9-6-25 Mousing

In September of 2024, I signed up for Ironman Lake Placid, all my free time was consumed with training and needless to say, there wasn’t much fishing going on. Now that it’s over, I am shaking off the rust and getting back on the water.

I booked a cabin on the water and took the family out for an afternoon float trip. I set up an indicator rig and my two boys took turns for about 15 minutes until they were no longer interested in fishing and more focused on snacks. Of all my trips down this river over the past decade or so, I have never seen more rising fish than I did that evening. It was unbelievable, blue winged olives covered the water and the fish took notice. It always seems to work out that way, when I’m unprepared, taking the kids to throw some bobbers, the river decides to send me an epic dry fly day.

I did not have any bwo dry flies small enough for the fish to take interest so I switched to a size 20 emerger and we were able to land two browns. It was great to show the boys all the rising fish and listen to them ask me why I can’t catch them over and over again…

After the float, we headed back to the cabin, built a fire and grilled some ribeyes for dinner. The kids were exhausted and got to bed around 8, so after a few bourbon’s I let my wife know that I’d be heading out to do some night fishing.

My friend Jim happened to be staying about 5 cabins up the river and it didn’t take much convincing for him to join. We decided we were going to give it a go and only fish mice. I have fished mice plenty of times at night but never had much success. To be fair, I probably never gave it enough time before switching over to a streamer that I have more confidence in. My go to streamer at night is a black and red dungeon with small dumbell eyes to submerge the fly, but not very deep.

I started off rowing us into one of our favorite stretches of water for night fishing. We almost always hook into a fish in this stretch. It’s slower water with a lot of structure so the fish have places to hide and hunt. Jim was throwing a deer hair mouse pattern and working it off the bank, or as close to it as he could in the dark, who really knows where the fly was landing but it looked good to us. He covered that entire stretch and didn’t get a bite. Again, this has been my experience with mousing and I was half tempted to back row up the stretch and do it again with a streamer but decided I was too lazy. Jim was also determined to stick with the mouse pattern.

We came up to one of our favorite stretches to wade in the dark, so I anchored the boat and worked my way down the bank with the mouse pattern. I did not move a single fish in that section, which is usually extremely productive for night fishing. Even though we committed to the mouse, I got weak and decided to tie on a streamer and wade through the exact same section again. It didn’t take long before I had a take but didn’t connect. I continued to work my way downstream and had another trout attack the streamer, this one came out of the water and somehow I wasn’t able to connect again. I worked my way to the bottom of the run and decided to fish it again as I worked back up to the boat.

Finally, it all came together and I connected on a fish. This time it was different, this felt like a different class of fish altogether. I yelled for Jim to grab the net because I either had the brown trout of a lifetime, or I snagged a beaver.. I had strait 20lb test on for a leader and really put some pressure on the fish. My 7 weight was bent over and I was putting as much pressure as I could on the fish. My forearms started to burn, but I finally felt the fish start to give a little. Not knowing what I had on, I turned my headlamp on when I felt the fish getting close. I really wanted to see what it was, just in case I lost it or broke it off. It was a nice fish, but hooked in the tail! That tail hooked 19” brown in the dark put up one hell of a fight and led me on an emotional roller coaster! Ohh well, on to the next one.

After releasing that fish, we got back in the boat and continued working the banks. I lost my streamer in a tree and went back to mousing. Close to an hour later, when both fatigue and boredom started to peak, we were interrupted by an explosion on the water. The line never went tight so I kept on stripping it in hoping the fish would circle back and eat it. No luck, but the excitement of that take was more than enough to keep me fishing the mouse pattern. What it lacked in productivity up to that point, it sure made up in excitement with the take.

I took over on the sticks and rowed into a great stretch of water. Not even 20 feet into the section, we heard a splash, followed by another one and then Jim’s line came tight. He connected on a beautiful brown trout, our first one on a mouse. I think that was the exact moment where I got hooked on mousing and became a believer. Even though I have more confidence in fishing streamers at night, that excitement and anticipation of hearing the trout smash the surface in the dark really was incredible.

Jim swapped back to the oars and not 3 minutes later another explosion, I strip set and felt a solid connection to the fish. Somehow, I neded up hooking the fish in the body, not sure if they try to swat the mouse to kill it, or if I am just unlucky on my hooksets, but we were able to land the fish quickly and get it back on it’s way.

I took over rowing and Jim continued to work his deer hair mouse. This stretch of the river must have a good mouse population, because Jim had another trout blow up his mouse a few minutes after I landed mine. He didn’t hook into that one, but it sure hit the surface with an attitude.

As we continued fishing, I heard another splash, but this one wasn’t very loud, almost subtle and I wasn’t sure if it was even I fish. I whispered to Jim to keep working the fly, but before I could even finish the sentence, the rod bent over and another fish on! This was a pretty aggressive brown that spent more time airborne than in the water. After spending hours without a take, we had 4 eats in about 100 yards and decided to call it a night.

We got back in at 4:30AM and I got a nice quick nap before the kids woke up at 6. I am now fully committed to mousing, even tied up a few deer hair versions when I got home. The one I used that night was Lynch’s white bellied mouse and will likely tie a few foam versions as well.