This not a Salmon Egg...

its the eclipse of our moon tonight, about 8PM Mountain Standard Time, in Montana.

Bush calling the kettle black?

So Fidel officially steps down today and passes the torch to his brother. This looks awfully familiar, sort of like the family Bush in the US? Ok, so we missed an 8 year interlude that brought us the Clintons from Arkansas. At least at the end of that run we were in pretty good financial shape and hadn't pissed off the rest of the planet. If you are a Cuban this will be Fidel lite. A kinder, more media friendly regime.

Bush promptly started spewing his usual blather. From the media- President Bush said Tuesday that the resignation of Fidel Castro “ought to be a period of democratic transition” for Cuba, and that the country must hold free and fair elections to pick a successor after half a century of Communist rule.

“And I mean free and I mean fair,” Mr. Bush added, “not these kind of staged elections that the Castro brothers try to foist off as true democracy.”

Ahem. You mean like in Florida? Not that I really care that Al Gore lost but there was something awfully fishy about those "free and fair elections". And weren't there a couple of other brothers involved there? If you ask me Dubya has been reading Fidel's playbook.

I am thinking in this election year, after 8 years of Bushism that in America there “ought to be a period of democratic transition”.

Kokanee, it's what's for supper...

I finally got my fishing mojo back today. After 3 hours of "pimpling" on Lake Five we limited out on Kokanee Salmon. I could not overcome my son's early lead by 3 fish. I did rally to tie and take the lead for a short time but flustered at the loss of two fish nearly out of the hole, I lost my composure and could not muster another comeback before the bite died off.

But to keep things in perspective, these are not sport fish really. For us, this is light duty, a diversion to keep us sharp for the coming season. This is meat fishing, its whats for supper and if you fail you can always pop a can of Stag Chili. These fish do not have a prayer once they are out of the hole, the are beginning their journey down my Homo Sapien digestive tract.

Once we were home we promptly cleaned the fish, half of which were baked, the rest went in the freezer for another day. My heart is working better already with the Omega whatever you call 'ems now running free in my bloodstream. Nice fishy.

Togen Hook order

I ordered a few Togen hooks this last weekend for a some early test runs at the vice and hopefully some early season fishing. I found these via Singlebarbed a couple weeks back.
Since Saturday I have seen one or two bugs flying every day except today. So things are starting to move. I just started rummaging through the tying stuff- way behind on tying new bugs.

Bad Ice

This was the weekend of the annual fishing derby at McGregor Lake, Montana. The fishing and weather were less than stellar but the fish were not totally uncooperative. As of Saturday's finish the biggest Mac was 10lb. and the biggest Rainbow was 7lb. Despite the conditions it was all still good fun finished off by a raucous crowd claiming some nice prizes in the drawing at the lodge' bar.

The ice was not the greatest. 6 inches of snow on top, 8 inches of slush under that and about 5 inches of good ice. I should have wore my chest waders and wading boots. The high point of the afternoon was watching a helo from Timberline rescuing an unfortunate participant's 4-wheeler from becoming an expensive piece of fish structure at the bottom of the lake. Actually, one other thing happened today, probably the most important thing I have seen in weeks, an actual large flying insect of the mayfly sort! Yeah, baby!

Road Trip

Over the last weekend (Ground Hog sees shadow!) we went to my father-in-laws 95th birthday celebration. Getting to 95 is tough business. Fortunately, getting to Anaconda, MT on this trip was not.

While in the area I took a morning run up to the Philipsburg area to see what was about on a relatively balmy February morning.

And of course, a valiant, but futile attempt at coaxing a Brown out from under an undercut patch of Willows. By Easter they should have their appetites and menu back in order.