a moment before carefully detaching the hook as my uncle had shown me when he put undersized trout back into the swim. It, too, was gingerly placed back into the beckoning brook.
This is definitively my earliest memory of what today is still a magical place for me—Uxbridge Brook.
Although the Uxbridge area produced my earliest memory of the countless waters I have fished, it also produced several others worthy of mention. The springs and brooks escaping from the underground aquifers in the ridge to the south of the town are not the only Uxbridge waters to have tested my angling abilities. The brooks feed a large pond, intersected by a road and bridge with a few lovely homes along its shores. With its feeder springs and brooks, the pond forms the headwaters of the main Uxbridge Brook which flows northwards towards Lake Simcoe after it pours over the small dam in the heart of town. The stream, still fairly small at this stage of its development, produced a couple of other exceptional memories easily recalled in full detail as follows.
The affable citizens of this lovely town whose backyards front on the meandering brook have never become terribly upset at my fishing my way downstream while working the many enticing pools with their log-laced cover. That is, other than the occasional emergence of someone either reminding me to, “Please be careful going around my flower beds, son,” or simply questioning our luck with, “Catching anything,” or that most oft-asked question of fishermen, “How are they biting?” Almost sixty years of fishing this particular section of waters has never resulted in my being asked or told by one of the owners to get off his land.
There are small, gorgeously coloured speckled trout in the brook. Unfortunately they have to share their territory with an occasional tire or old stove tossed in by some thoughtless person, most likely a non-resident. No longer pristine as they were many moons ago, these icy cold waters still provide an interesting, if not necessarily aesthetic, fishery for the “brookies,”3 some of which had actually departed their cover in the beds of watercress to take up residence in, or beneath, the debris.
A short distance beyond the towns main street where the stream emerges from its subterranean course below several buildings, it travels beneath another bridge before flowing alongside a row of ancient willow trees with many of their gnarled and enormous branches suspended low over the water. The roots of these massive trees, many of which extend into the stream, provide excellent cover for its fishy inhabitants. However, on one occasion when travelling through the village and taking a minute to see what I could raise from the undercut bank and willow roots, I experienced another magical moment.
I studied the stream looking for the most promising target for the first cast. It appeared probable that the place with the most potential to provide a brookie, worthy of being kept for the pan, would also be the most awkward spot in the area to fish. A huge branch, jutting out from the main trunk of the biggest willow tree on the bank, guarded the likely holding spot for a decent-sized trout—an entanglement of the willow’s tentacle-like, underwater roots. It would require a perfect and flat cast in order to propel the spinner far enough beneath the branch that a trout, holding court in the cover, would catch a glimpse of its flashing blades, exit the hole and strike.
The branch, more like a twin to the tree’s main trunk, was probably a foot or so in diameter and suspended only another foot or so above the water. It was a challenge I could not refuse, although the likelihood of donating my spinner to one part of the willow or another was considerable. Flexing the rod tip with wrist movement a couple of times, while keeping it close to the surface of the stream and holding my breath for a brief moment, I fired a sharp cast towards the selected target. As luck would have it the lure shot over the branch, not under as intended.
“Damn!”
Then came the memorable moment! After crossing above the big branch, the silver spinner did not have enough momentum remaining in the cast to even reach the water on its far side. It hung there enticingly, its blade flashing six or eight inches above the surface of the stream and a few inches beneath the branch, while I contemplated the best way to extricate it—but only for a split-second.
Before I could repeat the cuss word, a seventeen-inch brook trout shot out from the hole’s nether regions and acrobatically managed to latch on to the still fluttering spinner. This was easily the largest and most beautiful brookie I had ever seen in any stream, anywhere, and I somehow knew that I had to have it—but how?
Fortunately, reflex action had immediately taken over on my part. I had already loosened the clutch to the point where the weight and struggling of the trout was sufficient to pull the line smoothly down off the branch without its hanging up. With the fish now in the water, at least now its weight alone would not suffice to free it from the lures treble hook. Without pausing and wearing only my regular clothes and street shoes, I leapt into the pool, splashed my way furiously towards the branch and awkwardly passed the rod over the top to a spot where I could reach beneath and grab it before it dropped into the stream, all the while attempting to maintain sufficient tension on the line so that the hook wouldn’t simply fall out of the trout’s mouth.
Soaking wet from stem to stern, only a few minutes more remained before the battle was over, including one heart-stopping session where I had to extricate the brookie that had retreated into its underwater tangle of roots under the bank. My luck held and, stumbling backwards towards the bank, I carefully worked my prize into the shallows then pounced on it on all fours. I thought for just a brief moment about placing it back in the swim, but the fish appeared to be as exhausted as I, so it was kept for showing off to my fishing buddies at home and for the frying pan the next day.
My plans for that day were of course completely derailed by the experience as I sloshed my way back to the car and headed home, grinning all the way back to Toronto. Even the scolding I endured from my wife for ruining my clothes and shoes didn’t dampen my enthusiasm. Easily, this is one of my incredible memories ever and it occurred in what has always been for me—the magic of the waters of Uxbridge!
The waters in and around Uxbridge didn’t become the fodder for the opening of this book merely by chance, or just because of the earliest magical memory factor, but because there is a wealth of these wonderful recollections pertinent to the area in my mind’s hard drive. There is probably enough material stored there to actually write an entire book on the memories created over all those years by its springs, brooks, the pond and the river.
A couple of other reminiscences occurring at the pond deserve reporting here. Although the principals in the first anecdote do not include me, the Uxbridge Pond and I were sufficiently involved to create this next recollection. The Scarborough Fly and Bait Casting Association, launched by me and a few cronies in 1984, has from its outset been a club comprised of fishermen, skilled anglers and expert fly and bait casters along, of course, with others wishing, practising and learning to become skilled in the art of angling themselves. A few years ago we were approached on the last evening of the summer season at our outdoor practice venue, the reflecting pool behind the Scarborough Civic Centre and City Hall, by a couple of curious and interested spectators while we practised our presentation and accuracy on the floating targets.
Instead of the usual and dumb, “How’re they biting?” remarks, they inquired about the club’s activities and what were the requirements to join. Although their names have escaped me, I do remember that they were recently retired senior citizens who had moved to Ontario from Newfoundland a few years before our meeting them. They mentioned several times though that it was unlikely that they would become long-term club members, as their plans were to return to the island province within a year or so. But initially their stated objective was to become as proficient with their fly rods and casting prowess as were the
