By the time June rolls around, a lot of us Southern spring trout anglers put away the light tackle and get ready for bass, the warm weather kings of rivers and ponds.
I live just a few miles from the confluence of the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers that produce mighty catches of smallmouth and largemouth bass. So when the humidity settles into Washington, I hang up the waders and tie a colorful popper to my 7-weight fly rod and head to the nearest canoe rental.
Let me admit, though, that this is a reluctant shift. I prefer the clear, cold mountain waters that hold trout more than the murky bass rivers that pass through Shenandoah Valley cattle pastures. But typically by June, my local trout streams are either fished out or too low.
But a hopeful email arrived from the Maryland Department of Natural Resources on June 4: “Crews stocked 450 trout. Frederick County. Owens Creek: 450 brown trout.”
Owens is one of my favorites, a pretty mountain stream that wraps around the presidential retreat at Camp David and ends in Thurmont, Md. It is one of the streams to which my fishing mentor first took me, and it is locally famous for attracting lots of young first-timers.
In the center of Thurmont, there is a small monument to the angling group dedicated to teaching children to fish and named for the male Asiatic jungle fowl whose neck feathers were once used for eyes on trout and salmon flies.
Since I couldn’t get to Owens for 10 days after the email landed, and figured every other angler had already fished the stream hard for those few brown trout, I stopped by the monument to rub it for good luck. I’d need it.
I turned on Sabillasville Road and stopped at several spots to fish. The pools looked fishy enough, but I had little luck. I used a little brassy nymph, an egg pattern, even a “Green Weenie,” but nothing hit.
From 6 a.m. to 9 a.m., I tried every pool, riffle, and pocket, but didn’t get a strike. That would usually be frustrating and depressing, but just getting one more chance at a local trout made it a great day nonetheless.
Normally, I’d give up, but I tossed the fly rod into the pickup and headed to another trout stream 30 minutes away that typically held more water and, I hoped, some holdover fish.
When I got to Middle Creek in central Maryland, the water looked good. And there were the telltale wading boot prints of other anglers who’d been there earlier. Positive signs.
On the first cast into a long riffle that flowed into a deep pool, I had a strike. Then another and another. By the fourth or fifth cast, I finally netted a 4-inch-long creek chub. The Green Weenie it hit was about as long as the tiny fish’s head.
Over the next half-mile, I cast dozens of times and landed another four chubs.
Typically, I’d go home after that kind of “failure.” But something got me thinking that catching any fish was a success of sorts. Why dis the little chub? Especially since I’d caught enough to limit out if they’d been trout.
So I kept on until I came to the last pool in a long stretch. I switched flies several times but only snagged on rocks.
I opened my fly box one last time and pulled out a prince nymph, probably one of the most popular flies ever. It has a dark body and two white, swept-back wings. It’s weighted with a tiny brass bead head. My brother Joe gave me a bunch tied in India years ago, and they’ve been one of my top go-to bugs.
I flipped it upstream into some rough water and got a little hit. Another chub, right?
Out jumped a nice 10-inch rainbow trout. I maneuvered him stream side and took out the hook. Sure, I could have kept him to grill up for a little appetizer that night. But I released him to get fatter for next season — or for the next angler.
Paul Bedard is a senior columnist and author of Washington Secrets.
