Pictures by Scotty Craighead
Words by Scotty Craighead and John J. Craighead

This June, as always, my family and I went salmon fishing on the Grand Cascapedia River in Quebec. While writing an article about our trip for the Snaz, I stumbled upon a poem written by my grandfather, John J. Craighead, entitled The Grand Cascapedia. I’d fished with my Grandfather on this river before but didn’t know this poem existed. I thought I would braid his and my words together.

Atlantic Salmon are increasingly rare, so we don’t keep the salmon we catch (though we will keep other species, for lunch.) This year, zero salmon were released because zero were caught.

With a burr of Scotch, a blare of French,
The Cascapedia scours its ice-made trench.

It grows in depth with rocks and rills,
Then Penetrates green-quilted hills.
Clothed in maple, birch, and fir,
Alive with daisy fields that stir.

I balance on the wobbly, green, 27-foot canoe, ready to cast. As I pull line from the Bogden reel, there is a distinctive, pleasing screech.

The river conceals a coded spell,
A mix of rain drops, taste, and smell
That sends a smolt, yet holds the Parr,
Both time-coded for a journey far.

The line flows out of the rod smooth as Spidey’s web. If my cast is good and far, the slack I’d pulled out comes taught and the line whaps against the rod.

The spell homes the salmon when mature,
To seek a spawn and strike a lure.
To prepare a redd in which to lay,
Ten thousand eggs, her mate to spray.

The fly, a fighter jet, zips across the water, but intercepts nothing. I send it out on repeated, unsuccessful missions.

Breasting the Cascapedia’s flow,
Birth-water tells were to go
To seek shaded pools neath fir and spruce,
To find a mate and reproduce.

Over time the repetition starts to wear. No salmon today. Fortunately, they’re not the only fish in the river.

En route she sees the open sky.
And leaping upward strikes a fly.
She feels a hook, a tugging span,
Her first and last contact with man.

On the beach, we build a fire of birch and then toss a large flat river stone on the flames. Soon, a Brook trout sizzles on the stone.

Her cycle, ancient as our earth,
Programmed solely to give birth
To eggs coded to repeat her heat,
To preserve her genes, to avoid defeat.

The boat speeds down the slithering river. The wind rifles through my hair. I’m perfectly content.

All shattered by man with fly and rod,
How ruthless nature; how pragmatic God