Fishing Again on Meziadin Lake

The first thing you need to know about us is that things don't come into focus for us until we've had our morning coffee.  This morning we needed to get out and fish before the rains came, and so the coffee had to come with us and wait until we got on the water.  And the result was inevitable:

With caffeine in our arteries and hydration in our tummies, we could turn our attention to paddling out to our fishing grounds -- a stream inlet south of our campground along the eastern shore of Meziadin Lake.  In contrast to our last fishing paddle yesterday, it was foggy and misty withal, although still, with the waters calm, and no rain -- yet:

A stray log sticking up from the lakebed in our campground's cove was marked by some yachter with a cheery Canadian flag (see our prior fishing blog for a better view of the flag), but it acted as our guide to leave the cove.  "Red right returning."

Yep, those old familiar low clouds (or some might say, mist, or fog) was decking the far shore, just as it has done every day here except yesterday:

The water had a milky emerald color to it this morning.  One amazing thing about this lake is that it has had a different mood, and the water has had a different color, each day:

For such a large lake, Meziadin Lake has been the most reliable in being as still as glass every morning, subject, of course, to the risk of rain drops plopping into the scene:

Of course, with the water this still, it was easy to see the trout rising.  On the one hand, this told us exactly where they were feeding and got us excited; on the other hand, it made it particularly frustrating not to catch any.  Here, Kathy posts herself strategically at the stream inlet.  Rises, rises, everywhere, and not a fish to catch.

We got about 1.5 hours out on the water before it started raining.  These drops were our warning to start paddling the 15 minutes or so back to our campsite, or we would get drenched:

Our tally today:  Kathy 0, David 1 little 8-inch trout, who, mercifully, was too small to keep and was released back to his fishy life.  As we paddled back to camp, the fog, clouds and rain steadily closed in:

You heard about the neighborhood fisher in our prior blog about fishing here on Meziadin Lake.  As we were paddling back past the very spot where we had seen the elusive guy yesterday, we wondered if we would see him again and -- as if on cue -- he appeared, perhaps 100 yards away, starting a paddle across the cove with yet another fish in his mouth.  David was determined to get closer to get a better photo this time, and so, after catching this insurance photo of the fisher --

-- David started paddling to intercept the mammal's path.  However, the fisher would have none of it.  He sped up.  David sped up.  He sped up faster.  David sped up faster.  Finally, in exasperation, the fisher dove underwater with his fish and SLAPPED the water with his tail, just as a beaver might, to warn David away and inform him forcefully that his fish was his own, and not ours.

Message received.  So no fish, and no fisher close-up.  Ah, well, there's always another day.