The Shokuryoshi Experiment
I was feeling a little cooped up toward the end of May. I was ready to get out and fish different waters than my local creek. While I may have been a bit hasty on visiting certain tributaries and rivers, the month of June was still a good month - but any month with some fishing is a good month.
Week 1
To kick off fishing for June, I decided to head up the mountain to see how the flows were looking. On the first day of the month I hit three different waterways and found mixed success on all of them.
The first spot I stopped was along the main river in the watershed. Flows were high, but I was able to pull one brown trout from the current near the tail-out of a run.
The second spot was a creek that I'm familiar with, but this time, I decided to explore upstream from where I usually turn back. I met three brook trout pretty early in the session, but as I made my way further upstream, the fishing became less and less productive.
The third and final spot for the day was to another creek that I had visited last year, but the flows at the time were very low, and the water temp was borderline too warm. This time, I was met with almost the opposite. High flows and deep pools made wading almost impossible. I did find one fairly shallow stretch with some boulder features in a comfortable casting range. Here I pulled two small rainbows in fairly quick succession before hanging up in a tree and having to problem solve being able to reach my line safely. Luckily I was able to make it to the other bank and recover my line and my fly, all intact.
Week 2
I was able to get out fishing a few times this week, but only one of those times was with a tenkara rod. So, with that, only one recorded session.
It was a nice evening, and the fish in the local creek were changing things up and holding in spots that I rarely see them in. My plan was to fish up and around the bend, but that was cut short by a family that decided to rest by the water right at one of the best pools. That was fine though, I had gotten in a half hour of fishing, and enjoyed the time I had there that evening. Three rainbows were added to the numbers in this time.
Week 3
On the summer solstice, I hit the local creek for about an hour in the evening. The fishing was good. There wasn't much activity that was visible on the surface, but I figured I would start there anyway. To my surprise, I had pretty quick response from fish engaging the fly. There were a few fly changes as I tried to adjust to the angles and conditions I was fishing at early on, but I got it dialed in as I worked my way up the creek.
Week 4
The flows on my favorite river were getting close to what they were when I had started fishing it last year, so I wanted to take a drive to scope out the river and commit a little bit of time to fishing - to get a feel for how much CFS is "fishable" with a tenkara rod. This outing is the last recorded outing for the rest of the month, and is the one I decided to use as my journal entry for June, which you can find a link to below...
Stats Update
With my recorded outings for the month wrapped up, I'm able to compare states to this time last year. I had the same amount of outings, less hours fished, and one less catch than June of 2023. With that, I'm still averaging a slightly higher fish per hour rate for the month. Going into the hottest months of the year, I'm looking forward to seeing if I'm able to sustain that same, upward trend in the catch rates.
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