Earlier this month I made the decision to put one of my long time hobbies to work for several reasons. First and foremost being an excess of time on my hands during the wee hours of the morning due to the joys of insomnia, second thereof being to defray the cost of fly tying materials, and last but not least being that I simply like money. It's useful stuff, it keeps me in fresh provisions and reliable hunting gear!
Two weeks ago, I filled a small tackle bag with a well organized assortment of hand tied flies, paired it with a favorite compact ultralight rod and reel,and a pair of high traction ankle waders (also known as worn out old tennis shoes),and tossed these things into the work truck. I've been beginning and ending my days lately with freshwater products field research, which honesty just means that I've been dilly dallying along the riverbanks, before and after work, fishing.
Speaking on a purely spiritual level, damn I've enjoyed it! It's been good for me, the sights and sounds have been as refreshing to my soul as the cold streams have been to my skin. I've witnessed a romp of sleek walnut brown yearling otters playing in the shallows, feasting in the current, and basking among the tumbled boulders. I've admired a colony of sizable beavers busily training up their kits, maintaining their territory and harvesting from the shoreline to build their dams, and store their winter fodder. I've watched in awe as Great Blue Herons and Snowy Egrets have passed overhead,gliding to land among the shadows of monumental willows and oaks and the paper skinned white river birch to stalk those meals hiding within the murmuring ripples and placid pools. The scents of honeysuckle, wild blackberry and Confederate jasmine have enthralled me. The roar of coursing waterfalls resounding among the stones within their basins, the rumble of distant thunder echoing among the hills, the soft warmly whispered breath of the wind among the trees have soothed me. Stars and fireflies have lighted my paths as chori of crickets and frogs carried on their ancient a'cappela refrains. I have estranged myself from the frantic pace of daily life to immerse myself in the tranquility of living in the timeless moment.
Speaking as a field tester of fishing gear, it has been time well spent also. I narrowed down the various colors and patterns of the assortment of flies by eliminating those which produced no fish within a group of twenty five casts regardless of water conditions, atmospheric conditions, or bottom structure. I then began to further divide the remaining selection based on the most productivity of fish within a range of twenty five casts. This daily process conducted both in the morning and the evening soon led me to a small collection of twelve flies which produce fish most consistently over a variety of conditions. These are what I have decided to call the Summer Series. I will retest the entire original assortment again with the same parameters in the Fall, as well as the Winter, and the Spring.
I am interested to learn what the results of this next year of field research will reveal, and those surviving enticements will become the base of my freshwater product line.
(K) 
