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A friend and I recently met in Hayward, Wisconsin, with plans to fish the Namekagon River for brown trout. We had heard from a number of sources that black stoneflies were hatching and present on the river in high numbers. Emerging from winter and anxious to cast to rising fish, fly anglers need little more than a rumor of active bugs to plan a spring trip for trout.

John Koch and I go back a number of years, meeting first on a Wisconsin fly fishing website, then as vendors selling our wares and services at the annual Great Waters Fly Fishing Expo. John's booth at the Expo showcases his original woodcut relief prints.

Over the years, I've witnessed more and more prints become available on his website and at the shows, and I've also witnessed a rapidly growing appreciation for his art.

One of his prints, titled "Sun, Moon, Stars," a whimsical piece featuring a colorful brook trout ringed by celestial images and aquatic invertebrates, is now gracing the current cover of Gray's Sporting Journal. For those unfamiliar with this highly regarded publication, making the cover of Gray's would be akin to seeing one of your photos on the cover of National Geographic. It's sort of the Holy Grail for sporting artists.

Before continuing north to our final destination near the old logging town of Seeley, John and I dropped in on our friends at the Hayward Fly Fishing Company. Larry Mann and his wife, Wendy Williamson, had just opened their shop when we arrived, and were happy to share good information regarding fly patterns and where we might fish that day. Surprisingly, Larry told us of an angler that had come into the shop a couple of days earlier, reporting that a parachute Adams pattern, skittered along the water's surface, had been taking fish.

Initially, I was a bit curious as to why a standard mayfly pattern would work to effectively imitate an adult stonefly, but looking at it from a trout's underwater perspective, I could see how the larger, circular profile of the parachute hackle, when moved erratically on the surface of the water, could fairly well represent the clumsy wing beats of a stonefly attempting to deposit her eggs along the riffled stretches of a river. Also, because stoneflies are poor fliers, they're regularly blown onto the water on days with a bit of a wind, which happened to be just the sort of day we were fishing. Of course, a fly making contact with the water almost always gets a trout's undivided attention.

Don't worry if the last couple paragraphs have you scratching your head and running off to Google parachute hackles and stoneflies. Let me assure you that a lot of things in the natural world, particularly when it comes to fish and bugs, continually present little mysteries that keep us learning new things every season. Believe me, I was a bit confused too.

So John and I bought a few flies and other items at the shop, said our goodbyes, and set out for one of Larry's recommended spots. When we arrived, the stoneflies were there - sometimes thick in the air, landing on our clothing and hats and fishing rods. The desired riffle water was there, and so were the trout, rising and slashing at the surface for clumsy stoneflies. We did as well as we could hope to do on the oftentimes unpredictable Namekagon River. Fish took our flies often enough to make us deliriously happy, and we smiled at one another over stretches of dancing freestone river and bent fly rods.

It was a good day to be on the water again with my friend. Alliances made in the pursuit of fish are strong and enduring. Just as small black stoneflies fill the air and restore an angler's hope each spring, I look forward to the first warm days in March and April, when I can spend time on the water with friends.

If you have comments for Dan or story ideas contact him at e-mail [email protected].

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