Furnace Brook Clears Quickly

May 22 — Woke up to grey skies and rain in the official Daily Wild Guess from the National Weather Service.

The Housatonic was still a little high for my wading tastes, so I went to Furnace Brook along Route 4 in Cornwall. This is a small stream, sometimes squirrelly, sometimes fairly open. It's lovely water and holds a surprising number of trout.

It has one big disadvantage — it is right along Route 4. There is nothing like casting to a trout with the roar of traffic in your ear.

Naturally, no sooner did I arrive than the skies opened and it rained hard for about 20 minutes. I watched as the stream rose and became discolored.

"OK," sez I. "Let us put on something big and hairy and continue in the muddy water."

Which I did.

But what was interesting to me was that the stream cleared out almost as quickly as it became discolored. An hour later, you wouldn't know it rained from the water.

I finally got someone to take a Copper John in this deepish run at the second of two pulloffs with picnic tables along Route 4.

Then the LSD kicked in.