Maine Outdoor Journal

In the evening, which comes early at this time of year, the last long rays of the sun glinted off the rippling black water and the big trout drifted into the shallows at the tail of the pool where the currents funneled dinner into their waiting jaws. They were adhering to the fish's formula for successful living: pick a spot where you get the most food for the least expenditure of energy.

All the bright Fall day the northwest wind had blown relentlessly, tying knots in tippets and frustrating the best of casters. And the trout and salmon, which a year ago were thick in the pool and eager to take a fly, seemed to have vanished. Thousands of casts were made, dozens of fly patterns were tried, but the rods of the dozen or more anglers working the pool bowed only infrequently with the pull of a fish. My own fly patch was completely covered with everything from Gray Ghost streamers to size 18 emergers -- there were beadhead nymphs, black and olive woolly buggers, gold-ribbed hare's ear nymphs, Prince nymphs, a big grizzly Wulff, a parachute Adams -- a veritable fly shop. But for all that, one fish an hour was a high rate of return, and not many were achieving that.

But around five in the afternoon, with ninety minutes of light remaining, the fish began working the shoreline and taking up stations in the tail and some fine fish were landed and released.

The glory of autumn angling is not, however, in the numbers. To be on the water on a bright October day, surrounded by the brilliance of the dying birch and maple leaves (and not by a cloud of blackflies!), bundled snugly in layers of shirts and jackets against the bite of a north wind, is a privilege to be thankful for. And if we happen to land a bragging-size brook trout in his full Fall regalia we should pause and give deep thanks to the gods that put us in that place at that moment in time. The days of the 2008 season have dwindled down to a precious few, and it's a long, long time from Halloween to April Fool's Day when a new season will bring us back to life, back to the water.