Newsletter of the Truckee River Flyfishers

Transcription

1 Newsletter of the Truckee River Flyfishers TRF Mission Statement We are dedicated to: improving and promoting the sport of fly fishing in Nevada. Promote and encourage the conservation of game fish, especially wild trout, through the betterment of the streams and lakes everywhere. Encourage and assist our youth to become fly fishers and true sportspersons. Inside this issue: President s Message p.1-2 Meet the Board p.3-5 January Prospects p.6 Membership Form p.7 Upcoming Events: January 2015 President s Message by Mark Warren Happy New Year! This year, 2015, is shaping up to be a most excellent year. In only two short weeks, I will be off my knee scooter and able to walk, although I will still have to wear the boot on-and-off for the month following. At least I will be able to get out to Pyramid and freeze my rear end off trying to catch a fish. Mike Sevon, Ralph Phenix and Jimmy Greenhalgh are still catching a few fish, but they report that it has been slow. I ve been reading in the paper about the fish dying in Washoe Lake, and Sparks Marina. It s a sad thing, but NDOW has always managed to restock once the water levels return to normal. In the case of Sparks Marina, the oxygen rich surface water gets cold and, since it is heavier than the warmer water at the bottom of the 118 foot deep pond, sinks to the bottom bringing the warmer oxygen poor water to the surface killing the fish Our guest speaker for January 28 6:30) will be our own vice president Doug Ouellette. He will give us a Power Point presentation on Lake Fishing. Doug is an excellent speaker very knowledgeable and enthusiastic. He is also a professional guide and has produced DVDs on fishing. It should be a most entertaining evening. I will have raffle prizes, cookies, coffee, water and fly boxes for those who are tying for the banquet. Continued on page 2 January BOD meeting Jan. 8 Healing Waters Jan. 15 General Meeting Jan. 6:30 February BOD meeting Feb. 5 Flytying (NDOW) Feb. 11 (6:30) General Meeting Feb.25 Hinckson Fishout Feb. 28 March BOD meeting Mar. 5 Banquet (Boomtown) Mar.14

2 The Anglers The Angler s Line Line Page 2 Page 2 President s Message cont. by Mark Warren Our February fish-out will once again be held at Hinkson Slough in the Mason Valley Wildlife Management Area. Fishing success varies from year-to-year, but can be good if conditions are right. The event will be Saturday, February 28 th. I will cook the one-can chicken dinner as I do every year. We ll give you more details in next month s newsletter. Always catch big fish Mark Quote of the Month I look into my fly box and think about all the elements I should consider in choosing the perfect fly: water temperature, what stage of development the bugs are in, what the fish are eating right now. Then I remember what a guide told me: Ninety percent of what a trout eats is brown and fuzzy and about five-eighths of an inch long. Allison Moir-Smith Board of Directors & TRF Officers President: Mark Warren markeraw@charter.net Vice President: Doug Ouellette calvadaflyfishing@sbcglobal.n et Secretary: Tom Smith edsontiger@aol.com Treasurer: Cheri Pierce fufupierce@aol.com Conservation: Mike Sevon mikesevonphotos@yahoo.co m Web Master: Curt Kamada fishncurt@hotmail.com Biologists on Staff: Mark W. and Mike S. Newsletter Editor: Kevin Van Ry kvanry33@att.net Board Member Mike Hoffman smshof3@att.net Board Member Wes Ong weswinnot@aol.com Project Healing Waters: John Imsdahl fishingimsdahl@gmail.com

