4/22/2021

Six FATC members headed to Montauk for what seemed to be a perfect April day. Jim Craig, Don Varner, Harold Bates Vernon Preston, Bill Byington and Steve Baker carpooled to the park and after picking up our trout tags at the lodge we all got ready to fish. While the rest of the guys headed upstream I [Steve] wanted to check out the boulder area and focus on improving my fishing abilities  The plan paid off and I had 2 fish in the net before barely getting my boots wet. I then worked my way to the boulder and the fish were lined up just waiting for the right treat. i.e. a Y2K, a wet flies and an orange mop fly. Working the deep hole at the boulder it got exciting as I was able to pick up 5 more fish and almost missed lunch. My ears were burning as my phone started ringing because Bill and Vernon needed their lunch out of my car

 After a nice fellowship at lunch and talking over the mornings fishing we split up again to fish the afternoon. Jim. Bill Harold and Don went back upstream and Vernon and Steve headed to fish above the bridge going into the campground. That was a waste of time as it looked to be fished out from the weekend. So back to the boulder area to try and get Vernon on some fish, I left Vernon there and headed to the Walters stretch and to see how everyone else was doing. Jim was euro nymphing with a couple Zebra midges and I saw him  put several fish in the net in a matter of minutes. He was gracious enough to let me squeeze in and he moved down a little, but he took the fish with him. The Zebra midge didn’t work for me so I went back to the orange mop fly and was able to pick up 5 more fish with one of them being exceptionally exciting as he leaped completely out of the water a couple of times before I was able to get him in the net. My fish count for the day was my personal best and the rest of the guys also had pretty good days.

We finished up about 5 pm and decided to hit the Tater Patch in Rolla for diner. The food was good but getting a table and the service was poor. Needless to say the Tater Patch is on probation. This did not spoil the fellowship and everyone enjoyed the company and we were all ready for the long ride back to the commuter lot.