I have been refining my fly-tying skills during this winter (I'm not
one for cold-weather fishing -- you all can fish nymphs all you want, I'm going to sit by the fire and tie dries), and wanted to see how some of my "inventions" fished. I woke up on the 7th, and the weather was clear and calm. The only place I knew was open nearby was Beaver lake.

I grabbed a fly-box of recently tied flies and headed out, not expecting to catch anything. I wanted to practice some casts, and watch my flies in still-water conditions (I was using dries to be fished in pools in the upper Snoqualmie forks later in the season.)

I fished for about two hours, changing flies about every 20 minutes. I was happy for the most part with how they were fishing, but became ecstatic at about 8:30 when I actually caught a small rainbow (~6") on a #14 fly (red tail, peacock
herl body, heavy grey hackle). It was a very nice surprise, and a great first outing of the year.

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