3 The Angler s Line Page 3 Meet the Board by John Imsdahl I joined our club, I believe, in late 2011 and I joined the board in March 2014 to become program leader of our Project Healing Waters program. I bring to the board years of board experience as a board member and secretary for the Fly Fishers of Davis (FFD) and a former member of the Golden Gate Angling and Casting Club (GGACC). It is my desire to share with our board what those clubs did well and to assist our club with the annual dinner, speakers, fish outings and/or events, and to grow the Project Healing Waters Program. I met and married a United Airlines flight attendant in the San Francisco s Marina District in Judy and I will celebrate or 35 th anniversary on February 14 th. We were married in Sausalito at the Presbyterian Church across from the Alta Mira Hotel. We honeymooned in NYC s Manhattan and in Eqypt, climbing the Giza Pyramids, walking between the Sphinx s paws, the Valley of Kings, Luxor, Thebes, Tut s and Ramsey s tombs and we sailed the Nile. Despite numerous efforts, Judy does not fish, nor does she like camping, so I backpack, fish and camp without her. Her favorite activities are reading, the study of silent and silver screen film star biographies, cooking and traveling to foreign countries. As a result of her flight benefits and her love of travel, we have seen a lot of this world, but we have a lot more to see. She is a southern California girl and she is retired now from UAL. I was born in Oakland, CA and raised in the East Bay. Growing up on a pear, peach and apricot orchard in the Meekland section of Hayward, we lived on a lot that contained two houses, one for my mother s parents and one for us, along with my grandfather s woodworking workshop, garage, and carport with laundry. We raised rabbits and chickens, grew tomatoes and vegetables, and I loved watching my grandfather make things from all types of wood. My best friends' and playmates' ancestries included Chinese, Japanese, African Americans, Hispanics, Swedes, Irish, German and Jewish. This early diversity lent itself to an actual "blindness", if you will that we are basically all the same inside. Nevertheless boys had to fist fight there way through school until the pecking order was established, and I was sent to the dreaded VP's office in kindergarten, 5th, 6th, 7th and 9th grades before my "number" was established. My father was a "Teamster now, a Teamster then, and a Teamster forever". Born in 1904, he fought with bats and fists next to "Jimmy" Hoffa in Detroit and later in Oakland and at the Hunt's cannery in Hayward. He was a machinist, but a "Teamster first", a shop union steward, but above and beyond anything else a union man. As a result, I met "Mr. Hoffa", as I called him, on three different occasions and Governor Edmund G. "Pat" Brown several times. Both left lasting impressions of enormously powerful men whose very presence would push a crowd to the side. "Jimmy" and "Pat" were very kind to me, and I will never forget my encounters with them. My father never cared that "we built Las Vegas" because "we made lots of money (Teamster Pension Plan) from points and interest off of those fellas" and he was the first to tell me that "Jimmy" was "probably whacked because the mob made more money with Frank (Fitzsimmons). The Teamsters sent us to the 1961 Candlestick All Star Game and the 1962 Giants vs. Yankee World Series. At the time, 49er tickets came off milk cartons. I also proudly possess union books from the Teamsters, UAW and AFL CIO from my summer jobs at the Fremont GMC, Oakland Gerber Baby Foods, Hyatt Hotels and Gridley Libby peach factory.

