Re: alright enough talking about fishing..
Ok I just walked in the door. My wife gave me the puppy dog eyes before I walked out the door which I took to mean that she didn’t want me to go but in truth she wanted me to take our 4 yr old daughter Kara along to allow her some personal time so she could take a bath etc so I had to adjust my plans.
I took her to the Deer Creek Riffle which has lots of rocks and "crystals" (white rocks) for her to collect and pile up. I did make the mistake though of telling her I would let her reel in the first fish.
About 20 minutes into our little adventure after crossing Deer creek with her on my shoulders, and fishing the confluence from the NW side and then crossing the Stilly again with her on my shoulders and swinging the confluence from the Stilly side I hooked something. I was amazed that it was fighing pretty good since usually it was either a smolt or a steelhead up where I am fishing and this was neither. She caught me with a fish on out of the corner of her eye and shot me one of the scathing looks because I hadn't told her it was time to reel one in and dropped the 'You better let me reel that one in Dad'.
Well I handed her my 6wt Sage TCR and instantly became religious and started praying to any god that would listen to me that she wouldn’t let that rod go when the fish finally got turned around and made a little run.
She really did well though I have to admit. Even with the rod pointed directly at that poor fish she managed to fight him to a standstill and only get him reeled up through the first 3 or 4 rod guides (who could imagine fish's lips could stretch that far!). I grabbed the fish and held him up for her. It was a really nice 13 inch Sea Run Cutthroat! I was really proud of my little girl. Well I unhooked that poor fish and pointed her upstream in the riffle and 10 seconds later she swam off under her own power.
I turned around and was ready to congratulate my daughter when I saw the blackest scowl ever beheld by man. The first words out of her mouth were 'Uh, Dad... Why did you let my fish go?’ Well I got down on one knee and started to explain the whole catch and release thing and explain why we use barb less hooks and the whole bit but she wasn’t having it. She was ticked off that I let HER fish go and no amount of talking was earning back her good graces.
Left without many options I resorted to bribery! I know women and nothing makes them quieter than knowing that they are going to be far ahead of you regardless of anything you could possibly do. I promised her that no matter what, after I caught the next fish ,she would get the one after that so that she would have two fish to my one.
Well a drift or two later I picked up a stinking smolt...
The fish gods must have it in for me I thought. She gets a nice cutt and I get a peanut. The worst part of it was she saw me with the fish and made sure that I knew she was up to bat for the next fish. Dang kid had me by the windpipe since Dads are not allowed to go back on their word!
Well I made the following cast and BAM! Another sea run cutt I thought, just my luck. A quick glance over my shoulder and I knew she had seen the fish too. I quickly cursed my luck at having a cold blooded fish killer for a daughter instead of a mud pie making tree hugger.
'Dad that one's mine' I heard from the bank.
I gently reassured her that the backwards lean was me making my way to the bank and was in no way me fighting 'her' fish.
Well once again I quickly found religion in handing $1300 bucks worth of cork, graphite, and billeted aluminum over to my four year old daughters virgin hands and once again she proved the barb less skeptics wrong by reeling in yet another fish without keeping proper tension and honestly having no real form to speak of what so ever.
When she got the fish up close to bank I noticed that it was really dark with light spots. I was really excited because I was looking at one of the more rare Dolly's from the Stilly. A stinking nice one that once again I did not get to fight but I did get a large dose of enjoyment out of it from watching my dainty little four year old punish that poor fish into submission.
When the fish was just a couple of feet from the bank I grabbed the line and pulled in an 18 inch dolly the rest of the way by hand. I honestly didn’t want it to get away since this was the first Dolly I had seen in the stilly this year.
I unhooked that poor exhausted fish and he was bleeding a tiny bit from where the hook had gone through the center of his bottom jaw. I held him up to Kara and told her that she needed to kiss him better so that his owie would heal. This of course earned me a gross look and a shrug. I reassured her that if she didn’t kiss it better that the poor fish wasn’t going to make it.
Well that shifty little kid outflanked my bluff and the first thing she said was 'if I don’t kiss it does that mean we get to keep it then since it is going to die?’ Well I was screwed. I kissed that poor fish and let him go leaving us both scarred for life..
We ended the night with 4 sea runs and that one Dolly. Not a bad night for Kara's first time fishing with her dear ole Dad.
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lilnorthfork
I recall the feeling of dread and doom watching my 3 yr. old son with his 3 yr. old attention span play the trout with my Sage VPS Light a few years ago. "Look, a stick", he'd say right before he let go of the rod to reach for a floating stick. 
Every floating object within twenty feet of him was quickly dispatched. 
Linear Mode
