When Your Fly Fishing Gear Stinks, Life is Good

   If I knew I was going to die tomorrow, I wouldn't be upset if my house was a mess.  I am not neat. I'm only going to live once and my priorities are in order!  That being said, I still remember opening up a buddy's wader tote years ago & getting a whiff of the nasty, bacterial chemical cocktail that was brewing,  I was pretty grossed out.

   It's amazing how things (the same things you'd think would likely remain repulsive) change.

   Work, weather, timing... all sorts of things created a logjam to this year's warm water fishing opportunities.  Feeling that warm water time was swiftly winding down, I simply decided it was time to do some small river fishing, come low or high water.

   As it turned out I did have both water situations.  The Upper Iowa River was running a bit high to easily find the holding areas of smallmouth bass.  The Volga River was running too low to float any kind of watercraft.  A cold front had also come through.

 
   On Saturday, I floated the first 2/3 of the Upper Iowa River solo.  Much of this stretch flows right through Decorah, IA.  Other than one little smallie striking a topwater pattern at the first bend of the river, there were no fishy tugs on my line and the water remained undisturbed by fish.  After working through color, pattern, size, & retrieve changes, I switched to a couple "desperation flies" but continued fishless.  Around 4 pm I hooked up with a few friends, "T" and her son Ben, & T's DNR co-worker Chris.  The rest of the float included DNR smallie sampling to check for mercury so I'm happy to write we found a few smallies willing to make tissue donations!  I ended up with 2 in the net and lost 2 more.  Chris landed another 2-3 fish.  We also spotted a mink swimming in the water.  It was a beautiful day, we had fun, and I knew that during a particular stretch of my solo float, had the water been lower, I likely would have had to drag my pontoon a long way.  It was dusk when we left the river.

   I camped that night along a creek & on Sunday, I slept in.  Then, with a wet tent drying in the back of my CR-V,  I headed to the Volga River, near Fayette, IA.  I had debated visiting a trout stream, but I heard the tick, tick, ticking away of the warm water fishing season. After carefully bumping down a woodsy dirt road, I fished an unfamiliar stretch of the Volga and ended up with 6-7 smallies and likely lost the same amount.   Generally, I waded  from one hole to another, enjoying the weather, the scenery, wet wading, feisty fish, and simply being alive!  I still love the juxtaposition of feeling like I'm on a trout stream yet lifting smallmouth bass from my net.  While fishing, I was also treated to the sight of another beautiful mink meandering around the rocky bluffs tracing the river's edge.

   My longest fish of the day measured about 13 inches.  While tearing down my rod, the 3 guys who had been spin fishing for about an hour returned with 3 smallies that ran from 16-18" long.  Whoa!  I have my ideas on how they accomplished this, and am looking forward to returning to this stretch of river.

   After the nearly 3 hour drive home, I began unloading the CR-V of its contents.  While I got a stray whiff of something during the drive, it wasn't until I got the suv into the garage that I truly smelled the nasty, bacterial chemical cocktail brewing inside my vehicle!   I might have squinched up my nose, but I was smiling, too.  Heck, I'm smiling now!  That swampy odor was simply the left-over remains of a great weekend of fly fishing!

   While I promptly removed the smelly culprits, my net and fishing sandals, from the vehicle, I thought of my buddy's wader tote.  I hope his tote smells just as badly today as it did years ago.  After all, it's important to keep the priorities straight!

   

IA DNR & AWARE Volunteers Clean Up Waterways (...Trash Talk continued)

*JULY 7-14 were the dates for the 2012 AWARE clean-up of the Iowa River. Please see the 2012 post for results:  http://strip-n-twitch.blogspot.com/2012/07/this-year-participants-in-iowa-dnrs_19.html *


    On July 9-16, 2011, the Iowa DNR again backed up its trash talk with action.  The DNR’s Project AWARE volunteer river clean-up of the Little Turkey, Turkey, and Volga Rivers netted 64,722lbs of garbage.  That is the equivalent of 32.36 tons, or nearly the weight of 18.5 new 4WD Honda CR-V LX SUV’s, being removed by volunteers and their canoes! 

