| Written by outings guy |
| Another Kaweah Crawl was successfully put in the record books May 17. Memebers Don Stillwell, David Harris, Wayne Thompson and Fred Sciacca and myself fished Crescent Meadows and the Marble fork of the Kaweah at Lodgepole. The fishing gods smiled on us and provided many brook trout at our first stop and a few rainbows at our second under clear skies and gorgeous weather. Fred Scicca went downstream at Crescent Meadows and not only found some nice fish, but met a huge rattlesnake (“as big as my forearm!”).Fred was also there when later in the day a huge bear decided to cros the Marble Fork at Lodgepole exactly where he, Don and I were fishing. Dave Harris’wild waving and gesticulating drew my attention to the bank behid us where the bear circled around us. When he headed down the bank a little way from where we were, we decided that the fishing might be better a little upstream and vacated the site where the bear crossed a few moments later. He must have weighed about 400 pounds. When he crossed he was pushed a ways downstream by the heavy flow of the Kaweah. Probably we were in more danger from the heavy runoff fed river that we were fishing in than the bear, so keep your eyes on the water, but do not forget to look up and check out the wildlife.If you really want to see bigger examples of the dangerous creatures of the Park, be sure invite Fred Sciacca fishing with you. He can really attract the larger specimens. This outing is intended to be a follow on event from our casting classes, but Don Stillwell was the only former student who showed up with questions on streamcraft and as a result was forced to listen to possibly too many answers from yours truly. I want to help newcomers learn the ropes and I appreciated Don’s patience with my attempts to improve my instructing skills. In spite of my help, I think Don had a good time and I saw him take fish on his own when left to his own devices. I want to continue to try and help anyone in the club or their friends learn on the stream as well as at the casting pond, so hit me up and we will go fishing |