Introducing The Trout Fishing Handbook   By: Cal Kellogg March 21, 2008 More Articles by Cal

Hello Fish Sniffers! My name is probably familiar to many of you good folks, especially those that read the print edition of the Fish Sniffer Magazine. For those of you that don't read the print edition (you should it's awesome!) my handle on the fishing forums is Fish_Writer. Yes I'm the one that is always soliciting you guys and girls for fishing photos!

I've been fishing for as long as I can remember. Being an editor for the Fish Sniffer allows me to fish often for a wide variety of gamefish. Sometimes I fish on my own and at other times I team up with some of the best guides and anglers in the western United States, guys such as Gary Miralles, Gary Coe, Captain Barry Canevaro and Captain James Smith to name only four.

Now I love to target all species of fish, but if I had to name the two species that occupy a special place in my heart they would be trout and striped bass.

Over the years a great many anglers have called and emailed me inquiring about one type of fishing or another. A great many of these folks wanted information about pursuing trout. They wanted to know everything from how rig up for fishing Power Bait off the bank with their kids to how far to run a lure behind a downrigger ball to the best way to tempt big mackinaw living in the deep recesses of high mountain lakes.

Finally in 2006, with the desire to help trout anglers catch more and bigger fish, I set out to write my first book. I christened the finished product The Trout Fishing Handbook: A Comprehensive Guide For The Conventional Tackle Angler.

The book is over 50,000 words in length, encompassing 166 pages and makes use of 38 photo illustrations. As the title implies it is the only trout fishing guide on the market focused exclusively on how to catch trout using spinning and conventional casting gear. If you do a web search on trout fishing you'll find a zillion titles focused on fly fishing, but there is only one book like mine, that details all aspects of trout fishing that fall outside the realm of the fly fishing with fly tackle.

The Trout Fishing Handbook takes the reader from the simplest bank fishing approaches to advanced trolling strategies. The information in the book is a compilation of the tricks and strategies I've learned over the 30 plus years I've spent chasing trout in reservoirs, lakes and streams in addition to all the tips and tactics I learned while fishing with legendary guides such as Gary Miralles, Monte Smith and Gene St. Denis.

Inside the book you'll learn the basics of bank fishing, advanced bank fishing tactics, basic trolling, advanced trolling approaches, how to troll with natural baits, how to troll for trophy browns, how to catch mackinaw, how to still fish with bait from a boat, how to team flies with conventional gear, how to catch stream trout with bait and lures, how weather and moon phases affect trout, how to properly release trout, how to clean and store trout for the best possible table fare, how to take a well balanced attractive photo to preserve the memory of your trout fishing success for years to come and much more!

Burt Carey is one of the best known and most respected outdoor editors in the business. For many years he was the editor of California Game and Fish Magazine, Rocky Mountain Game and Fish Magazine and Washington and Oregon Game and Fish Magazine. These days he works for the National Wild Turkey Federation as the Chief Editor of Turkey Call Magazine, the organization's flagship publication. This is what Mr. Carey had to say about me and The Trout Fishing Handbook last December:

Some people are easy to mentor. Just a handful of years ago, a young school teacher by the name Cal Kellogg called my office to ask how he could write feature stories for California Game & Fish magazine. As with hundreds of calls just like his that I've received over three decades as an outdoor magazine editor, Cal's telephone call was neither earth shaking nor new. After all, everyone has a fishing story they want to tell, right?

But there was something about Cal.Perhaps it was the passion in his voice that prompted me to challenge him. Later that week, I told him, I would be hosting a dinner at a restaurant in Fairfield, California, presenting a seminar to about a dozen freelance writers. I suggested he be there, if he really wanted to write for a living. He came.

Of all the veteran and novice writers huddled inside Marie Calendar's restaurant that night, Cal out-scribbled everyone there. He must have written down virtually everything I said. His zeal carried over into the following months, and I soon purchased a story from him. It turned out to be the first story he'd ever sold to an outdoor publisher. And yes, it was about trout fishing, a destination piece that covered five lakes in Northern California's Motherlode region.

Cal hasn't slowed down since then. Smitten with the bug to communicate the outdoors story, he's parlayed his zeal for the craft into freelance writing and photography, video production, frequent outdoor television appearances, a full-time editorial position with The Fish Sniffer magazine in Northern California, and now, this book.

During our conversations over the years, we talked about how to stand out in a field where seemingly every angler and every hunter has a story they want to sell. I encouraged Cal to study the videos being produced, the television programming being broadcast and the books being sold, and then to do what so many others have told me is impossible: To find what isn't there.

You have the result of his research in your hands. "The Trout Fishing Handbook: A Comprehensive Guide for the Conventional Tackle Angler" is the guide Western trout anglers have been looking for. With apologies to our fly-fishing brethren, who gasp at the notion of catching a trout with an earth worm, the number of anglers who use hardware or bait to catch trout are staggering compared to those who wield wispy rods to toss microscopic flies.

Recent studies by Southwick Associates found that 53 percent of this country's anglers use conventional tackle - spinning, spin-casting and bait-casting gear - exclusively, and another 31 percent use conventional tackle most of the time with just a dabbling interest in fly fishing. That's an incredible 84 percent of anglers who use conventional tackle in their pursuit of game fish.

And yet so very few books are written for those who prefer spinners, hard plastics and bait to size 22 caddis imitations, or deep-water trolls instead of Woolly Worms. What makes this book different is that it contains how-to information for those who put results ahead of form. Like Cal, I'm one of you, a rural California native who grew up dangling Pautzke's Balls 'O' Fire salmon eggs on a No. 8 hook; who learned how to cast a Shasta Fly (a sandwiched trout snack of a night crawler, a salmon egg and a miniature marshmallow) before my 8th birthday; I'm one who seldom finds anything more satisfying than a well-balanced ultra-light rod in hand and a pair of worn wading boots on my feet. I join Cal in sharing your passion for catching trout.

There must be at least 1,000 ways to catch a trout, and yet so few of us possess the know-how to switch tactics as we go from mountain tarns to major rivers to deep-water lakes to small streams. From the beginning trout angler to the veteran whose practiced eye can spot a fish behind a rock forty yards away, Cal Kellogg takes you through just about every setup and every rig used by conventional anglers today. You will learn different applications and variations to tactics that can and will make you a better trout angler. Enjoy the ride, and keep a close eye on this rising star among outdoor communicators-Burt Carey

If you'd like to get your hands on a copy of The Trout Fishing Handbook for the low price of $16.95 and learn the secrets of consistent trout fishing success, give me a call at (530) 320-0368.