After the recent rain

I had the opportunity to visit two streams this past weekend, hoping that the recent rain had both significantly raised the water levels and perked up their residents.  While neither proved to be the case, I was at least able to catch a number of nice little brookies.  The water temperature of both streams was low enough that I did not feel like I would harm the fish if I handled them with care (67 and 60 degrees F).  At both streams I was able to entice the fish to take flies on the surface (Ausable Bombers, parachute hopper, and Henryville Special), although at the second stream the majority of hits were from very small fish.  While my fishing partner, Alan, seems to have the knack for periodically catching one of our favorite brook's low abundance residents (i.e. wild brown and tiger trout), just after he did it yet again I was shocked to hook and land a nice wild brown trout myself.  All in all it was a nice visit to what he affectionately calls brook trout forest.