A trip to the Big City isn’t complete without a little fly-fishing
It’s funny how seemingly unrelated things and events remind me of fishing. It’s the way I am by nature and nurture. I don’t think I can change. I don’t want to anyway. My dad would be proud of me, and my unending dedication to trouting.
ECLIPSE AND FISHING
After experiencing our sun being eclipsed by the moon this week, I started thinking about sea trout fishing.
The tide is a critically important consideration when planning an outing to hunt sea trout. And that is true in both day and night fishing.
Of course, the moon and sun’s gravity are the driving forces behind ocean tides. The moon’s influence is much stronger due to being a tiny fraction distant from Earth compared to the sun.
The moon is 384,400-kilometres from Earth and the sun is a whopping 149,000,000 kms. That’s a lot of zeros and division shows that the sun is 387 times as far away. But the sun is 27,000,000 times more massive.
Without getting into physics and Newton’s Universal Law of Gravitation, the gravity of the moon on the Earth is twice that of the sun and so it follows on the tides.
Very well and good, so they came together in line yesterday, with the moon almost exactly covering the face of the sun, and is that coincidence I wonder? Can science explain to me why?
Or are the gods of fishing and the heavens holding that secret from our peering eyes and instruments?
In any event, the sun and moon combined forces to produce wicked high tides. Our wharf almost submerged.
I think the sea trout may be on the bite when the spring tides settle down. Kayak trouting is on my agenda this weekend. I will let you know if I’m right next column.
TORONTO
Today I heard on the radio that Uber is coming to Newfoundland. I have the app already set up on my phone. And it reminded me of, once again, fishing.
How is that possible?
I spent the better part of this winter in Toronto, living on Bay Street in the downtown College Park area. Goldie and I had an apartment on the 28th floor of a 50-storey building. Our view was of other tall buildings, the Cn-tower, the roof of the Rogers Center, all with Lake Ontario in the background.
That’s a big change from Wharf Road in Spaniard’s Bay, beside Conception Bay, with Green Head our predominant living room view.
Why? Not by choice, you may assume. I even missed the big snowstorm. I did not take my snowshoes to Toronto, although I did think seriously about it.
CANCER TREATMENT IN ONTARIO
A couple of years ago, I had surgery for prostate cancer. All went well and the hope was that was the end of that. But as time went on, my PSA – which should have remained undetectable – crept up slowly but surely.
This meant I had what they call a biochemical recurrence, or in simpler terms, a few cancer cells got left behind after the surgery. I would need radiation treatment to clear that up.
You may have heard in the news about the shortage of radiation technologists at Eastern Health. Because of that, I was given the option of having my 33 treatments done at Princess Margaret Cancer Centre in Toronto. And that’s what I did.
I left home on Jan. 21 and returned March 20. In terms of my medical treatment, everything went extremely well and all the doctors and staff in Toronto were most excellent. I’m back home and in fine fishing form.
FISHING IN TORONTO
Around Christmas, I got to wondering about possible fishing opportunities in Toronto. I seemed to remember reading about winter runs of Steelhead in the rivers and streams flowing into Lake Ontario.
Maybe, just maybe, I could give it a try. After all, my treatments took up about 30 minutes out of my day and my weekends were free.
I did some Googling. It didn’t take long for me to discover some quite promising fishing opportunities not far from Canada’s biggest city.
I wasn’t really surprised – it’s not that unusual. Once, I fished in front of the Statue of Liberty in New York City.
THE CREDIT RIVER
The Credit River came into focus for me. It flows from headwaters above the Niagara Escarpment near Orangeville and Caledon East to empty into Lake Ontario at Port Credit, Mississauga.
It’s a big river, about 1,500kms long, and one of the best steelhead rivers flowing into Lake Ontario.
Where did it get its unusual name? It had to do with a fur trading post at the river’s mouth where credit would be given to First Nations people for supplies. Payment would be made in furs the following spring. So the river was a furtrading route historically.
UBER TO THE RIVER
Wait, what does this have to do with Uber? It’s an excellent way to go fishing when you find yourself in unfamiliar territory without a car.
It’s not easy getting from Bay Street to Mississauga by public transit, specifically where the Credit River flows through a golf course. That’s where I went fishing.
I lugged along my rod, waders, boots, lunch, and gear while travelling by subway, train, and bus. It was tiring.
Next time I’m going Uber. I planned another outing on my last weekend but a downpour of rain rendered the river unfishable.
NO LUCK
I met up with Jordon Pocket at the golf course and we headed down to the river to go fishing. Jordon is a great guy and head guide at A Perfect Drift Outfitters. Check them out at www. aperfectdrift.com.
I was in for a grand afternoon, although I did not manage to catch a steelhead. I did see one, and I met a fellow angler from The Rock, apparently a regular fixture on Credit River.
It can happen anywhere in the world. The fish just weren’t biting that day. None of the anglers I met had hooked a fish on the fly. One guy landed a nice one on bait, a beautiful fish.
FUN EXPERIENCE ANYWAY
But I liked the fishing. It consisted of two basic techniques, swinging the fly, and nymphing.
The angling is more similar to sea run brown trouting than salmon fishing, at least that’s what I reckon.
The swing style is the basic down-and-across technique, like we typically do here in N.L. for salmon. But on Credit, we used much bigger flies and kept them well submerged by using a sinking polyleader.
Nymphing is a submerged dead drift style using weighted flies and a floating strike indicator.
"Strike indicator" is fly angler speak for a small bobber. We do it a lot here on the Avalon for sea trout. It was fun and I shall return one day.
Nymphing is a submerged dead drift style using weighted flies and a floating strike indicator.
FORTY-ONE POUNDS OF FISHING GEAR
Hey, I have a great idea. Why not take off to Toronto for a couple of hockey games and a few days of fishing? Now that’s my kind of holiday in the Big City. It really isn’t that difficult to do. Maybe the playoffs will be a good time.
Here’s a funny story to leave you with. I’m organizing and packing my stuff for two months in Toronto. My flytying gear goes in first. I have salmon bombers to get tied up. Then I stuffed in my rod, waders, boots, rain jacket and so on for fishing.
OK, it’s weigh in time. The scale reads 41-pounds. Damn, I have nine pounds left for two months worth of clothes and footwear.
I guess I won’t be wearing jeans or heavy winter coats. I had to pack very strategically with my lightest travel clothes.
But I managed to get fishing and spend my evenings tying flies in the window of the 28th floor. Oh, and I got out to five Leafs games. That’s not bad for a Habs fan.