The bad eye

I don't know if a fish can come up from 20 feet of water and you give you the bad eye but it sure as heck looked like one did on Sunday.

It was snowing and wet and generally nasty outside but still pleasant in an odd way. The snow had coated everything and winter was beginning to set up shop in Glacier National Park like it should have. Last year winter just sort of skimmed over the place and was largely unfulfilling. There was never enough snow to ski and there were far too many sunny days for any sort of real comfort.

All of this may seem like a contradiction unless you were there and you saw it, then it makes complete sense.

But this year winter appears to be starting on a normal foot with wet gray days and Sunday was a classic. It was snowing but almost raining, too and the trout were still rising in a place where yes, I have seen them rise before, but they were very small and it was August.

These fish, by Glacier's cutthroat trout standards, were large. I'm guessing the longest was 16 inches and the rest were in that 10 to 12 inch range. Respectable, especially for this creek, which harbors a slew of dinks most of the year, if you catch anything at all.

The stream looks like it should have monsters in it, but I've never caught one and I've never heard about anyone else catching one either. It has enough beaver in it to make it fertile and sort of buggy but the fish just don't stay there. They're either in the river where the creek enters it or the in the lake which fills it.

But hordes of folks fish it anyway in the summer and they make good photo ops so I don't say too much when I take their photos because at least they look good out there, all geared up, ready to go.

But last week at least for a few days there were some honest-to-goodness trout in there and they were rising every afternoon. This is November 10th mind you. November 10th! I'm just about beside myself, because that's really late for any sort of rising fish, especially in Glacier National Park.

I can watch trout rise once and leave them alone. But if I come back the next day and they're still rising, well, unless I 100 percent have to be somewhere (which is rarely the case) I will fish for them.

In this case, I saw the fish rising on Wednesday and let them be. I came back late Thursday and they were rising again and I fished for them, neglecting family and a meeting or two in the process.

Such is life.

The pool looked simple enough but it had a tricky little current that had several different speeds and the first few casts the fly sunk like a rock.

But I figured out the mend and eventually caught six or so trout, none of them big, but all of them fun.

Finally it got dark and windy and I couldn't feel my hands anymore, so I left.

Then Sunday rolled around and I was looking down at the same pool and despite the cold and the snow the fish were still coming up, slurping some sort of unseen bug, but not slurping fast like they were the day before.

Then this big cutt with a big orange belly came up and rolled over on a fly and gave me the bad eye.

I rigged up the rod went down to the creek and made 20, 30 casts.

But there were no more rises and I caught no more fish.

I know, I know this isn't possible. I know it doesn't make sense. But I'm pretty sure that big fish was trying to tell me something.

It was a vulgar gesture.

Fish aren't supposed to have the mental faculties to do this.

But if you had been there and seen it you would have understood.

I'm sure of it.

Chris Peterson is the editor and a columnist for the Hungry Horse News.