Fly Fishing Dreams
By Jason Tucker
I COULD HEAR THE VOICES OF TOMMY AND PHIL DOWNSTREAM FROM ME, A HUNDRED OR MORE YARDS AWAY IN THE DARKNESS.
They were methodically working over a promising looking pool, skating mice across the surface, discussing the possibilities. I’m kind of impatient so I felt my way through the brush and grass to a spot where I could fish.
The spot I found seemed to be just right- a sluice pouring out of deeper water upstream into the next pool. I stripped out twenty feet of line and put my first cast in the middle of the torrent. The moment my mouse reached the pool the water erupted with the sound of a brick being thrown in the river.
With a rare presence of mind, I actually waited until I felt the weight of the fish before setting the hook. When I did it exploded out of the water, leaping once, twice, three times, before settling into a dogged fight.
“I got him,” I shouted into the darkness, and Tommy replied, “We’re coming Jay! Hold on!” followed by the sound of running in the darkness, and Phil emerged from the brush, leapt without looking into the water and waded across in time to help me land the fish.
It was a male brown trout with a massive hooked jaw. Keeping him in the water, we taped him out at just over 28 inches long. We estimated his weight at 9 or 10 pounds. For me it was the pinnacle of my fly fishing career, and a lifetime fish for almost anyone who fly fishes. I was later told by those who know that it was one of the four or five biggest browns caught in the state that season, on a fly.
A lot of elements came together perfectly that night- the right river, the right time of year, the right weather. I had the right equipment, the right fly. I made a good cast, timed the hookset right and my knots held. I was also with the right fishing buddies- experienced guys who had landed a lot of big fish themselves, who jumped in and helped out in all the right ways. Tommy even knew how to take decent photos in the dark.
What is it that makes us seek big fish?
Of all things in life, why is that such a special moment? There are of course far more important things in life- graduations, jobs, proposals, marriages, buying a home, births,…Deaths. Those things are certainly more important than landing the fish of our dreams, but they don’t seem to excite us and capture the imagination in the same way. At least, not for some of us.
The birth of a child is for most of us one of the most joyful moments in our lives, and certainly one we will always treasure. At the same time, it is the start to an endless cycle of dirty diapers, sleepless nights, first steps, scrapes and bruises, and those are the easy days.
Soon you’re sending them off to school, negotiating the ‘tween years, puberty, rebellion and college applications. All a labor of love, but one that often leaves you wondering, which weighs heavier in the balance, the labor or the love?
I’m not sure everyone has a dream, but
Read More »Reel Balance
HAVE YOU SPENT MUCH TIME THINKING ABOUT THE COUNTERWEIGHT ON YOUR FLY REEL? SOMEONE HAS.
Odds are good you haven’t spent a lot of time thinking about that little button opposite the handle on your fly reel. Some of you may have thought it was just there for decoration. Well, it isn’t. The counterweight is actually a really important piece of your reel’s design and without it you’d be in trouble.
Think of it like the lead counterweights on your car tires. When you buy a new set of tires the guys at the tire shop balance each of them once they’re mounted on the rims. Without those counterweights your car would feel like it was driving a washboarded forest service road all the time. Your reel works the same way.
Without a counterweight every time you hooked into a fish big enough to pull some serious line, your reel would buck and vibrate like that car tire that’s out of balance. That would cause a couple of things and none of them good.
The jerking motion of the rod caused by an out of balance reel would cause you to lose fish, either by breaking them off or dislodging the hook. It would also cause extra wear on the reel shortening its life. It would also be annoying as hell causing you to throw the reel as far as possible.
It’s easy to understand why a reel needs to be balanced. What’s tougher is actually balancing one. It’s a surprisingly tedious process. The slightest change in the length of the handle makes a big change in the counterweight. There are formulas, but reel balance only comes from a process of trial and error.
When I was at the Nautilus factory a few weeks ago my friend Kristen Mustad showed me how they balance Nautilus reels. It’s pretty clever and a great example
Read More »Glass and Grass
THIS IS A SIGHT FLATS GUIDES LOVE. THOSE GLASSY CALM MORNINGS DURING THE HOT SUMMER MONTHS WHEN ISLANDS OF FLOATING GRASS STACK UP ALONG THE EDGES OF CURRENT SEAMS. WHEN YOU SEE IT YOU KNOW SOMETHING GOOD IS ABOUT TO HAPPEN. IT’S CALLED A SHRIMP HATCH.
