The doldrums are still with us, a 40 mph wind last night and sustained 20 (air temp. 49) today make for – nothing but touching base and seeing how fellow fly fishers are doing.

From South Texas, David Winters is in the doldrums too – with little to offer the Reds tailing the Laguna Madre’. I’ll be sending him some flies to see if they will do any good, and tie some more of the winners before going South this spring.

Local fisherman, Lane Kregel, gave his take on the outing to Texoma / Denison Dam last weekend:

The day started off with the anticipation for catching mad, pissed off stripers.

As I geared up in the unusually empty parking lot, I noticed that nobody was on the spot. So I threw the faithful clouser that has given me the tug hundreds of times. Nothing. Even the bait fishermen with their pawn shop ipods and screaming kids on the Oklahoma side weren’t catching fish. Not a good sign.

Still no luck. I move down river and try a different color, fast strip, slow strip – nothing worked. Minutes turn into hours.

Tired, pissed off, I was ready to climb Everest back to the truck for oxygen. Then the alarm sounded.

Now everyone has a story about grandad feeding the catfish; Honk the horn and the feeding frenzy starts like sorority night at the Dixie Chicken in College Station, Texas.
In a short period of time before the flow changes the river I caught enough stripers to feed a small family for weeks.

So the next time you are at the Texoma / Denison Dam parking lot, and see a bald-headed guy with a fly rod in one hand and pulling a two wheeler with a generator and a Model 840
Cannonball Express air horn with direct drive 150-psi compressor, that will be me.

It is strange behavior, but these super fat Stripers really do seem to “hear” the horn. I know I caught some heat for calling them skinny awhile back, but if these guys aren’t fat …

As for me, the doldrums reach into business as well, with clients puckering a bit in anticipation of economic or political news not to their liking and still not to their knowing. Yet, the dogged determination behind more than twenty years in photography forces the drive toward … something. I’ve driven away and toward before, and I keep reminding myself seeing something to go toward is always best. Looking back eats at one’s insides, and runs the added risk of a head-on collision.