Pop fly of the week!

There are a great many flies out there that I don’t tie. This is a new segment meant to look at some of the best.

1: Sculpzilla!!
When you are out on your favorite trout river and things are looking bad, no hatches, no drys, and it's fall. The nymphing is poor, and let's face it, it's not the most fun. But damn, you left you seven weight with the fast sinking line at home. You know the trout are eating something a bit bigger. You still have a chance with that floating line. Gear up that six weight floating line and arm it with sculpzilla Jr. This fly has a great cone head for getting it deep even in current. It in larger sizes sinks like a stone. The cone head with eyes is a great touch, but the soft hackle collar, and the rabbit strip tail make this fly deadly. But the best part is the hook design. Tied with a gamagatsu octopus hook, that is almost all the way in the back, articulated, you keep most of the movement, but have perfect hook placement that is even better for getting a clean hook up. They come to match almost every color needed. These flies will get you the monsters, but also you will not miss out on the tiny guys too. Pack a box of olive and tan today. You will not regret it.

Fly line review!

So many line are coming out geared toward certain fishing situations.  This is most common in freshwater.  No longer is it just sinking lines and floating lines with some in-between.  But what most of us have to find is a line that works best across the board.  SA has General purpose taper, and then good big fly lines, but i want a line i can do it all with.  I just wanted a line that could nymph, drift drys, cast bass bugs, swing sculpin flies, and lay down a cast for a carp.  What i found was no general purpose line in fact, it was a line that was meant to hunt one fish.  Rio's Smallmouth bass fly line.  It might have been meant for smallies, but anyone who has fished them knows, you need a line that dose it all.  Smallies need to be fished with most freshwater technices, and ever a few saltwater tatices are sometimes needed.  I found that when i needed a floating line, almost always this line was great.  Distance cast was easy with it, and short cast where great, it was super accurate, and even was great for sight fishing roughfish.

I love this line

But if you throw big flies for preditors this line is great.  For most general purpose fishing i recomend a six weight line on a five or six weight rod.  Even larger for bigger fish.
Don't let the name fool you, its for everything and dose it all.

Once a year my family decides we don’t argue enough, so we go spend a week in northern Wisconsin, the great north woods; A land of fishing.  A land where all of the mid South’s fishing tactics barley work.  We went to one of the North’s deeper, cooler, clear water lakes, a natural lake full of fish.

In this lake is a bio-diversity most would love to see.  Common are the pan fish, with bluegills and crappie.  The crappie are only black crappie and disappear after their spawn for the rest of the year.  Perch are most common in this lake, and I mean real perch, yellow perch up to a pound.  They live in the dense weed beds and many fallen trees that litter the lake.  But they are not the only food source.  Over twenty kinds of minnows live here and there are cisco, a kind of white fish that school in deep water.

Living more on the cleanup side are three types of suckers, some channel cats, and bullhead.  And for them to eat, are the crawfish, hellgrammites and other little taste bugs.

Feeding on most of these fish is all-star team of predators.  Bait guys will spend millions to try and catch Walleye on these lakes, and with a decent shot at ten pound fish, why not?  In spring and at night even flies can get them.  After them you have the Bass.  Although 80 degree water temperature is rare up there, largemouth live in the shallows.  They feed on it all.  After that come the far Stronger and faster Smallmouth bass. These all fear Pike.  Northern pike are called the water wolf, but in these lakes they are normally stunted in growth, with few fish beating out a size of 25 inches.  Overpopulation is to blame.

But everything in the water, from minnows, to water skiers, fears one thing: The King of the Lake.  Bigger than pike, and known to have more teeth then Gar, it is the Great white of the north, the Muskie, the fish of my nightmares.  And for one of the few times in my life, I choose a fly Rod for it.

But first, our family trips start with a gypsy style packing job.

200 feet of rope later we headed north.  With the North Woods showing what the weather is like, front after front.

We got there in late afternoon.  We decided to put my father’s forty year old boat in the water.

I armed myself with flies I do not use much in the south.  Flashy Ben-backs, and flies heavy with deer hair and buck tail.

Instantly, I discovered the fishing was going to be decent to good.  The largemouth were bedding, regulations said they were out of season, catch and release only, perfect for fly fishing.

