The first week in October was a little too warm but it was hard to complain. I spent the week at Libby Camps in northern Maine guiding grouse and woodcock hunters and spent an afternoon fishing for brook trout in one of the ponds open to fishing in October. Most afternoons it was simply too hot for the dogs to work, one day the temperature was 80 degrees at 4PM. Hard to imagine in Northern Maine in October. One thing that I did notice was that there is no afternoon breeze off of the water that far inland. Here near the coast all but the hottest days cool off after around 2.
I fished with Matt Dunlap who is currently our Secretary of State; he sponsored the legislation that made October fishing possible when he was in the House of Representatives. Matt Libby our host was on the Commissioners Advisory Council when the specific ponds were opened. So the afternoon took on a special significance. We fished from a canoe and had a number of strikes that we missed but we were able to bring trout to the net.
I had taught Matt to fly fish long ago on the lawn of the Capitol in Augustaon a warm spring afternoon when things were slow. It was definitely a treat to spend time with Matt and to enjoy a great afternoon that I am sure we will both remember.
Now we are suffering from way too much water. Here in the mid coast we had over 7 inches of rain and every brook, stream and river is over its banks. I went striper fishing one last time this morning and was surprised to see the water looking brown and muddy far downriver. It looks like the stripers are really gone although we did have one fish swirl at a fly. So I just might have to make one more trip at the end of the month to make sure that they are all gone.
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