The Search for Iowa Trout 4: Turkey River

I suppose it doesn't bode well for me to be an avid fisherman and a horrible morning person. If it's a fault, I claim my father's genes, but I hate mornings and anything pertaining to mornings (with the exception of cereal bowls filled with more marshmellows that flakes). So when Randy emailed and invited me to join him for a day on the Turkey River near Elkader, Iowa, my mind immediately began to calculate how early I'd have to wake up to meet him. Not to mention that my good friend, and fellow church plant participant, Andrew Rampey was going to join us. That meant an even earlier departing time than the original. ...it better be worth it!

The forcast was pefect; wait, more than perfect. Weather forcasters correctly perdicted temperatures in the high sixties. A sixty degree November day in Iowa. I must be dreaming.

Before the sun had even opened its eyes, I picked up Rampey, and we headed up past Cedar Rapids to meet Randy at the Walmart parking lot near Independence. Andrew and I passed the time talking about anything and everything before the rising sun caught our eyes. It's those constants in life, the span of the sun across the sky and the changing of seasons, that always recall my mind to the promises and faithfulness of God.

At Walmart we jumped into Randy's subaru and made our way to the Turkey River. The Turkey is unique in that its banks are home to one of Iowa's major hatcheries which diverts water from large, nearby springs to sustain fingerlings in their holding pens. The spring water being forced through the rearing pens is then dumped into the river from three parallel pipes that stand about a hundred yards apart. The spring water significantly decreases the river's water temperature, allowing trout to survive downstream year-round. The river actually reminded me a lot of some of the rivers in Maryland. It doesn't run clear, and there is a distinct smell to the water, but the bug-life is significant enough to sustain trout populations.

The area around the pipes where the spring water flows into the Turkey has become a dream spot of bait fishermen, and Randy had mentioned earlier that the floods in May forced thousands of rainbows into the river. If the bait fisherman hadn't caught all of them, we might have a chance.

Randy hadn't explored much of the river downstream of the pipes, and the alure of a few rising trout put all three of us in two pools just below the pipes. Andrew quickly caught one on an Adams, I had a strike on a large black ant, and Randy was flinging a blue-winged olive around; but, after being reared in the ways of fly-fishing by my older brother, I new the best fishing involved "distance." So, I left Randy and Andrew in the pool and headed downstream.

After about a quarter mile of slow moving water, the Turkey widens out creating nice rifles dumping into sizable pools. Tempted by some rises in the section of slow moving water, I slid down the steep bank and cast a wooly bugger through the current. To my surprise I pulled out a smallmouth bass! After a few more strikes without any hook-ups, I made my way down to the pools swallowing up the riffle water.

Jackpot! Cast after cast my bugger was hit by rainbows. They struck at the fly in an awkward way that felt like they were still learning how to eat larger prey, and by the time I had developed a technique for setting the hook, I'd missed dozens of fish. Nevertheless, I was into double-digit catches when my stomach let me know it was lunch time.

I packed up my gear and headed upstream to the guys via cattle tracks alongside the bordering corn field. They were catching fish (they claimed), but not in the numbers to which I testified. So, after a lunch of roast beef sandwiches, chips, and Randy's home brewed beer, we made our way down to the lower section.

Nothing had changed. Randy was catching most of his trout with copper-johns and Andrew and I worked black wooly buggers through the deeper sections. With the sun setting, wet nets, and a few fish for dinner, we packed up and headed home.

It was a great day on the Turkey River - enough said.