On 20 pound brown trout and the danger of setting goals

Let me get this out of the way.  I have actually landed a legitimate twenty pound brown trout.  In fact, I've been fortunate to land three.  Not because I have unique superpowers, or even above average fishing abilities, but mostly because I have spent several decades purposefully fishing one of the greatest brown trout fisheries on earth, the Lake Michigan tributaries of Wisconsin.

That seems like hyperbole, I'm sure.  But consider this, every year, until three years ago when the stocking program ceased, tens of thousands of fingerling brown trout were planted in various tributaries and harbors.  Soon these trout make their way out the lake, where they are ferocious eating machines.  Three to four years later, they return to those very same tributaries.  Now, they are esentially wild fish, at least behavior wise, and they are much bigger.  The average brown trout I catch is between six and ten pounds, or somewhere in the 26-30 inch range, and bigger fish are very common.  Because the Lake Michigan environment is complex, each fall looks very different.  Sometimes there are heavy returns of fish, sometimes they are very few.  Sometimes the bulk of the fish are smaller trout in the four to eight pound range, and sometimes they are larger.  Much larger.  And then, occasionally, there are years like 2016.

In 2016, a massive rain event in October kicked off the main "run" of
 fish a bit earlier than usual.  Within a few minutes of entering the water, I became aware that it looked like this could be a special year.  First, there were a lot of fish.  They were bumping into your legs.  They were rolling, sometimes jumping clear of the water.  They weren't all brown trout, there were steelhead, coho salmon, and few chinook salmon mixed in, but a high percentage of them were browns.  Secondly, they were tanks.  There were very few fish below ten pounds.  And there appeared to be many fish above fifteen pounds, and while not documented, some of the fish that were throwing themselves out of the water and giving us good looks at them, were definitely north of twenty pounds.  I saw a few that were no doubt between twenty five and thirty pounds.

Right there, a goal was formed.  It may not have even been stated.  But I was going to be quite disappointed if I didn't land a twenty pound fish.  And maybe a little disappointed if I didn't get a twenty five.  That fall I made four trips up to Wisconsin, and spent a total of ten days on the water.  I didn't get a 20 my first trip, or my second, or my third.  On the last trip, in late November, I was swinging my fly along a deep bank, the water temperature was now in the mid thirties, so I was keeping the swing as "low and slow" as I could.  In the bucket of the run, I felt a couple of gentle tugs, but simply let the fly continue to swing, and few seconds later, got that good, hard, pull that this blog is named after,  Immediately the fish came up shaking it's head, and there was no doubt that it was the "one".  Somewhere in the 36-38 inch range and thick, was a no doubt a 23-26 pound fish.  The battle was actually over fairly quickly, lake run brown trout arent actually always strong fighters, but I ran into a problem.  I usually don't carry a net, preferring to lead fish into shallow water, and then leader them or beach them.  In this particular spot, there just wasn't a good place to do this, and I ended up trying to leader the fish in waist deep water, on about the third attempt, the fish took off, and as I steered it back again, the fly just pulled out.  I felt all those familiar emotions, despair, recrimination, self doubt.  And as I packed up and prepared to make the long trip back home, knowing my season was over, it felt for all the world like the season was failure.  And looking back, how silly was that?

I had just enjoyed many days of truly world class fishing.  I had landed 35 brown trout over the course of the fall.  The smallest fish I landed all fall was 27 inches long and probably weighed around eight pounds.  My average fish was around 32 inches and 12 pounds, I had landed numberous fish over fifteen pounds, including three over 17, the biggest being a 35 inch, 18.5 pound fish.   Mixed in were dozens of steelhead and hard fighting coho salmon  It honestly was one of the best seasons I have ever enjoyed..  I should have had a big grin on my face from sun-up to sun-down.  But all because  I had set a goal, and decided without putting it in to words that if I didn't reach it,the season was a failure, that's exactly what it felt like.  Honestly, how crazy is that?  The difference between an 18.5 pound fish, and a twenty pound fish, can be as little as a half an inch of length, and an extra inch of girth.  Objectively, is it really any better?

Goal setting is generally a good thing, right?  It's certainly helpful in business.  It's helpful in financial planning.  And it even has it's place on fishing trips.  Sometimes, you're not going to catch a big fish unless you specifically chase one.  And there's nothing wrong with even shooting for numbers, saying, "I'd like to catch ten fish today."  But, I encourage you not to let the pursuit of your goals wring the joy out of the experience.  Because joy is precisely what this is all about!

I recently went on a trip to the Amazon.  I had a goal.  I wanted to catch a peacock bass of fourteen pounds.  It wasn't a hard goal to reach.  My wife got one that was sixteen pounds.  Almost everyone else in camp had landed a fish of fourteen pounds.  But we reached the last day, and  my best was twelve.  But I've learned my lesson.  I just decided to relax and enjoy the day.  I decided to simply enjoy every fish I caught.  In fact, it was sight fishing, and if I had a challenging cast, I even cast at the smaller fish.  It was a beautiful day of throwing to aggressive, hard fighting fish, and I enjoyed every second of it.  If I didn't get a big one, it would have been fine.  I when I got a fourteen pound fish, followed by a fifteen pound fish it made it even sweeter.  It was my favorite day of the week!

Hoping all your dreams come true and all your goals are accomplished this year.  But if they not,  I also hope that every day on the water is a successful day that leaves you a little better person when you exit the water than you were when you entered it.