Page 35 - Nick Simonson News Today

First and Ten

Me and the Trees

By Nick Simonson My first experience with wild trout came in Montana just before my senior year of high school.  There, alongside a ditch that we were told was a trout stream by the man at the shop in the nearby town, I wandered out toward the bank and looked down to see a dark, missile-shaped body holding at the bottom of a blue-green run of water.  With my flyfishing days far ahead of me, I slashed at the fish deep in the pocket.  It barely flinched as my Mepps spinner burned back time and...

By Nick Simonson The evolution of the fishing net in the past few decades has leapt from the one-size-fits-all model of an aluminum hoop with a nylon basket of one-inch squares into the branches of an evolutionary tree reaching out across the horizon of angling options. From ergonomic grips for more stable solo landings, to extendable handles allowing for greater reach from shore or high floating boats, to oversized baskets to cradle today’s growing trophy-sized fish such as muskies and sturg...

By Nick Simonson I’ll be the first to tell you that I’m a homebody when it comes to the outdoors.  It doesn’t take much for me to get lost chasing walleyes along the river winding through town, casting after trout in the nearby lakes, or picking off a few hungry bass as summer progresses on nearby waters for largemouths and smallmouths alike.  In the fall, I don’t travel far for hunting, heading a few minutes northeast for a readily available shot at sharpies in September, and southwe...

By Nick Simonson A shellacking. A beatdown. A butt-whooping. All these terms paled in my young mind when describing a drubbing on the baseball field when compared to the term “getting creamed.” That descriptor suggests that the opposing team had swung their bats so mightily and so frequently and with such success that they converted our pasty-white, pre-summer milky makeup into slow-moving whipped cream on the diamond. While disappointing to be on the end of such a creaming, it made the ...

By Nick Simonson Stocked trout don’t take long to acclimate to their surroundings. Within a week or two of the recent dumps of rainbows and browns across the state, these fish spread out and stalk the water column for just about anything edible. Whether that’s the first rising midge populations of the year, small nymphs on the bottom, or other prey items, trout find most of what they need below the surface. On those still evenings early on as they pick off rising insects, my all means, have...

By Nick Simonson There’s an encounter each spring that reminds me of how lucky we are to have ugly fish. They don’t glisten in gold like walleyes, sparkle with silver like a white bass, or even bring up the base of the podium like a smallmouth bass bedecked in bronze. Instead, they fight hard, provide fast action, and often remind us of the basics of angling and where many of us got our start. These not so pretty fish also reinforce the idea that beauty is truly in the eye of the beholder....

By Nick Simonson We buzzed along the inside of the breakline, my buddy Kevin and I, watching the rhythmic ticking of the tips of the trolling rods strung out alongside his Alumacraft, with a second eye toward the graph behind the console he was manning for the blips and arcs which symbolized the post-spawn walleyes lurking below. In the blue-green waters of the Missouri River, our firetiger crankbaits bumped and scraped along the beige bottom as things got shallower, and then swung back to th...

By Nick Simonson It’s a sure sign of spring when you begin to see the little mounds of dirt popping up between the segments of sidewalk, evidence of ants hard at work getting active and ready for the warm weather months. As these industrious insects ramp up their efforts for the betterment of their colonies, their adventures often take them up trees and bushes and into the grasses which line the waters of our area. Be they lakes or streams, hungry bluegills and trout await the feeding opportu...