Filed under: Observations — admin @ 3:09 pm
Do you think you’re catching your fair share of fish? We all have our favored flies. We fish them often because we have confidence in them. We sweep an area with a particular fly and presume the fish aren’t active if we catch few if any fish.
Yesterday I went down to a familiar section of water - I wade fish it quite often for small-jaws. For experimentation sake, I spin-fished the entire section with a sexy perch colored Rapala…zippo! I then grabbed the flyrod and sifted through it with a White Bunny fly that is quite successful here. I took one decent fish of 16 inches.
The weather was lousy and I considered leaving, but thought: I’ll try another fly and work through the same water. This time I put on a dark olive Wholly Bugger Conehead (about 4 inches long, and worked back up through the water, connecting with a slightly larger fish, around 17″. That was it - for that fly.
Again, just about to leave, with some cooling rain smacking me in the face, I figured it was time to give it one last try. I tied on a new concoction (that I’m sure someone has tied before and has a name for) I call the Orange Crush. It’s basically a weighted Wholly Bugger with krystal flash chenille (hot orange) and rubber legs. I use coneheads, dumbbell eyes, and wrapped lead - as variations for weighting the fly. I use a cream marabou for the tail. I’m not sure if this makes a difference or not - still under investigation.
I again worked back through the SAME water, now for the fourth time! Surprisingly, I caught two very nice micropterus: the first - an 18″er; and the last one taped right at 20″ even. I believe we had met once before, earlier in the season, when she fell for a black popper back then. You see she likes this one big rock…This is a gorgeous riverine smallmouth - long, fusiform, with the magnum tail.
The lesson is obvious and one we all know - but don’t adhere to enough: Don’t give up on a stretch of water unless you give it a fair chance! This particular area holds a bunch of very nice fish in the 16 to 20 inch range. I often work through the water with a popper before going underneath. I don’t spend more than about an hour on a single outing and sometimes less. But it’s close to home and I can steal away for awhile without making too many waves (if ya know what I mean). I almost always hook at least one fish during an outing, regardless of the weather. I usually change flies once or twice and often pick wrong.
Today I picked right.
It was fun.
Get out there.
Filed under: Adventures — admin @ 4:18 am
Well it happened last night.
I arrived one hour before sundown and cast poppers and streamers to no avail. It appeared there were no fish in this vicinity of the upper Mississippi. With about 45 minutes of light left, about 8pm this time of year, I spied a few ephemeron leukons about. They attracted no attention. About 8:20pm the tempo picked up and the flies began coming out in earnest - big and white! Fish began to take notice as the air in my little part of the world looked like the proverbial snow storm. The duns began to hit the water, individually and occasionally in clumps of 1-3. My # 10 Parachute Light Cahill began hitting water as well, just upstream of the boiling rise forms.
My friend Tony Kimball, who lives near by, stood on shore and watched, never having seen the likes of fly fishing, much less matching a hatch, much less for smallmouth bass! He would call out and tell me where the most consistent risers lay as I was busy fighting fish after fish. Through the next half hour I think I managed 6 - 8 nice smallies in the 14 -16″ range. All took the parachute either on the surface or just below the film, as the fly was a bit soggy. I’d have caught a few more except for a five minute down-time episode, trying to thread a 15# test tippet into a fly eye that would only accomodate 10 pound test or less.
The hatch seemed to dissipate right when it got too dark to fish - perfect. Just one of those nights, the right place at the right time…
Lord take me now.
Filed under: Observations — admin @ 11:30 pm
I was thinking how fleeting the summer fishing season is, year after year. The memories we make this season can last forever. (Here’s my brother Bruce with a dandy).
Have you been getting out enough this season?
Filed under: How To... — admin @ 8:09 pm
We were on the river the other night and decided to shoot this little vignette on double hauling. My daughter chimes in to wake everyone up. It’s unedited and just kind of fun, hope you try the techniques and let me know if it works for you. Oh yeah, click on the image to get it going and it might take a second or two to load.
Filed under: Adventures — admin @ 7:59 pm
Just get out there and do it.
August 3, 2007
Guess what? It’s August!
Can you believe it? Sorry to say this folks but the summer is slipping away, once again. Have you put in enough time on the water this season?
As my slogan goes: Fun Waits for No One!
Here’s a shot (by my daughter, Sienna) of yours truly waiting for the Whites (see below). I think this is far less predictable than a steelhead run. One night it’s a snow storm, the next night “nada”.
August may be the best month to fly fish smallmouth on many of our midwest rivers. The hoards of winged marauders have lessened and the nights will start to cool slightly in a couple of weeks. Low water has concentrated fish and generally you can expect decent to excellent fly fishing this time of year.
Remind yourself to make the time to enjoy our wonderful outdoors. Immerse yourself in the sights, sounds and aura of nature while casting for the finest freshwater game fish around. More and more folks are realizing the potential of our sport and turning their attention away from other fly caught species.
The main theme in the posting is this; Another season is waning. I’ve had a ton of fun wading this summer (for about an hour and a half several evenings a week) in July and August. I average, maybe 2.5 fish per outing, but they’ve been good sized. I’ve taken them largely subsurface and found a number of patterns that produce: Here’s a few:
- Bunnies - Weighted Strip Leech type patterns, size 2 in white, gray, black and combos of the aforementioned.
- Crayfish patterns - I’ve used the Clouser crayfish pattern generally dead drifted below a float.
- Clousers - Deep Minnows - The standard in this area (and perhaps the world) is a chartreuse and white Clouser, sizes 2 - 6.
- Conehead or Dumbbell Head Wholly Bugger - type patterns in all kinds of colors.
- Poppers - I’ve been using black a lot this summer with good results, see inset. That’s just gray squirrel tail and grizzly hackle.
- Light Cahill parachute size 10 and 8 - for the fleeting white miller hatches.
Filed under: Adventures — admin @ 7:58 pm
We’ve been spying some light ephemeron leukons hatches over the last couple weeks. Last evening things finally got interesting! We arrived on the water late, around 8pm to witness a very heavy spinner fall with Whites everywhere on the water. The fish largely ignored the spinners. At 8:45pm the hatch started up in earnest, like a snow storm. We took only a couple of fish on a Light Cahill #10 parachute, but I believe better nights are in store. For complete tying instructions on flies that work during this hatch go <<HERE>>.
