Tangled Lines

It may be jumping the gun a bit … but here is the Tackle Fondling edition of Tangled Lines for 2019.
If you fish small streams a lot, you might look into a pair of wading pants. These are the same as bootfoot chest waders except they stop at the waist. No straps to fiddle with, and subsequently a lot easier to get in and out of.
Obviously you can’t go in as deep as with full chest waders. But if you are creeping around little brook trout streams, that is not a problem.

For one reason or another, you may not get to your local fly shop when shopping for the fly-fisherman on your Christmas list. 
I therefore offer these online suggestions.
Inexpensive reels
There are two schools of thought on fly reels. One is you need the very best, because you never know when that 12-inch brown trout is going to take you into the backing.
The other school notes that the primary purpose of the reel is to hold the line, so get the least expensive model that does what you want it to do.

Every year I take a week’s vacation at the family homestead in Phoenicia, N.Y. I try to time it for the end of September or beginning of October, the better to take advantage of early fall fishing on the Esopus Creek and tributaries.
It’s a happy time, especially since there is no internet at the house, no cable TV, and I have to drive 5 miles to get a cell phone signal.
That means, for instance, that I will not know what Kanye tweeted that week. 
This is a good thing.

Sometimes you’ll hear fishermen speak cryptically about “little blue lines.”
They are referring to the little brook trout streams that show up on maps as, you guessed it, little blue lines.
That’s if they show up at all.
I fish three little blue line streams in northwest Connecticut on a regular basis. One of them is listed in the Connecticut state angler’s guide. One of them is on private property and you need to ask permission. And one is so secret that I hesitate to even mention it.