July 26 Upper Crow

Fished the Crow with Crowsnest native (not aboriginal, just from there) Jamie Petrone. Due to high number of water whackers everywhere east of Hillcrest, Jaime suggested we head upstream to edge of Coleman and fish up from there. He'd fished this stretch many times and has had moderate success.

First impression, nice water- some great stretches with nice pool water- small stretches between pools at times where lower non fishable type water.

Started with stimulator, but quick to switch to Chernobol ant- saw action on 3 of first four casts before a beast snapped me off. Can't say for sure the size, but certainly not small. I tried a foam hopper that was more beige and brown, but to no avail. Went back to stimmy and saw moderate action- landed a couple in the 9-11 inch range. Jaime stayed with stimmy throughout and was seeing more action, but was slow on the draw, missing quite a few. He hooked a good size (14-16 range) in a deep plunge pool, but after coming out of the water a couple times it spit the hook at him in the shallows.

Side note- these fish were crazy, fought like banshees- far better fights than up the gap. Even the small ones took your line for a spin and always came out of the water at least once.....crazy

After comparing flies with Jaime, I realized my Sofa pillow lacked the green his Stimmy had. I switched it up and nialed a couple more soon after. I would say the green was key. In all solid morning- 4 fish in hand and Jaime nabbed about the same- a couple elevens were the biggest, but I'm confident larger ones were there. Didn't see another fisherman and fished a large swath- untapped by Crow standards.

One final foot note- lost two flies (later recovered one) to low powerline monsters. Didn't want to mess with them though....