Beavers Bend Oklahoma
Not far from home, a mountain paradise awaits in eastern Oklahoma

by Steve Brigman

As we leaned over the hood of the pickup, the sun disappeared behind the hills leaving but a pink glow to define their silhouettes. We stood in our stocking feet discussing our mutual love for Hemingway. "The old man and the stream," I called him jokingly. Like we shared reading taste, we had discovered we shared other things. On this day, he shared with me his "stream."

As I had arrived at Sid Ingram's Beavers Bend Fly Shop many hours earlier, two friends, one new and one old, were shooting the bull with him when I walked into the shop. Sid and I had met two weeks prior and planned my first trout fishing in southeastern Oklahoma. But by this time, I had collected one of the day's memories.

A drive around the Beavers Bend State Park revealed my exclusive human presence in the park on this cold, gray February morning. Sid and I were to meet later in the day. I had come early to photograph the park, but the light was not going to cooperate, so on went the waders and into the Mountain Fork River I went.

While untangling a back cast from a cypress branch, the first human noise of the morning grew louder. A stocking truck zoomed by. This was the every-other-Thursday that rainbow trout were stocked into the river. I continued to throw my gold bead hares ear at the deeper pools in front of me when the truck crossed the bridge downstream. The lapse of time indicated it had stopped: no doubt to put fish in the river. Even I could catch those hatchery trout, I decided, and was soon downstream wading toward fish breaking the surface near the middle of the bridge.

Flailing the No. 4 line to get a little distance off the reel, the first cast fell far short of the fish. A slight slip on a rock turned attention away from fishing to balancing. But the line was in the water and tightening. A hook set prompted a run by a fish obviously not one of the 10-inch "stockers.

"A bass?" A heavy fish was staying off the surface unlike the trout I had caught before. Maybe it was a brown.

But as it rolled on the surface after the end of a long run, I realized I had hooked the largest rainbow trout I had ever seen, except those on the "Outdoor Channel." After a long careful battle, I held the fish by the tail — tired its body swimming gently in the water — pondering what to do with it. I had come to do a story. I needed pictures, but no photographer was available, and my catch-and-release instincts were taking over. I measured it against my rod and let it swim away.

Back at the shop, Sid's ruler measured 22 inches to the spot I had marked. I couldn't believe it, and by the looks of the others, they had their doubts.

As a year-around trout fishery, it was not unbelievable that a trout that size had been caught. It was just the fact that the "writer" had caught it. Sid said he saw a couple of fish every week that size brought into the shop during the winter season. A few weeks earlier, a nine-plus pound state record brown trout had come from these waters.

Beavers Bend State Park offers southern fly fisherman a unique opportunity. Trout are stocked year around, and the cool water that flows from the Broken Bow Reservoir Dam grows the fish to some impressive sizes. The clear water flows over a rocky bed, surrounded by cliffs and steep hills, creating scenes more common to New England or the Rocky Mountain West than Oklahoma. Deer and turkey are plentiful.

Sid and I decided on lunch before we went back after 'em.

It was warming nicely when he waded into a small riffle.

"OK, now watch this," he offered.

Sid Ingram lands one of the many stocked trout put into the Mountain Fork River every other Thursday.

His nymph had been in the water only a few seconds when he set the hook. A 10-inch rainbow leaped repeatedly before being turned loose.

The newly stocked fish that were hanging in the swift water were to easy to catch. They came one after another. The day became a calendar photo as the the sky cleared into a deep blue and the sun compelled us to shed clothes needed earlier. We continuously caught the eight- to 12-inch fish until the sun neared the horizon. Sid had another place to show me.

As we hiked along the river, a vertical rock face on the opposite bank provided shade. The day was dying fast. Sid was showing me the area for future trips. As we stood at the edge of a deep blue pool, a rise broke the surface. Sid cast a small dry in, and the fish grabbed it. He released the small rainbow and we headed back to the truck.

We stood and talked until dark. The fading light represented a new chapter in my life; I had made a new friend and found a new river to fish.