Fishing Hemingway's Brook Trout
By: Dave Cameron
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The flow of the river pushed under the railroad trestle as it moved downstream and along the cedar strip hull of my boat. The river flows south through the small community of Seney, Michigan. Downstream from Seney the river enters an expansive area of lowland cedar and tag alder swamp where it braids into many smaller channels that split as the riverbank loses some of its definition, only to rejoin again further downstream. In this portion of the watershed there are few roads or trails, the swamp is however punctuated with isolated sandy ridges forested with spruce, poplar and mature white pine that push up to the sky above the surrounding soggy forest.
The river flows clear and cool over a sandy bottom and cedar sweeps hang out over the flow tracing their branches on the waters surface. The cedar logs that make up most of the logjams are sun bleached and gray, looking like some giant antler shed from a prehistoric beast. Tag alders border much of the river in this area, they are backed up with spruce and tamarack trees as they form a tangled maze of leaves and branches at the rivers edge. The alders produce overhanging shaded cover for the native brook trout that inhabit this water. The trout dart out from under this shaded canopy to assault any possible meal that comes tumbling down the current. The river is quite wild and wonderful, but not easily fished or navigated.
In the early autumn of 1919 a young Ernest Hemingway plied
these waters in search of adventure and brook trout. He made camp and fished
several of the river’s branches where he caught both trout and inspiration.
A few years later while he was living in Paris he penned the classic short
story “Big Two Hearted River”, Hemingway’s timeless story
about the beleaguered Nick Adams who finds some order and purpose in the wilds
of this river, trout fishing, after experiencing the horrors of World War
I. The inspiration for the story flowed from these waters and today much of
the watershed has changed little from Hemingway’s time. There is still
a thriving population of native brook trout and there is also still plenty
of inspiration flowing in the water. And oh yes, the river that my kayak now
floats on is the same river that Hemingway wetted a line in, only it’s
not the Two Hearted River. For the real Two Hearted River flows some thirty
miles to the northeast as it makes it way to Lake Superior. This is the Fox
River. Hemingway took some poetic license for the title of his story.
With a couple of quick paddle strokes I guide my kayak down one of the channels, it is only about twice as wide as my boat. My plan is simple, paddle downstream for a couple of miles then turn around and fish the river as I travel back upstream to my point of origin. This plan will let me get a good look at the river and mentally mark some of the best cover as I float downstream before I fish it. Besides, it is many river miles before the next bridge, too long to cover on this day.
The afternoon sun lights up the shallow clear water that I am floating on. I have piloted my little cedar boat down river for many bends, maybe almost two miles. Only my fellow anglers the kingfisher and a great blue heron (the boats namesake, inspired by the birds stealthy fishing technique) have been my companions on this afternoon. I have just passed a deep hole that is guarded by a logjam that is lodged in the bend of the river where two channels meet.
It
is time to quietly lower my front anchor. The kayak smoothly and silently
swings around in the current with the anchor secured. With the bow of the
kayak now pointing
upstream I quietly sit suspended in the current. I lower the angle of the
boats seat back to relax, taking in the sights, smell and sounds of my surroundings
before I start fishing upstream. Dragonflies are everywhere! Swooping, darting
and landing on the gunwales of my boat and on my wood paddle. After a few
seconds of rest, the dragonflies launch back into the air with their wings
a blur of motion as they continue the hunt for insects. The air is full
of the smell of water, pine and cedar. A clump of ferns is perched on a rotted
log at the rivers edge, some of the fronds sweep in the steady current.
I
lean forward in my seat and cinch up the rope that secures its back into
position and start to cast to the shadowed cover of the hole that I am anchored
below.
Its now mid-day and the sun is bright overhead, I can feel
it press down on the back of my neck. My first cast sails over the brightly
lit
shallow water and is targeted for the shadowy depths. The small silver
plated spinner hits the water with a plop and the lure sinks fluttering into
the shadows. Nothing. On the third cast the spinner is pushed by the current
and swings further under the logs as I retrieve it. This time the lure is
ambushed by a trout! The strike sends a live jolt up the thin line through
the graphite rod into my hands. With the rod tip I gently muscle the trout
out of the cover of the logs and head him downstream towards my boat.
The
fish flashes over the shallow golden sun-lit sand bottom of the riverbed as
it shoots downstream past my anchored kayak. The slack line that the fish
has generated as it shot downstream is quickly retrieved. I am lucky the trout
didn’t throw the hook! The line is now tight. I turn his head around
with the tight line and the force applied by the rod as I start to pump him
back upstream to my position. The trout’s brilliant coloration of its
side is illuminated in the bright sun. Holding the tired fish that is tethered
by the fishing line on the surface of the river beside my boat, the trout
now is in position to be released. I grab the hook shank with a needle-nose
pliers, and with a flip of the wrist the trout is free without ever touching
it with my hands.
The river has rewarded my stealthy presence with a nice chunky little ten-inch brook trout. I plan on keeping a trout or two for the pan, but this small fish can return to his station in the river and grow larger. I have all afternoon to harvest a trout or two before the sun sinks behind the trees and evening falls over the river.
During the course of the afternoon I found myself in the familiar rhythm of quietly paddling upstream, guiding the boat with the paddle to find the lesser flow of current, that would offer less resistance against the hull of the boat as I moved upstream. I would often lower the bow anchor in the shallow water of the inside bend of the river to cast into the heavy dark water on the outside of the river bend. The low profile of the kayak and the silence of it suspended in the water by the thin anchor rope would allow me to send my offerings to the fish without being detected, all from the comfort of my nimble little craft.
More
than a dozen brook trout would assault my spinner that afternoon. Not all
of the fish were landed,
but I did keep one fat twelve “incher” for the pan! I’m
sure Ernest Hemingway couldn’t have had a better time on the river than
this day I spent with his trout on the “Big Two Hearted River”!