Dear Yale Angler,
Opening Day of the Edward C. Migdalski Pond is Saturday, April 1 at 8:00 am. To purchase a membership, complete and return the application enclosed. The annual stocking of the pond represents the majority of our budget expenditures each year, and it continues to increase with the price of fuel, labor and trout feed, at a cost to the club about $2,500. Any support in funding for the stocking is greatly appreciated and needed. If you are so inclined and able to contribute toward the trout, please write a separate, tax-deductible check payable to “Yale University–Fishing Club” and mail to the address above with your application.
Opening Day will include the usual coffee, donuts, bagels and muffins during the morning, and an assortment of hot pizza, salad, beverages and cookies at 12:00 noon sharp in the Bullock Clubhouse. (Please indicate if you will be attending the lunch on the application form.) 2017 membership applications are due by March 27th for Opening Day use. The spin-casting option was successful the last three years, and it will again be offered this year. Interestingly, fly-casters continue to outfish spin-casters on Opening Day. Directions, detailed pond hours and regulations will be mailed with your pond membership card.
Please enjoy the following student “fish stories” from this past season.
Tight lines!
- Sean Callinan, fly-tying instructor and fly-casting coach
- Tom Migdalski, club advisor
“Spoiled on the Sound” by Blake Thomson
A 25-minute boat ride from the Niantic launch landed us in our first spot. It was a late Sunday afternoon in August, and the casual boaters had stirred up the water. The majority of my fishing days are spent scrambling through rivers, searching for trout with fly rod in hand. Being on a boat was a treat as Tom Migdalski, a Yale fishing legend, guided us through the waves. I had been wanting to fish with Tom for some time.
Eventually we slowed down, analyzing our first spot. There were only a couple of boats nearby and there wasn’t the chaos of feeding birds one would hope for. Tom knew we would be shortly switching spots, but it gave us a chance drop some lines and learn to diamond jig. It consists of bouncing a heavy metal jig, a monster to my traditional split shot, off the sea floor. As soon as it touches bottom, you quickly reel 8-10 turns before releasing and repeating. It is efficient and a fun way to catch big fish. And when you are with Tom, it can be flat out deadly.
Not a fish in sight, Tom said we could cross Long Island Sound towards Plum Island. It was going to be a bumpy ride, and he said he could not guarantee fish, as any fisherman should. We headed out further, putting our hopes on a different submerged rock structure. There are many parallels to being on the Sound and in a river. I am used to analyzing miniature insects, rocks with eddy back currents, and waist- to shoulder-deep fishing holes. Out here, the same concepts applied, but on a grand scale. We were approaching a swarm of sea birds indicating bait holding on the submerged boulder field 100 feet below. We were in for some serious fishing.
Plum Gut is a major tidal passage flooding into and out of the Sound daily. Today, the wind and currents were opposing, pushing our boat and lines away from each other. This was going to be fun. I picked up my rod, dropped the diamond jig, and waited anxiously for it to strike bottom. Ten quick reels, drop again. Ten turns, drop again. Three turns and BAM! Fish on. The bluefish sliced my line through the water as I fought him to the surface, Tom coaching.
We spent the rest of daylight catching and releasing bluefish after bluefish – all in the 8- to 12-pound range. This was one of those days I only dream about, but now it was real. The smile and high fives were the only relief we had from working these fish up from the bottom. Days like this you do not forget. As a first-timer, I was spoiled on the Sound.
“First Trout” by William Koh
When I caught my first trout on a fly this summer, it came as a shock. Road tripping with my family from Portland, OR back east, I stopped at the Gallatin River southwest of Bozeman, MT based on the suggestion of our hotel clerk. I was new to the sport and had spent the past few days watching YouTube videos about casting and properly tying flies to the tippet. With my recently acquired 9’ 5-weight rod, I launched my Parachute Adams into the river poorly at first, occasionally snagging it on the shrubs and small trees dotting the riverbank. I wavered between restlessness and determination, tweaking my motions and making incremental progress. After a few hours, the sun was setting and another day of driving loomed. “It just takes more experience,” I justified to myself. “You shouldn’t get your hopes up.” I cast one last time, a weak, absent-minded toss into the river, which was more a muscle spasm than a proper delivery. I felt a novel form of pressure. The line started to pull out, and my adrenaline peaked. This was no rock in fast-moving water. It was alive. After fighting the fish for a few moments, frantically stripping and reeling, it surfaced. The sunset hit the silver scales of the rainbow trout at a blazing angle, and in that moment I felt supreme glee. Good things come to those who stick around. With fly fishing, I’m going to stick around.
