Sunday,
July 2, 2002
By
Torli.
McCormick
Special to
the Star Tribune
OSAGE,
MINN.
Wading in knee-high
water as clear as moonshine, Dave Schaum strips
out 3 feet of fly line and begins
a series of rhythm-gathering false casts. His eyes are
transfixed on
a pool 20 feet ahead.
”Did you see
the back on that guy?” said Schaum, pointing to the boil in the water, the handiwork
of the rising brown trout. “I’ll
tell you what, that’s a big fish . . .
.
. better
than 20
inches, I bet.”
It’s just
shy of 9:30 p.m. last Thursday. The gloaming
has nearly given way to nightfall.
Nature’s little flashbulbs
– fireflies - flicker and refract
off the moving water. All is perfect, except for the maddening din of dozens
of blood-sucking mosquitoes.
The
presence of large mayflies entices the
brown trout
to abandon their traditional hiding
places to feed on the
surface. And incredible fly fishing
is sometimes the result.
For
Schaum, 37, of Osage, the night isn’t over --—
it’s just
beginning. And he’s
giddy with anticipation, given
last night’s exploits. “I caught three browns over 20 inches last night,”
said the full-time science
teacher and summer fishing guide.
“We’ll see what happens tonight. Maybe well catch Walter.”
In two weeks
in mid-June and early July,
Schaum, as well as a small but
hard-core contingent of fly fishers, descend on the Straight River to fish
one of the Midwest’s
most storied mayfly hatches— the Hex.
Hexagenia
limbata is the largest North American mayfly,
and its emergence,
particularly on the
Blizzard
hatches
“The
intensity of the hatch is different every year, but there’s always the
chance that you’re going to hook up with a big, big fish,” Schaum said.
“I’ve seen some true blizzard hatches over the years where there are so
many flies. . . that fishing is nearly futile due
to the plethora of naturals.”.
Mayfly hatch makes fishing good
The Hex hatch presents fly anglers with myriad challenges. The hatch is
relatively short --
about 90 minutes, often less. And most of
it happens in the dark. Stream wading and navigation can be difficult, even
dangerous. And even the most accomplished fly fisher, Schaum
says, can come unglued under the cover of darkness.
“Hearing is
extremely important for locating fish in the dark, especially on cloudy nights
with no moon,” Schaum said. “Sight is still important for locating
individual fish, however, and a ripple or two is alI
that is needed to pinpoint the source of the feeding sound.
“But at
times you’re pretty much fishing blind, although with practice it’s
possible to become very accurate at casting merely to the sound of a feeding
fish, and at setting the hook by sound, too.”
Overtime, Schaum says he’s developed a “sixth sense” about fishing the
nighttime Hex hatch. It takes patience and time and ingenuity.
“With more
experience at fly fishing in the dark comes a sort
of feel for how it’s done,” he said. “How much line is needed to reach a
feeding fish? And how do you determine what the various currents are doing to
your line and fly? Those are questions that are only learned with time on the
water.”
Water
warms
Schaum, who started fishing the river
as a teenager, spends much f his summer break on the river; he knows every
riffle, pool, bend and feeding lie. The middle-school teacher also has become
a well-spoken student of the watershed’s ecological health.
“Years ago,
the Straight had a viable brook trout fishery,” said Schaum, a member of
Trout Unlimited and TU’s
Straight River Trust Committee
(SRTC), an advocacy group formed three years ago to help with stream
improvements. “But intensive logging practices--
like the beavers are trying to do out
here today— degraded the habitat, warmed the water and killed the brookies.
But because the river is fed with dozens of cold, clear springs, the brown
trout population, which can tolerate
warmer water to a point, has survived.”
The river’s
“thermally marginal” water temperature, which can fluctuate dramatically
throughout the day, is a source of concern, said Doug Kingsley, DNR fisheries
supervisor in Park Rapids.
“I think
it’s on the bubble,” Kingsley said, referring to the
That makes
managing the
On one hand,
the
Wells
on increase
The largest consumer of water in the
region, the R.D. Offutt Co., grows hundreds of acres of irrigated potatoes and
employs as many as 600 people, according to R.D. Offutt manager Larry Monico.
The company also
runs a potato processing plant near the river, which uses additional water
from the
The chief concern,
say Schaum and other
“It’s a
real concern. For much of the 1990s, we’ve had above-average precipitation
around here,” Schaum said. “But we will hit a another drought cycle, and
I’m worried that the
increased irrigation, coupled with the lack of rain, could
really impact on the
stream and the trout.”
While there
is anecdotal evidence suggesting irrigations wells can take water away
from the small springs
that feed the stream, DNR studies have
shown
no conclusive evidence that permanent harm is being done to the groundwater
supply or the fishery, said Bob Merritt, area
hydrologist with the
DNR division of waters, which administers irrigation well permits.
“Our
(study) model is not showing there’s substantial increases in water
temperature,” he said. “What we’ve learned, at least up until now, is
that the fishery is under similar condition… even prior to the
irrigation.” Merritt says more research is needed. But research is expensive
and labor-intensive. “The problem is that we’re stretched too think (in
the division of waters) on other projects and don’t have the funds right
now,” he said. “I fish the
Ron
Miller, a pediatrician from