photo by Todd Kaplan 

Seasons on
Silver Creek

Retired Idaho Mountain Express
Editor and prolific fly-fishing author
Ken Retallic shares his memories of Silver Creek Preserve as it celebrates
its 30th anniversary. Illustrations by
Lynn Toneri. Photos by Todd Kaplan.

A hundred or more sandhill cranes swirl high overhead. My fly-fishing line floats slackly on the wind-ruffled flows of Silver Creek as I search out their broad wings and slender, tan-gray bodies barely visible against the pale-blue autumn sky. The crane’s mewing calls filter down through the thin air as they circle in a slow, spiraling ride up the brief thermals of the late-afternoon sun for another downwind slide on their migration south. The melodious tones of their flight chatter announce the arrival of autumn.

Harbingers like cranes rarely follow calendar dates for the seasons. But these ancient, stately birds are among my favorites. At Silver Creek the cranes’ early appearance in late March—you can often hear them even though you may not see them—signals the quickening promise of spring that brings the willows, dogwoods and cottonwoods alive again with feathery new leaves, sprouting buds and catkins.

The quickening may gather force too slowly for the impatient, but nature follows its course and anticipated events resolutely fall into place, regardless of anomalies in the weather. Generally, by Mother’s Day—a mere two weeks before the opening day of the fishing season—the new season of The Nature Conservancy-Idaho’s Silver Creek Preserve is nearly at its robust best. The scenery is beautiful and the wildlife is vocal.

Pale lavender blossoms of flag iris are the first blooms to appear along the narrow footpaths lining the meandering flows of the stream. And when the chokecherries blossom, it’s always a good sign that the annual migration of the warblers will soon be passing through. If there’s a good hatch of aquatic insects occurring, these colorful songbirds often pause in the trees and shrubs to refuel longer en route to their nesting grounds in northerly climes.

Several years ago, around this sublime season, a phenomenal invasion of warblers and a host of other migrants joined the creek’s earlier arrivals and resident birds. With binoculars and notebook in hand, I spotted more than 50 bird species previously unrecorded that spring in only a few hours of a drive-by visit. A fortuitous experience, to be sure. Even more fortuitously, I added two more species to my birding life list—the yellow-breasted chat and the willow flycatcher.

The chat should have been an easy find to record in my field guide—considering I’ve been visiting the creek for two decades—but the flycatcher required a long hard look in the guide book to identify it and make it a part of my official list.

Capping this remarkable day was a photograph few can ever hope for: Lined up on a low limb of a cottonwood, overhanging a gravel road, was a long-eared owl and her three fluffy chicks.

Hemingway’s legacy

This year marks the 30th anniversary of Silver Creek Preserve, situated three miles west of the town of Picabo.

Few have known this fabled oasis in a sagebrush desert better and appreciated its bounty of flora and fauna more than Jack Hemingway, the eldest son of Ernest Hemingway, who married an Idaho native and adopted the Wood River Valley as his home.

“There are red-winged blackbirds calling in the cattail marshes, geese clamoring on nesting sites ... bees are gathering pollen in the wildflowers, trout rising to early hatches, all mixed with the sound of the stream—the fishing regulars call it Silver Creek music,” wrote Hemingway in 1976.

An acclaimed outdoorsman, conservationist and author, Hemingway died in 2000. Among the many accolades bestowed by family and friends at a memorial service in Sun Valley was appreciation of his role as “the savior of Silver Creek.”

“He left us an extraordinary legacy when he spearheaded the effort to preserve one of Idaho’s premier trout streams, Silver Creek,” said Idaho’s former governor, Dirk Kempthorne. “And now, the clear waters of Silver Creek beckon fly fishermen from all over the world ... a living legacy to a remarkable man.”

A legendary stream by any definition, its crystalline waters harbor a phenomenal population of trophy-sized rainbow and brown trout. The lush riparian shrubs and trees of Silver Creek Preserve provide a haven for an equally remarkable myriad of wildlife and birds (as many as 150 species of birds have been identified by explorers along the self-guided nature trail). Among its cornucopia of wildflowers is the small yellow ladyslipper orchid, a state plant species of concern.