Emily was with me as always.  She has an, itch, let’s say for pike.  Pike were a bit harder.  We had a very thin window to take them, and often we struck out.  But with our pike gear we got lots of Bass.

After days of trying, a leech fly got one decent pike, and a bend back got another, sicker looking fish, but nothing near 20 inches.

Dad found out quickly what the smallmouth where doing, and pulled one of the biggest fish of the trip off of a sand flat near a dock.

Before we could run around fishing more fish, we had a problem.  Forty years takes it tool on an engine.  So Emily and I found a different boat.

 

For some reason, Emily and I always do better without a motorized boat.  And now we could go much shallower.  Emily then hooked up on some of the best smallie fishing I have seen in a while.  Not huge numbers, but the size of the fish was unreal, even after the boat was fixed, we still found monsters.

The bass hit strange things, mouse flies, bendbacks, and sluggo flies.

I went on one last shot for a monster I had not seen much of.  A few small sightings, a lot of pike strikes (none tried later for pike flies though, figures) and one small Muskie strike had me frustrated.  I tried one last time.  I got the perfect shot (if you fish Tarpon), head on and the king of the north ignored my fly.  In one week of fishing I got two shots at muskies.  Welcome to the big leagues of muskie fishing (And yes, I casted the 20,000 times).

In total, Emily had the most fish, maybe 70 fish, with 30 or so over 3 pounds.  I had a grand total of maybe 20 fish.  2 of them pike.  Not one of my better pike trips.  But I had one 4 pound largemouth.  Most largemouth and smallies where taken on a 4 wt.  So I had fun.

Emily had one 5 pound smallie and so did my dad.  It was unreal, but a lot of fun.

If you go up north, be ready for the most intense fishing you can have in the so called warm water fishing.

Sculpins!

If you fish like me, you often fish river and outlets due to the fact you can wade them and have an easier time reaching the spots that fish hold in with you casts.  In fly fishing this is almost life, when you find yourself fishing a river, you often have to spend time swinging flies.  As far as trout go, many drift nymphs and dry flies.  But this there is a group that like to streamer fish.  Even when the big fish are not around, smaller trout will strike streamers.  The most popular prey of the trout is sculpins.  These tiny fish are perfect food.  They can range from less than an inch to up to six inches.  But trout are not the only fish they eat.  Bass, walleye, and many others eat them.  There is also a common fish called a Darter that is super similar to sculpins.

When hunting trout, walleye, and smallies.  I get out my sculpin flies.  Not all have to be deer hair head or wool headed flies.  I decided to develop two new, simple patterns for hunting trout.  One is nothing more than an intruder fly turned into a sculpin pattern and shrunk down to size.

The second is similar to a wooly bugger.  Both are small and simple.  They will get you a lot of rainbows.   Remember to fish these near the bottm.

Some more art.

A brown trout.

A smaller taimen from europe.  Called Danube salmon, (Hucho Hucho).

Salmo marmoratus, aka a Marble trout.

some lesser known fish.

Some art for those who enjoy art, Inked line drawing of a Trout.

New year, new flies! Are you ready for Sowbug!

So most times of the year I’m working hard at finding my new magic pattern.  Whatever will be work right now, or for the run later in the year.  I spend time judging how I think fish will react.  But this year, I need to pull out everything right NOW!  So I’m tying all kinds of things to present.  I have even gone out to make some brand new patterns.

I know everyone loves poppers, so here are a few deer hair ones like what I’ll be showing.

Since I’ll be right on the banks of the White River, I have been working on big trout catching patterns.  Like this sculpin like guy tied with craft fur.

One of the best fly tiers out there is Nick Granato,  he came up with this pattern.  It’s called a Sasquatch.  I use craft fur more than he does, but looks almost the same.

In spired by the craft fur brush, I decided to make another baby Brown trout fly that is articulated, with one big B10 stinger Gamakatsu hook in the center of the fly, with the front hook clipped.  I used craft fun all over and got marker happy.  I love it.  It moves like a dream, hope it casts like it.

            So i have been working on some new Hopper ideas too.

The last is the reason I tie.  I love making Deer Hair diver.  This is a new frog pattern that is larger than most of my flies, but with a deer hair head of the same size, making it far more castable.  Double weed guard.  This is a new big seller.