The Shokuryoshi Experiment
Tucked away in a small ravine that’s close to town is a little creek. A short walking trail meanders alongside the creek, giving access to sections where the trees and brush aren’t overgrown. It’s not a long stretch of water, but it is the spot where I like to go when I don’t have a lot of time to fish. In the springtime, when runoff is still too high to fish the big river, this little creek helps me to get back in the rhythm of fishing. In 2023, it also helped me to set a foundation for skills that I would use throughout the season. Even though the flows were higher than average, I still got out and practiced new ideas.
A lot of concepts I had been reading about at the time all revolved around movement. The goal seemed to be to cover more stretches of water, and to cover them efficiently. If I were to make the most of my time on the water, I needed to learn to manage my time better when fishing. I had already spent plenty of time reorganizing my pack and system for carrying gear. With the creek being so close to where I live, it would be the “training grounds” for a good portion of the warmer months - at least until the flows mellowed out in other areas.
The creek is about 20 to 30 feet wide in most areas that are accessible. There are several pools, but none of them are too deep. Along with that, there are a few sections of shallow riffles, and some spots where the current tumbles over rocks into cascading pockets. There are small boulders throughout the creek that give opportunity to reach different spots, depending on how high the water is.
Because the flows were higher early on in the spring, I was relegated to mostly fishing from the bank and a few spots that I could hop along the rocks to. This was a great way to gain understanding of some of these concepts that I was trying to grasp. The stretch that I normally would fish in about 45 minutes to an hour was now being covered in less time. This may have been due to less options of where to cast from, but I started to realize where fish weren’t going to be in the high flows.
As the flows came into a range where they were wade-able, I started my sessions a little further downstream from an access point on the far bank - opposite the trail. This starting point offered access to a deep pool with a steep bank and a lot of tree cover. I would mostly observe this pool as I came up on the spot, but did fish it a few times if activity was high.
Upstream from there was a shallow stretch of riffles, fed by a large, flat pool in which the current came in from a few spots - and this is just below my previous starting point from earlier in the spring. The activity here was much better, but the approach and angle which I had to cast from was a bit challenging due to tree coverage along the bank.
Early on, with this lower section added on to what I fished, my total time was at about 1.5 hours to get from the lower access to where I usually ended my session. With the increased familiarity of both the creek, and new practices, I was able to cover the whole section in about 1 hour.
One aspect I was trying to balance was the catch rate for the hour. I didn’t want to move too fast and miss opportunities to catch fish, but I didn’t want to spend too much time in one spot either. The idea was to get better at reading water, and pay better attention to what was working and what wasn't. Becoming more and more familiar with the creek over the years, I already knew where some popular lies were, but, in being more time-oriented, I started to weed out which lies were more likely to produce a fish. I learned that some were dependent on the time of day, or even how much water was flowing through the creek.
I was gaining more understanding of the concepts I was practicing, and noticing faster movement without a decrease in catch rates. There were many other skills to learn, and to better understand, but this was a start.
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