Face to Face with One of Wyomings Finest

We were fishing on my favorite stretch of water in Wyoming. A small creek that winds its way through a wonderful canyon filled with wild flowers and critters and then exits on to a flat plain. It winds like a slithering snake, back and forth through the valley below. You can fish what seems like miles of stream and actually only move along a few hundred yards.

I had just finished my turn catching a beautiful 15-inch brown trout on my third and last attempt. My first try ended with the fly stuck in the bushes somewhere behind me and my second was just a simple missed strike. But this one…the third attempt was right on. Wooshh…and a tight line. “Fish on,” I yelled. No one cared but me.

My fishing buddies had a bet going on whether I would be able to land the fish. Of course you have to know that they are going to do just about anything to make sure I won’t land it. Things like throw a net and try to break off the fish. Goose me while I intently try to reel it in or make loud noises that would make me jump out of my skin and make a big mistake causing the fish to go free.

These guys are supposed to be my friends…and yet this is how they behave. Well, you have to know…that…humm…yah, you need to know…I’m just as bad to them.

John had to slide down the overgrown bank and go knee deep in the soft, silt and muck to net my beautiful fish. Loren, on the other hand, had already started climbing up the bank on to the next bend.

“Oh Shit!” was all we heard. John jumped up out of the muck onto the bank in one leap. It normally would have taken a few minutes of tugging and pushing just to get his feet loose with the real possibility of having to go back down to retrieve a boot left behind in the mud. I, on the other hand, just needed to turn from my crouched down position to see what had spooked Loren so much.

There he was. Sliding back down the bank, running backwards across the water, with his rod going one way and hat another. He was moving so fast that his feet didn’t even leave marks on the stream bottom. His face said it all. FEAR. Terror. Intense concern for his own safety. He wasn’t thinking about us, just himself. Nice guy for a friend.

And there it was. Just a little fellow, oh, maybe 4 to 5 feet long. You would have thought it might have been those big, long teeth that causes all the commotion but it was the baby rattle he held in his tail that caused the most fear. It was here that Loren came face to face with a 5-foot Rocky Mountain Rattle Snake!