“River Rodeo” by Joshua Perez-Cruet
I only have three rules that govern the way I fly fish: (1) Always start with streamers, double-jointed streamers. (2) Always end with streamers, double-jointed streamers. (3) Only fish streamers with 3 and 4wt full-flex rods, making sure to duck every time a gust of wind coincides with your forward casting motion. I’ve pulled a lot of hooks out of my hat, neck and shoulders. There’s one special case when these rules don’t hold: when big trout are sipping dries. I’m talking big trout, 20-plus-inch fish. Only then does the fiery ambush of a predatory specimen take second place, maybe, but even then, the desire lurks in the back of my mind, ready to pounce at any hiatus in the action.
These same tactics held true when I explored the breathtaking landscape of the Northwest. I find solace in the wilderness; nowhere else can you witness fleets of stoneflies, salmon flies, and mayflies gracing the water in their race against time, the ravenous appetite of a wild cutthroat in its native landscape, and the humbling majesty of glacial canyons and lush conifers, phenomena many never get the luxury to behold. That afternoon, I was wet-wading with my little brother, David. After five days, the ice-cold water had lost its stinging bite on my legs; I like to think my mitochondria adapted, but David said otherwise. He’s a prodigy when it comes to fly-fishing, but I’ve got years on him, and with years comes experience. Together, we had landed 30 good-sized streamer-eaters by early afternoon, and at that moment, David decided it was time to gink up and flick dainty little dries. In his defense, the dries of choice were stoneflies, namely PMX and Stimulator patterns, but I only saw 18 and 19” fish so I wasn’t about to throw on 5x.
David finessed a gem of a cutthroat off of a textbook ledge, and I submissively netted his prize. I couldn’t help but snicker at his flimsy attempts to claim supremacy at the sport; he had failed to see the large, stealthy shadow that followed his 18”er all the way to the net. All I got was a brief glimpse before the shadow motored downstream, but it was all I needed—we weren’t leaving until it was in my hands.
As I approached the river bend, adrenaline coursed through my veins. This hole looked like a ball pit, except the balls were 200-lb boulders. I inspected the front of my leader, which held my favorite streamer, a secret, hand-tied pattern that had already undergone 6 prototypes. I swung it over the darkest crevasse, line-tight, eyes keen, and rod pointed directly at the fly. A brilliant flash broke the surface, catapulting upstream through the air, and my prized 4-wt was nearly jarred from my hands. “Bully!” David yelled, “He’s on a Bully!”
I could hardly contain my excitement, the fly line, and the silver-scaled tank that was already 100 yards downstream. By some miracle, I hadn’t ripped the streamer out of his mouth the five times I tumbled head over heels on the algae-slicked river rocks as I blundered down the river, bruises rapidly accumulating on both shins. The phrase, “Bull in a China shop” still comes to mind. I guess there were two bulls in this case.
Although I could see him and had the upper ground, our fight was nowhere near over. “Video?” my brother asked. “Only if you want to film my rod snapping,” I responded. At that point, I had lost hope of prevailing—this fish was too strong for my delicate equipment, and I applied more and more pressure as the grim feeling of imminent failure grew. But miraculously, he finally succumbed to me.
As I gently lifted him out of the water, my first ever bull trout, I was soothed by an overwhelming sense of awe and gratefulness for what I had just experienced. To this day, I still consider the multitude of errors that could have lost me that fish; but sometimes, it just works out. Sometimes you just get lucky.