by Uncle Wes, January 01, 2002

As the years go by, I often find myself thinking of past fishing adventures. My brother and I used to spend a lot of time scouting out new trout lakes. Usually armed with a map and our favorite reference book, Fishing in Oregon. We were always amazed at how many different trout lakes were around, especially ones that were so close to our house.

There was one particular spring that comes to mind, it was about 12 years ago and the trout season had been open for about 2 weeks. We had fished all of the creeks and small ponds and lakes in the area. We were getting bored and needed a change of scenery. One problem though, our personal funding was a little low. We could afford a small trip, preferably within a 60 mile radius. So we broke out our fishing bible Fishing in Oregon;, as we poured through it we found the lake. Yes it met all our criteria, it was one we had never fished before, it was a trout lake, and it was close to home. Perfect.

That evening we pulled out the map and located the lake. Simple enough. We new right where we were going. Fact was, we were pretty familiar with the area. We thought that it was amazing that it was so close and we hadn't even heard of it. Especially considering it was supposed to be such a successful early season fisherie. Well our next problem was to figure out when we could go, our schedules being so busy. My brother had a brilliant idea. We could phone in our unemployment claim real early Saturday morning and hit the lake first light. So it was set. Saturday morning it would be.

So that evening we put together our fishing gear, tied our hooks, packed our lunches, went down filled the car up and got our bait. We were starting to get a little excited in anticipation of a trout dinner for Saturday night. We always caught fish, even when no one else was. We considered it a done deal. We discussed it and decided I should just sleep on his couch so we could call in our claims first thing and be on the road. We sure didn't want to be late calling that in, after all that was our fishing fund.

About 4:30 am, my brother was kicking the side of the couch telling me it was my turn to call in. As I rubbed the sleep out of my eye's I made the call. We grabbed a couple of pieces of toast and we were out the door. We loaded up in his rig, which by the way was a perfect fishing rig. A 1972 Datsun B-210 Honey Bee. A nice puke green, so as not to draw attention to ourselves. Only been wrecked once, a bungy cord to hold the trunk closed and extra big floor mats to cover the holes that had rusted through. So we start our trip out of town.

As we head out onto the highway, the sun starts to come up,its beautiful, big fluffy clouds and colors that are just spectacular. You know the kind, oranges, pinks, and yellows. It was breath taking. After about a half hour we come to the turn-off, were getting antsy now. Only about twenty more minutes to go. Now we are traveling through a nice farming community and it was so green you just couldn't believe it. All kinds of cows, and horses . It was perfect. We finally approach our turn off which takes us down a gravel road. After a few minutes we look over the embankment and there it is. Our trout haven, our mecca, why you can practically cast in a bare hook and catch fish . Our new secret lake. We're ready!
Although the water looked a little muddy, we new we were at the right spot. Fisherman before us left their calling cards. Empty bait containers and so on. So we pull on down there, get our gear out of the car and make our first cast of the day. Now were both fishing bottom with worms, seemed like a good starting strategy. Well we think we have hit the big time. Not another soul in site. What could be better? A whole lake to ourselves. After a couple of hours we hadn't even had a bite. So we switch out and started with a little bobber action. We know this will surely work. Of course by now we've noticed a few rigs have gone past us headed towards the river, probably Salmon fisherman. Well another couple of hours goes by and still nothing. So we decide that maybe we should toss a couple of spoons and work the lake.

Well the whole day is about shot and not even a nibble. How could this be? Our fishing bible had never led us astray. We quite obviously were doing something wrong, but what? We had tried everything in our tackle box, and still nothing. After another hour or so goes by, it starts sinking in that were going to get skunked. How disappointing. T.V. dinners, again. About that time one of the local farmers pulls up in his truck and asked us how were doing. So we proceed to tell him our tale of whoa. Well after about 10 minutes of our story he just breaks out laughing. He says, Boys this is the run off from my dairy farm up on the hill, the lake your looking for is another half mile down the road. Much to our dismay, he was right. As we get packed up to go, a couple more cars pull up with some fisherman and start pulling out their gear, they ask how we did? But I just told them it was slow. As my brother and I climbed into the car we gave each other this devilish grin and headed home. So that's my tale of Cow Paddy Pond.