4 The Angler s Line Page 4 My earliest memories of fishing included ocean fishing off piers from the Cliff House and by boat underneath and outside of the Golden Gate Bridge. There were also two special sections of the Tuolumne and Stanislaus rivers that I loved to fish. I fished the Tuolumne River from Moccasin Creek to Jacksonville and the Stanislaus downstream from the Lake Tulloch dam. This was where I did my very first successful fly fishing, but I also resorted to a Mitchell 300 reel with a Super Duper on the line as well. In 1968, despite being in college for a career as a civil engineer, any nineteen year old that was 1A was expected to be drafted for the Vietnam War. This was before the lottery, my 2S deferments had been cancelled for Westmoreland s and Johnson s huge build up, and the only ones that I knew that avoided the draft were the married ones with kids and the ones whose families paid $10,000 to attorneys to fight the notion of a draft in an undeclared war. So I went into the Oakland Induction Center just past my 19th birthday, as demanded by the draft, and I ended up in basic training at Fort Polk, Louisiana and infantry school at Fort Jackson, South Carolina. I served in the US Army for two years, reaching the rank of Specialist 5, E5, and I spent a year as a member of the 3rd platoon, D Troop, 2/17th Cavalry, of the 101st Airborne Division. We would have 38 members of our unit killed in action, numerous wounded, a Medal of Honor was awarded along with (3rd platoon s Michael Fitzmaurice) numerous Silver and Bronze Stars, as well as the coveted Combat Infantryman s Badge (CIB). I fought in Khe Sahn, Ashau Valley, probably in Laos, on the DMZ, and near Hue and Phu Bai. We were a reactionary force so we went into battles as a platoon sized 30 man unit, we slide down 140 foot ropes through triple canopy jungles, from hovering Hueys while the 9th, 66th or other NVA regiment shot at us. We lived in the bush for anywhere from a day to a week, seeking out and finding NVA base camps where, at night, we watched as dozens of trucks traveled a new artery of the Ho Chi Minh Trail. My unit was one of the first on Hamburger Hill. No civilians, women, farmers, children, or babies were killed by us, nor did we burn anyone s home or village. We just fought uniformed North Vietnamese Army units when they outnumbered us 4 to 1. I came home in July 1970, received my discharge at Ft. Lewis, took off my uniform in Seattle, and tried to disguise myself as never having served in the military. I moved to Monterey, California, took a job at the Del Monte Hyatt House, entered Monterey Peninsula College for a transfer program to UC Berkeley, and lived on the GI Bill, generous tips and played a lot of golf. I met celebrities, who were there for the Crosby Clambake or the 1972 US Open, singers for the jazz festival, famous golfers, and Laguna Seca race car drivers. In two short years I transferred to UC Berkeley, but returned to Pebble Beach to stay at my girlfriend s parent s house on Heritage Rd almost every weekend. I played golf with them on the MP Country Club s the Dunes, the Sands, or even Spyglass, Cypress or Pebble golf courses. I would continue to play golf with them, even after marrying another woman, until their deaths, and then I never played again. After my UCB graduation, I had a successful 35 year career in San Franciscan and Hawaiian commercial real estate, participating in the building of 116 condos in Maui, the sale of 4 hotels located in Kona, Hilo, Kauai and Oahu, and I spent a lot of time on Maui or the Kona Coast from 1977 to We bought homes on Potrero Hill, Dolores Heights and Eureka Valley. I worked in the Castro for several years in the mid to late 1970s, for a while at 1844 Union Street and for a time in Embarcadero III. We left San Francisco in

5 The Angler s Line Page because many of our gay friends had died and there were too many funny memories that were turned into sad ones. San Francisco Real Estate will take you in many interesting directions. One week I was looking at three Victorian apartments on Sutter Street, stacked with beds 3 high, 9 to a bedroom, containing Jim Jones followers, and the next week the apartments were cleaned out with all of the followers moving to Guyana. And, while we disagreed about the benefits of rent control and the restrictions on condominium conversions, Harvey Milk, and I had would have frequent chats over a cup of coffee at The Bakery on Castro Street just a few doors from his camera store. Some of Harvey s ashes were buried in front of his camera store, and the other half off of a 106 foot tall ship I was involved with called the Lady Frei. I have framed black and white photos of the Lady Frei before she was lost for good off the west coast of Florida. For my last 20 years of real estate I was a Napa and Solano county appraiser as well as an apricot and almond farmer living not far from Putah Creek and Lake Berryessa. In 2003 I bought a home in Carson City believing I would soon retire there, but in 2011 I purchased a home in the Del Webb Sierra Canyon section of Somersett and retired there in We love Reno and we love our neighbors and neighborhood. My wife has an aunt and dozens of first, second and third cousins, many are Nevadan natives and UNR graduates, living here. I love to tie flies, although I'm not great at it, and fly fish Pyramid Lake, Davis Lake, Fall River, Baum Lake, East Carson River, Silver King River, Trinity River, Lewiston Lake, and Truckee River for trout or steelhead. About every five years I return to the Kenai Peninsula to fish for halibut, and fly fish for Coho and Sockeye as I did last August. I am very proud to be a member of the Truckee River Flyfishers (Doug says it is TRF and not TRFF ) and I hope that I might provide valuable contributions to your board. John