From its genesis as the 479-acre Sun Valley Ranch—purchased in 1976 for the reduced price of $500,000 through a year-long, international fund-raising campaign launched by Hemingway—Silver Creek Preserve now encompasses 882 acres, and The Nature Conservancy has partnered with neighboring landowners to protect another 9,500 acres of Silver Creek drainage through conservation easements.

A fly fit to be tied

The beauty of fly-fishing is that trout live in picturesque environs. Yet, nothing captivates a fly fisher more than a progression of rise forms—trout sipping mayflies or caddis—dimpling a stream like the sprinkling of a gentle rain. For it’s in the “ring of the rise” that fulfillment occurs for the fly fisher.

Many people think fishing is passive, but it’s not. Fly-fishing, especially, is an art and a science as much as it’s a sport. To do it well, you have to understand the natural histories of the fish, their habitats and their prey.

So, the checklist fly fishers pay most attention to is the Silver Creek Preserve Aquatic Insect Hatch Guide. The hatch refers to the flying adult stage of aquatic insects, the most ephemeral period of mayflies and caddis that live a year or more of their short lives underwater. In turn, the chart detailing the seasonal occurrence of the bugs on the stream is a calendar dry fly fishers take to heart.

Many schedule their vacations around periods of their favorite hatches. The two most exciting favorites are the largest of the many mayfly species, the brown drake (Ephemerella) that hatches only in the first two weeks or so of June, and the tiniest of mayflies, the trico (Tricorythodes) that erupts in phenomenal numbers primarily in late-July through early August.

Equally exhilarating—when they occur in worthwhile numbers—are two other “big fish on big flies” events: the green drake (Drunella), first two weeks of July, and the gray drake (Siphlonurus), late June to early July.

Most reliable through the full season, but occurring most strongly in early spring and late autumn, is the blue-winged olive (Baetis). The other prevailing hatches, although more temperamental, are the pale morning dun and pale evening dun (Ephemerella), June through September. A season-long personal favorite is the speckled dun (Callibaetis), primarily because it’s often the trout’s first choice in a multi-hatch.

Many may think tiny Baetis are the only prime expectation in late-autumn, but a truer fall favorite is the mahogany dun (Paraleptophebia) and a generally overlooked “miniature version” of the fabled October caddis (Trichoptera). Also, truly wicked autumn weather seems to disrupt the cyclical clockworks of large-sized Callibaetis, which seem to erupt in false expectations that it’s spring again.

That’s just the mayflies, okay?

 

Idaho’s river of dreams

For those of us who call Silver Creek our “home water,” the stream is a rare and treasured privilege that offers unique experiences on virtually every outing. A legion of other fly fishers, who travel from around the world to fish here, arrive with the same sense of dedication, but are occasionally disappointed by the whims of weather or the proclivities of a hatch. Nevertheless, they come, too, because they’re fully aware the trout will be difficult to net.

For there comes a time in the life journey of a fly fisher when the soul needs testing as much as the mind. The skills of casting, reading the water, fly selection and presentation have been honed to fine edges. Place becomes as important as numbers. The combination of immaculate stream with fabled fish, awe-inspiring scenery and classic hatches commands the angler’s quest to test his mettle.

Ultimately, it brings him to Silver Creek, Idaho’s quintessential river of dreams. Silver Creek defines the essence of intellectually challenging fishing on demanding spring creeks.

Notes from
a fly fisher’s journal

Over the past decade Ken has shared his reflections on magical moments at Silver Creek with his friend Mike, who comes down from Canada every year to fish at the creek for a week or two. Scattered across the next few pages are snippets from Ken’s fly fishing journals, which he has e-mailed to Mike to help sate his fascination with the captivating creek.

