, trailer, boat on, etc.
I’ll see YOU riverside, Josh