The Neal Lally "Brookie" Collection
Back in the very beginning before we started Cutts and Bows, when fishing was still quite new and slightly overwhelming, we were introduced to Neal Lally. It was on one of our fist missions to the upper Skagit river. Neal, along with his fly rod, brought a camera and spent almost as much time taking pictures as he did fishing.
This was the start of a great friendship and Neal has since joined us on many fishing missions. He spends a lot of the time stripping in his favourite go to fly, an olive pumpkin head wooly bugger, but mostly he is trying to capture the perfect fish/fishing picture.
He has been more than generous with his craft and we have often shared his images on our platforms.
Here is a few favourites from some older Skagit missions.
He has started to gain some notice and respect for the quality and compositions of his nature photos and was recently published in Fly Fusion Magazine. We wanted to help get Neal some more exposure and also give a little something back to him for all the photos he has shared with us and many other fly fishers in our Lower Mainland scene.
We more than proud to offer you a very limited collection of 16" x 13" prints shot by Neal on a recent trip to a local Brook trout lake. Each of these prints will be signed and numbered by Neal will come with a free sticker of one of the spectacular Char Neal photographed.
The Mission
Tucked back into the Coastal Mountain Range of BC, is a small and beautiful lake. It is one of only a handful of lakes that hold Brook trout in BC's Lower Mainland. Stocked back in the 50's, the population of Brook trout has survived and thrived. These beautiful fish congregate in great pre spawn schools in certain area's of the lake in Oct. and Neal knew it would be a great chance to get some quality underwater photos with his Nikon/Outex underwater housing/camera set up.
A date was set and we started getting excited.
Just days before we were slated to go, environment BC releases a weather warning. Another windy and very wet atmospheric river was coming our way and was supposed to hit around mid day of our trip. We discussed the options and decided to give it a go anyhow. The power of the Brookie held sway. As luck would have it, the weather didn't turn until after we had made it back home and we were only blessed with a stable drizzle and light winds.
After arriving to the lake, we geared up, pumped up, and loaded in our tubes into the water and started kicking across to where we new the fish would be grouping.
As soon as we dropped a fly we started catching fish after beautiful fish. Brook trout have to be the prettiest fish period! It was not lost on us how stunningly bright their orange bellies were, the stark white edges of their fins, or how vibrant the blue/pink spots were. Neal could not stop taking pictures. He was like a kid in a candy store.
Not only did he get the images he was looking for, he also caught many fish and ended the trip by catching the biggest brook trout of the day!
The Pictures
It took a long time for Neal to sort through all of the images he had captured. There were so many great shots it almost seemed an impossible task to narrow it down to a top three. After a few voting committees we were able to narrow it down to these three.
Brookie on - A great underwater shot of a stunning Brookie being reeled in on a Hot Head Bugger. A completely sub surface picture showing this fishes beautiful colours in contrast to the deep blue/green back drop.
Heading Home - An impressive release shot showing both the below and above surface angles. Just look at those colours.
Brookie fin - A fantastic above surface shot showing that beautiful dorsal fin as the Brookie heads back below.
Each of these shots show these magnificent fish in all their glory! We couldn't be happier with how they turned out.
We only produced 3 prints of each of these photographs so once these are gone, you will have to wait and see what our next adventure provides us.
You can follow Neal on instagram at @neal.lally and @neal.lally.photo
#gonefishin