Snow covered roads and a partially ice covered Little Juniata set the stage for a great fishing trip with my son. We arrived on one of our favorite stretches of the Little J in the late morning and spent a few hours Euro Nymphing.  There is something calming about standing knee deep in a crisp cold flow soaking in the beauty of the woods with a fresh blanket of snow.

This little gem of a Prince Nymph out-fished every other nymph we drifted. Its a home brew we deemed the “Heavy Metal Prince”. This extra buggy heavily weighted fly has been a solid performer for us this winter. My son has done an excellent job perfecting the tie to our fish catching specs.

My son’s first brown trout of the day. He had to vie for position competing against a slab of ice large enough to float both of us! He pulled several willing browns from the “tapper up” at the end of this deep pool. He’s enjoying his new 10 foot nymphing rod. The smile says it all. A bit later he lost a HUGE brown he hooked up with at the base of a small water fall. I saw his rod double over then pop straight as the hook tore loose from the massive browns jaw. We’ll get him next time!

My son is great behind the camera. He makes me look good despite my best efforts to bumble and stumble my way through a day of trout fishing. This is one of my favorite action shots of the day. A couple false starts and I finally netted the fish on the third try. You’d never know from photo though!

This buttery brown was the best of the day. He fell to the HM Prince. I rarely make more than a few casts on the same drift but this time I’m glad that I did. I probably made close to twenty. I knew there had to be a fish in the thin sliver of slower moving water sandwiched between two faster moving currents. The potential holding spot was barely perceptible. After I caught the fish, I called my son over to show him the drift and current situation I was targeting. I try to teach him something new every trip. For that matter, I try to teach myself something new every time out. I think we both accomplished that today!