Spring 2010
Casting Call
Trout season opening beckons anglers to the Willoughby River
By Matt Crawford
Photographed by Stefan Hard
It's difficult to pinpoint precisely when spring arrives in Vermont's Northeast Kingdom unless you fish the opening day of trout season on the Willoughby River. There, when the river flows as cold as your favorite beer, you can record the exact moment spring blooms. Numb hands wrapped around your fishing rod pick up the vibrations emitted from the gentle bouncing of hook and sinker tumbling along the river's rocky bottom. Spring's arrival is promised as the line tenses as it swings through faster water, and manifests itself fully at that instant when the sharp hook pierces through a trout's jaw. You know Old Man Winter has keeled over when the line goes taut and the rod bends with the weight of a wild fish prepared to fight.
The fish that draw crowds of anglers to the Willoughby River in Orleans each April are migratory rainbow trout — silvery, pink-striped fish triggered by longer hours of sunlight and warming water to embark on a spawning run out of Lake Memphremagog. These colorful fish, their very name invoking the vernal spirit, are big by Vermont trout standards — broad-shouldered 5-pounders with rose-hued gill plates. Most of the fish caught on the Willoughby are released: hooked, played and sent back on their way.
Dozens of anglers descend on the Willoughby on opening day of trout season. They wear long underwear and wool pants under their waders. They don heavy hunting coats and winter hats. Some have gloves. Most sport polarized sunglasses, mostly to better see trout in the water, not so much to reduce the glare. The sun doesn't always shine in April.
Opening day on the Willoughby shatters the image of trout fishing as an exercise in seclusion. Anglers stand as close as churchgoers in line for communion, and in a sense that's why they're here. The opener is salvation day for anglers — a full-on soul-cleansing time to repent and rededicate.
"I get pretty excited for opening day," said Kevin McClure of Sutton, who landed four trout on opening day of the 2009 season on the Willoughby. "I couldn't sleep very well thinking about getting here to start the season. About 4 a.m. I decided to just get out of bed and go fishing."
Much of the action unfolds in a short stretch of river just below the falls in Orleans. The river is about as wide as a two-lane road. The water, murky from melting snow, is icy cold. Big patches of old snow and rotting ice are found in the dark, shadowed pockets of the bank. Invariably, somebody will start a campfire beside the river, sort of a pyre at this funeral for winter.
Quite often the madding crowd will wane by midmorning. Many anglers make the short drive to the American Legion Post #23 for the fishermen's breakfast — a fundraiser for the Orleans County Rod & Gun Club — that, as near as anybody can tell, has been held for about 30 years now.
"Fishermen," said club director John Choiniere, as he collected $6 from each person, "start eating about 7 a.m. We go through a lot of coffee."
Few breakfast-patrons remove their hip boots or camo ball caps. While gulping down scrambled eggs and bacon, they yak about their morning and listen to invited speakers (local politicians, game wardens and fisheries biologists) talk about the river and ongoing projects. They buy tickets for a gun raffle the club will hold later in the year. Sooner or later a mild disagreement will erupt about fish stocking policies or regulation changes. It's nothing anybody will harbor ill will about for long.
The trout are relative newcomers to the region: modern-day byproducts of a population that likely was shipped from the West Coast by train in the late 1880s or early 1900s. Willoughby fish are often called "steelhead." In truth, steelheads are a specific strain of rainbow trout that migrate to the Pacific Ocean from West Coast streams. Willoughby fish have evolved into a freshwater, lake-run strain and migrate each spring from Lake Memphremagog up into its tributaries, including the Barton, Willoughby, Black, Clyde and Johns rivers.
Rainbows have a reputation as feisty, flashy fighters. Later in the spring, as the water warms into the 40s, groups of sightseers will gather at the Willoughby to watch the fish jump the falls; but on opening day, the fish are only airborne when trying to throw a hook.
It's the thrill of a cartwheeling fish that keeps anglers like McClure awake with anticipation, but it's not the only reason the Willoughby bustles on opening day.
"I've got my waders on, and I'm standing on the edge of a river," said an upbeat Larry Krygier of Bakersfield. "I've been inside pretty much all winter. That's come to an end." A
Trout fishing in Vermont
The 2010 trout fishing season begins April 10. A valid fishing license is needed for anglers age 15 and older. For more information, call the Vermont Fish & Wildlife Department at (802) 241-3700 or log on to www.vtfishandwildlife.com
