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I am not physically large. I'm Not you’re Norway pine tree, more like a slender balsam. I wasn’t made for the seven seas or the ocean. Big folks get the big water. I fit nicely in a canoe or kayak. I feel my best in chest waders. I was made for the likes of little creeks and  one in particular.

This black ribbon rivulet is hard to get to. It is a tough place to fish. Overhung branches make casting impossible. There may be dry fly purists but this is a creek their not invited too. Vegetation so thick you cannot take a stride without tangling in something. Every step better be measured or you’ll be fitted for a primordial casket.

Bank beavers burrow and the spring runoff under cuts what you think is solid stream bank. Hassocks rise up to your knees and trip you up and over. On a good or bad day, mood depending you may walk right up to a moose. You won’t out run Bullwinkle in chest waders. You ever get eye to dewlap with a moose your bowels suddenly get loose. Makes a damn fine moose repellant.

The mosquitoes keep you locked in a mesh head net. The stinging nettles demand fingered gloves. The ancients knew what they were doing when they set a perimeter defense mechanism aside this water course. Gnarly spindly grasping alders you can’t crawl over rob you of anything. Inert branches pluck your pockets left unbuttoned.

The only tracks I see on a regular basis are mink and herons. My boots squish in the black muck and the brush is thick. Nobody else has been here in years. There’s no litter or snapped branches. Getting back in here is just an untimed walk. It’s not easy with all the thick stuff so my rod is still broken down. I will string it up creek side. The grouse are pounding. Fiddle head ferns for salads will fill my creel when I leave.

The water looks like it flows out of shrubs, brush and grass as I peek up stream. Pocket water openings get tested from the upstream flow. Mid pool is about all a brookie can take for a drifting crawler. Then they slam it and run to get away from there colorful cousins. They go deep and straight to there lair. Hopefully no logs in the path or I lose it all.

I assemble the rod and thread line through the guides. My fingers are shaky in anticipation. Baiting the hook I bare my fingers and feed the flying biting horde. I bait quickly. A pendulum plop dapples the dark surface. Within seconds the line zips through my fingers. I snap a short hook set into the rod as it bounces in my hands. I kneel and net one fat brook trout.

It’s plump and wet. The black back makes the orange slashed gills brilliant. The white fin edges almost glow. So dotted and spotted from black dark water. I get the hook out and measure from tail to head against my rod handle. Just shy of fourteen inches.

I can’t hold any fish in higher esteem. Nothing to my taste buds compares to charcoal grilled brook trout. Every one in my hand is truly a living water color. I love that they are from cold deep remote waters. No boats, only boots. I catchem with crawlers which isn’t to fancy, but then neither am I. With ten thousand lakes and lord only knows how many rivers, streams and creeks, I’m sure there is one just your size. I know I found one that fits me.

The trout whisperer.

Inside the Mind of a Guide

Living the Dream in God's Country - Superior National Forest

Join author, professional guide, and master storyteller, Karl "Trout Whisperer" Seckinger, as he takes you on a 20 year, mystical journey into the Superior National Forest.

On this CD, Trout Whisperer's unique manner of storytelling, and digital sound effects, will transport you on a journey that will place you in the heart of the 'super natural forest' that is known as the Superior National Forest.

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