MAY: Perfect opening day

Hi, Mike … Silver Creek was incredibly magnificent with its magic Sunday…  At the same time it tested my favorite bamboo rod, thanks to your gift, to its limits… Trout were hammering huge Callibaetis and I had ‘the’ pattern that I’ve been telling you about in my vest…  Caught six or eight 14- to 15-inch rainbows, couple of dinks, and one 16-incher between noon and 4:30. Fortunately, action was slowing down when I had to take son-in-law Josh back to parking lot…  Went back to island channel and decided to pound bank with over-sized Callibaetis spinner. An 18- to 20-inch brown trout hit the fly on third or fourth cast into cutbank in mid-channel, exploded at least 3 feet into the air, ran short run downstream and bull-dogged into the bottom, and wouldn’t move. Got below him, reset the reel drag, and pulled him up. He leaped couple more times, ran right at me, I reeled too hard on the over-sized reel—and, Bob’s your Uncle, he was gone…

JUNE: Green drakes bonanza

Hi, Mike … Cold, high winds and pelting rain roared in Saturday around 3:00 sending “los touristos” home and giving me choice of waters … . Storm brought up a carpet of tiny Baetis, healthy numbers of sulfurs/flavs and random appearances of struggling green drakes. Long strings of rising pods fed on Baetis below your island in random flat stretches of water and inside the tree-sheltered bend above the peninsula. Both scenarios kept me chasing fish and switching flies for hours—had one exhilarating bout with large, leaping rainbow on No. 18 blue-winged olive thorax—but really couldn’t match hatch … finally tied on green drake Wulff pattern around 6:00—bam! 15-inch rainbow hammered cast to riser taking Baetis. High winds ripped water all day (Sunday) and ye ol’ bamboo got strenuous workout … started out with green drake Wulff, whipping it against wind to visible risers: several short strikes, and then, wham, a 16-inch rainbow hammered fly. It leaped several times, and when I put pressure on him, it ran straight at me through weeds, broke off leader at 5X knot and came out of weeds at my feet. Never experienced anything like that before. Ended day with most amazing fish of all on flat water above canoe island channel. Another pod of gulpers had moved in and was feeding in slack water pool … . This time I was determined to “match the hatch.” Fly that finally worked was No. 20 Baetis quill sparkle dun that I rooted out of “small Baetis” box ... Brilliant 18-inch rainbow took it on third or fourth cast. Beautiful fish, albeit a bit too slender after coming back from his spawning adventures…

JULY: Sunset tableau

Hi, Mike … Glad to hear you’re out and about more often … . Have always felt the flora and fauna experience is as meaningful as the fishing. It was so quiet on creek Friday night that when I went back for last shot at canoe island channel, I found a pair of sandhill cranes had settled on second island downstream. They didn’t care about me (walking to tip of island), and I watched fascinated as red-winged blackbirds nesting there mobbed the cranes and snapped in a flurry of aggression at them as they fed in soft soil. The cranes ignored the pesky blackbirds. I got closer to these magnificent birds than I’ve ever been able to before on foot. Too dim for a great shot with camera but recorded it anyway…

AUGUST: Island hopping brown

In late-summer, the creek occasionally enters a doldrums. Even so, one day in late August I had to send Mike a quick note on an amazing event that broke that day’s mold: Have had a few other minor successes at Silver on pale evening dun hatch that never seems to last more than an hour around 6 or 7 p.m. However, the best producer has been a rusty spinner. Most spectacular episode today was the island hopping brown (trout): Yellow-sallies are still occasionally coming off on upper creek … . Ran one down cutbank on inside of island point that sends water into minor side channel just below where planks into this stretch reach water. Saw big head come up, turn and chase fly, take it, and turn back upstream—and next thing I saw was a 20-inch brown leap over point of island into side channel, going away, not stopping, stripping fly in weeds—it happened faster than you read this.

November: Autumn farewell

Hi, Mike: Silver has been stingy with hatches last couple of weekends, or winds have blown them off before fish could get on them. Sunday, however, produced another of its classics: intermittent flurries of Baetis, mahoganies, Callibaetis, and the 16-18 pale evening dun that has been skittering around late afternoon most of summer … . Bank feeder at mouth of Loving Creek was sipping PEDs like popcorn, but only the ones that came straight down his lane … . Froze my feet casting to him for almost 2 hours, as well as another very large feeder in shallow slack water ... . Both take advantage of very subtle shear lines that come off bank and feed flies into their mouths like funnels … . Almost got bank planks feeder Saturday evening, though. He popped up and bounced a black-hair beetle off his nose … will go looking for him again next season. Watched a large otter cruise down through canoe island channel and around bend. Saw couple of Virginia rails, including one that I spooked into flying, at your downstream island where you photographed the sora. Rails are bigger and noisier, so maybe they’re the ones you heard there this summer. Large mule deer doe leaped almost midstream, leaped and plunged to south bank at tree bend you worked several times above Loving Creek. She would have swamped you if you were there. Acted like something was chasing her. A water spout performed a whirligig like a mini tornado. Very loud and dramatic and I sort of expected to see fish being sucked up. But it disappeared in seconds. Eerie.

