Father's day with Oakland Casting Club on Pit River.
Pit River Outing with Oakland Casting Club on Father’s Day Weekend
Evening at Baum Lake I wasn’t planning to join the outing until a day before because I was busy putting together a tenkara presentation for Pasadena Casting Club. Many of my friends believe Pit River was not for tenkara rod because tenkara rod is designed for small mountain streams and handling smaller fish. From many fly fishers' perspectives, fishing with a tenkara rod on Pit River would have more disadvantage in landing fish and covering water than with a fly rod. Secondly, many tenkara fishers also believe that I would need a different rod with a stronger backbone to fish the fast water of the Pit. These were two main reasons I decided to give my Tanuki XL-1 a try. Video of the trip
My setup was very simple: a rod, line and flies. I took my Tenakara Tanuki XL-1 series. Tanuki XL-1 is about 13' long, 13' of Tanuki line + 3 ft of 5x tippet. I have two fly patterns: 4mm slotted tungsten bead on a #10 jig hook and Japanese kebari pattern with a #10 dry hook.
Hat Creek Power House Riffle
A Fish at Hat Creek Power House Riffle
I got to Hat Creek power house about 6:30 PM and fish until 8PM. I landed 2 small fish with kebari, then switched to double #10 nymphs and landed two about 6” too...
Rainbow on Pit 3
Next morning, we went to the Pit 3. Pit 3 access was covered completely with blackberries, poison oaks and sting nettles. I hiked up stream and fished on the fast water. Landed 4 good size fish and headed back to camp site with the group and rested.
18" Tennessee Tailwalker Browns: they will fight to their last breath
I went to Baum Lake and fished for about two hours. I landed about 11 trophy fish between 18” - 22”. Those browns fight hard, jump until they were out of breath. After the trip, I feel more confident in fishing with Tanuki XL-1 on the Pit River. I may bring Tanuki 425 next time just to cover a little more water.
