Small Rant

And another day gone by. Started off with some dirtier than expected water and a cold morning. The bite was slow early and steadily improved throughout the day. Worms.

Had some more thinking time today and mostly thought about how too many people can really ruin a good thing. Probably shouldn't complain about too many folks as I only add fuel to the fire. It's a simple biological issue and F&G should do something in terms of regulating use, both commercial and recreational.

There are some places that simply do not have the fish numbers to handle a bunch of guide boats and recreational floaters several days a week. Usually this is self limiting as you just kind of learn that if you are behind a bunch of other boats, fishing is going to suck. But, people have plans and they aren't always going to change their plans just because there are other people there. The problem that I've seen is that the few fish that are there are getting thumped on pretty good. It's not like some places where we have several thousand fish per mile. The places that I'm talking about only have 300 or so per mile, if that. When they're on, it's easy fishing but realize that it's the same fish being caught everyday. Throw some foul hooks, broken flies, fights that go on too long, natural mortality, and so on and suddenly things don't look so good.  

I've seen one of my favorite fisheries slowly deteriorate over the years and I think it correlates to pressure. Maybe I'm wrong but nobody really knows why, but the little data that is there supports a decreasing fish population. So, this is why lies are sometimes a good thing. The angling world is full of treasures to be hunted and found on your own. We live in a place full of some crazy good trout waters on the Yellowstone, Madison, Gallatin, Jefferson, and more. These are the obvious gems that should keep an angler busy for a lifetime. When you do stumble on something special, maybe keeping it to yourself isn't always a bad thing.

On that note, I'm heading over to the Big Horn tomorrow for a couple of days. Shhh, it's on the down low and I don't want the word to get out about hoppers over there yet.