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Silver Creek
through the years

1883: W.H. and Mary Kilpatrick homestead on Silver Creek, establishing the town of Picabo. Family history relates that “picabo” translates as “shining water” in the language of an Indian tribe that lived then in Minnesota.

1920s: Idaho Fish and Game introduces non-native rainbow trout in Silver Creek. Native redband rainbows are eventually genetically swamped by non-native species.

1939: Ernest Hemingway first visits Sun Valley Resort, as an invited guest to promote hunting and fishing in the area, including Sun Valley Ranch on Silver Creek. Over the ensuing years, he primarily hunts in the vicinity for upland birds and waterfowl with friends including Gary Cooper and other celebrities.

1940: The famous author’s eldest son, Jack Hemingway, fishes Silver Creek for first time.
1955: Bud Purdy buys his grandfather’s, W.H. Kilpatrick, ranch and establishes Picabo Livestock Company.

1961: Ernest Hemingway commits suicide in Ketchum.

1967: Jack Hemingway returns with family to live full time in Ketchum.

1968: Idaho’s navigable stream access law tested by local fishermen on Silver Creek to disprove landowners’ opposition to passage through private property. Idaho Supreme Court rules that navigable waters are open to public access to float waters or wade streambeds below high water line.

1970s: Idaho Fish and Game ends stocking of hatchery-raised rainbow trout in Silver Creek.

1971: Jack Hemingway is appointed to Idaho Fish and Game Commission by Gov. Cecil Andrus. He serves six years.

1975: The Nature Conservancy and Jack Hemingway launch TNC’s largest private fund-raising drive in the West to purchase the 479-acre Sun Valley Ranch for the reduced price of $500,000.

1976: Acquisition of the ranch is announced and Silver Creek Preserve established. Guy Bonnivier is hired as the first employee to oversee fencing and construction of visitor center cabin. Hard work begins to restore deteriorating habitat.

1977: The Nature Conservancy initiates fly fishing-only, catch-and-release fishing regulations on the preserve.

1978: Brown trout, a European species, is introduced into Silver Creek. Transplants end two years later.

1979: Regulated three-day-per-week waterfowl hunt on Silver Creek Preserve is negotiated. Idaho Fish and Game spreads the word that fishery is rebounding.

1980s: TNC-Idaho begins a campaign to acquire conservation easements to forestall development along Silver Creek and its tributaries. Idaho Fish and Game establishes Silver Creek West-Point of Rocks public fishing access site downstream from Silver Creek Preserve. Picabo Livestock Company opens its lands in same area to public fishing.

1986: Guy Bonnivier is named executive director of TNC-Idaho. Jack Hemingway’s book Misadventures of a Flyfisherman is published.

1989: Idaho Fish and Game reports angler use and success rates have doubled since 1977 at Silver Creek Preserve.

1991: Jack Hemingway helps launch and hosts Incredible Idaho, a wildlife television show by Idaho Fish and Game in cooperation with KTVB in Boise.

1996: Bud Purdy and his son, Nick, donate conservation easement of 3,400 acres along Silver Creek to TNC-Idaho—a $4 million gift.

1997: Addition of May Ranch properties to Silver Creek Preserve adds 284 acres and one mile of Stalker Creek to preserve.

1999: Guy Bonnivier resigns as executive director of TNC-Idaho.

2000: Jack Hemingway dies on December 2. Eulogized as the “savior of Silver Creek.” Winter fishing season on lower Silver Creek is authorized.

2001: Idaho Fish and Game dedicates Silver Creek West access site in memory of Jack Hemingway. October 10 is declared Jack Hemingway Conservation Day.

2006: Silver Creek Preserve encompasses 882 acres, and TNC-Idaho partners with neighboring landowners to protect another 9,500 acres of Silver Creek drainage through conservation easements.