6 The Angler s Line Page 6 represent us when it comes to Giving Back to our thousands of local veterans by Wes Ong January 2015 Prospects By Wes Ong Pyramid Lake: The lake has slowed a bit from the good late fall catch rates, pressure is light but every week there are double digit fish being caught. Of late Dago Bay has been yielding the best fish but is very crowded. As usual weather helps the catch rate. Word of advice: change to a new leader or at least re-tie knots before each day of fishing. The chances of getting a big one this year are even greater this year than in previous years. Most of us have gone from 2x leader to 1x or at least 12 pound test! Some are using 16 pound test. The Rivers: The place to fish is the slower water with finer tippets and smaller flies. In the past on the East Walker when the water was 34 degrees in the morning and warmed a few degrees in the afternoon a bite would start. Seems to me that the same should happen on the Truckee if the water conditions are stable. Look for baetis to hatch in the afternoons east of town, question is did any fish survive the low water of the Summer? Topaz Lake: Opens New Years Day you can fish it with your current Nevada License. Size 8 Purple Woolie Bugger up by where the West Walker dumps into the lake is what Pete the former owner of the Anglers Edge use to recommend. It s a prospect but I have yet to catch a fish here. Squaw Creek Res. This is where we normally go in January and it should fish well. There are good numbers of fish but it is a significant drive. Call NDOW for the current ice conditions. Collection Ditch: Generally completely iced over it is only partially iced over and there are always a few small fish to be had. Short route over Harrison Pass is closed so the long way over Secret pass is the only access. More open water should be fishable next month. American River: Steelhead fishing in this urban environment, it helps to be the first one on the water. Indicator nymphing with a #12 Olive Bird s Nest and a dropper with either an egg pattern or a salmon fry should work. Typical down and across with a sink tip and a steelhead pattern will also work. There is less angling pressure at Goethe Park, Gristmill or Watt Ave. Beware, vehicle break-ins are common so don t leave anything in sight! Discovery Bay: I hear this is where the Stripers are at in January. Forget it, the home owners here put herbicide on the hydrilla and everything died so there is nothing for any of the fish to eat. Sleepers: In California, Pardee Lake, Iron Canyon Res. Amador Lake, and Lake McCumber.

7 The Angler' s Line Page 7 Truckee River Flyfishers Membership Form P.O.Box 7231 Reno,NV Name: Date: Address: City: State: Zip: Phone: Work Phone: Occupation: Experience: Beginner Intermediate Advanced Fishing Interest: Projects and Activities Interests: Are you willing to volunteer at club events? Yes No Are you interested in being a TRF Board Member? Yes No Payment M ethod: Check # Circle one: $30 Cash - Project Healing Circle one: New member Renewal Circle: Trout Unlimited Member Federation of Fly Fishers Member Waiver of Liability, Assumption of Risk and Emergency Contact In consideration of being allowed to participate in TRFF events and activities, I, the undersigned,, acknowledge, appreciate and agree that: 1. I knowingly and freely assume all such risks, both known and unknown and assume full responsibility for my participation; and willingly agree to comply with the stated instructions and policies and customary terms and conditions for participation. 2. I,hereby release the Truckee River Flyfishers and their officers, directors, and sponsors harmless with respect to any and all injury,disability,death,. or loss or damage to person or property to the fullest extent permitted by law I HAVE READ THIS RELEASE OF LIABILITY AND ASSUMPTION OF RISK AGREEMENT,FULLY UNDERSTA"ND ITS TERMS AND I SIGN IT FREELY AND VOLUNTARILY WITHOUT ANY INDUCEMENT. Signature Date _ Emergency Contact Information: Contact's Name Relation. Phone