   This year, 429 volunteers participated in the clean-up.  An average of 152 volunteers participated each day with 273 being new to AWARE this year and 61 having participated for 5 or more years.  Of the total amount of trash collected by these volunteers, 96% was recycled.  Scrap metal, then tires (611), composed the greatest weight of recyclables, and 335lbs of redeemable cans/bottles (cha-ching!) were found.   

   Participants ranged from aged 2 to 76.  An Indiana father/daughter team participated and a father from Cedar Rapids, IA., had sons from Illinois, Colorado, and Oregon join him on the hunt for garbage.
    When asked what the most unusual piece of trash removed from a river was, Brian Soenen, Project AWARE Coordinator replied, “While I don’t recall anything being incredibly unique, volunteers found quite a few wooden-spoked wagon wheels and an insane number of large implement tires.  The great news is that most of the trash was ‘old’ junk…been there a long time and has now been forever removed.”

Photo Caption Information:

   #1:  On day 1, Nick Gaeta, Cedar Rapids, IA, transports trash through Gouldsburg Park on the Little Turkey River, following a 'pre-cleanup' of nearby Crane Creek. Gaeta has participated in all but the 1^st year of the Project AWARE clean-ups.  #2:  While at least 5 paddlers had already spent a good portion of this day plucking trash on a 'pre-cleanup' of Crane Creek, most volunteers set up camp at Gouldsburg Park, Hawkeye, IA, & enjoy the day's outdoor festivities. The confluence of Crane Creek and the Little Turkey River is located at the park.  #3:  KJ Rebarcak, Long Grove, IA, left, and 'Dutch Oven' Dave Brown, Springfield, MO, transport trash through the Little Turkey River on the first day of this year’s Project AWARE river clean-up.  The trash was actually removed from nearby Crane Creek.   

 #4:  Members of the Dubuque Fly Fishers and the Hawkeye Fly Fishing Association were asked to volunteer their time and present a hands-on fly casting clinic.  Approximately 8 fly anglers participated.  Project AWARE volunteer Rose Danaher, Homestead, IA, (pictured) receives a fly casting lesson from Kate Lodge, a member of both clubs, & a Geneseo, IL, resident. 

   For more information about Project AWARE (A Watershed Awareness River Expedition), & methods of participating in the clean-up of Iowa waterways, please visit this link:   http://www.iowadnr.gov/Recreation/CanoeingKayaking/ProjectAWARE.aspx .   And, please e-mail me your 'trash talk'!  If you pick up trash from waterways or want to share how you have changed your own habits of trash disposal while on waterways, if you want to comment about how waterways have improved over the years, or if you want to report about what you most commonly find in and along waterways, email me about it or send me a picture.  I'd like to increase the attention paid to the maintenance and appreciation of our waterways.  ~Twitch

Trash Talk About Garbage on Waterways (...continued from April post)

   Project A.W.A.R.E. will host its 9^th annual volunteer river clean-up from July 9-16, 2011.  Volunteers will spend a day or up to the week helping to clean trash from 88.1 miles of the Little Turkey, Turkey, and Volga Rivers.  A.W.A.R.E. refers to ‘A Watershed Awareness River Expedition’ and is an Iowa DNR program.   

   Volunteers travel the rivers by canoes, tent-camp, pay for the provided meals, and may partake in nature and environmental programs in the PM.  Examples of this year’s programs include:  a canoe skills and safety class (IA DNR), an owl walk (Fayette County Conservation Board) and a hands-on fly casting demonstration (Hawkeye Fly Fishing Association & Dubuque Fly Fishers). 

   Please click on the link to the website if you would like to learn more about the program or to become a sponsor or volunteer.   http://www.iowadnr.gov/Recreation/CanoeingKayaking/ProjectAWARE.aspx

  Following the week-long river clean-up, I will attempt to provide readers with general information about the volunteers, & the pounds of trash removed from the rivers, along with some of the oddities discovered in the waterways.

   (And as I wrote in my first 'Trash Talk' post in April, 2011, if you happen to pick up trash from any waterway, anywhere, e-mail me a few lines and/or send me a picture so I may post it and encourage further waterway responsibility.)  Thanks, ~Twitch