Hatch is a misleading term. The shrimp aren’t actually hatching, they’re dying. Suffocating to be exact. Like a trout stream, the water in the ocean must be replenished with fresh oxygen for aquatic life to survive. The ocean however, does not have riffles turning out oxygen around the clock. Aquatic plants provide some oxygen through photosynthesis but not at night, so the ocean relies heavily on wind to oxygenate the water when the sun is down. This becomes even more crucial as water temperature rises. Since warmer water holds less oxygen it must be replenished more often.
On those still hot nights the shrimp are suffocating and leave the safety of the turtle grass to look for oxygen on the surface. There, they are an easy
Read More »A Michigan Guide Prepares For Winter
By Brian Kozminski
Just got off the phone with a fellow fishing buddy who is a few states south of Michigan. I could immediately tell the genuine giddiness in his voice over recent tracks in the woods and excitement for the fishing season immediately in his focus. At first, I was caught off guard, “What do you mean? We are storing boats, raking, shoveling, blowing out water lines, switching the lawn mower and placing the snow blower in pole position in the garage.”
It is a much different story north of the 45th in Michigan. We can see hard water on many lakes in time for a Christmas bluegill fish fry fresh from the ice. Be careful. Many anglers jump the gun on first ice bite and inevitably find that spring and thin ice with a rather frigid bath to accompany. I will wait until my girls are home for Holiday break before we trek out and drill a few holes looking for some panfish or burbot. There are many other activities keeping my focus at full attention.
Long & Dusty road~
Rod and reel maintenance is foremost. Not that we are totally done with fly fishing, we have a streamer fest scheduled first week in December in hopes of finding a post spawn mega-tron brown in the Trophy waters. It has been a long and, at times, arduous summer; back-to-back trips for weeks and mixing in family time at the beach left some of my equipment neglected. I have set a large towel on my workbench to break down reels, toothbrush in hand and 3-in-1 oil to make sure all levers and cranks are at peak performance for next season. Lines are stripped into a bucket of warm soapy water, wrung through a microfiber cloth and dried, awaiting dressing at the next stage.
Fly boxes can become a task, so try to keep it simple. I have a large Cool Whip container filled with ‘past-prime’ flies that I will either de-hook and use for kids casting events or adorn on a few of my favorite fishing hats. This is also a perfect time to take inventory on what was used and what I need to either tie this winter or prepare a massive order from various favorite fly tyers. The Weather Underground app is a daily ritual; one eye on the coming forecast in hopes of a 45º streamer bite in the middle of a twenty-something daytime high can get any of us excited.
The Vessel~
Keep that float in shape and she will take care of you for more than a couple of seasons.
Read More »Forget About Competition And Focus on Teamwork
Like many anglers, I enjoy a friendly competition on the water with my buddies.
However, if you get too wrapped up in the competition aspect, often it can get out of hand and ruin your day of fishing. These days I try to forget about competition and who’s catching what. It’s just not important to me anymore, and I instead prefer to focus on teamwork. Teamwork usually yields better fishing results anyway, and it also seems to build camaraderie much better than competition. Below are three reasons I choose teamwork over competition in my fishing.
1. Working as team on the water allows you to dial into the current fishing conditions much quicker.
Read More »Bonefish & Wind — 7 Strategies
John Byron
Here are 7 tips to help you catch bonefish in the wind.
Expect it. Chasing bonefish, wind is a feature, not a bug. The flats are … wait for it … flat. Often no lee. Nothing to impede wind across the ocean. When you’re after bonefish, you’ll deal with wind every trip and often every day.
Learn. This blog and its sisters have a ton of great videos on casting in the wind. Chase ‘em down. The Belgian Cast. High with the wind, low into it. Side arm. Let the rod do the work. Don’t overdrive the cast. Keep the normal rhythm. Study the art of casting in the wind.
Practice. Old joke: “How do you get to Carnegie Hall?” “Practice, my son, practice.” How do you get good at casting in the wind? Same answer: practice practice practice. Five minutes a day, all winds, all directions. Practice your casting.
Heavy up. If your main gun is an 8-weight, go to your 9-weight when the wind is getting gnarly. If you’re normally casting that sweet all-distance flyline, shift over to one of those front-loaded cannons like the Rio Quickshooter or Bruce Chard’s Airflo Tropical Punch. And put on a lead-eye fly, one heavy enough to drop straight to the bottom instead of skating across the surface as your flyline scoots in the wind.
Shorten up. You can’t see the fish very far away when the wind whips up the water surface,. Good news:
Restore an Old Bamboo Fly Rod #2: Video Series
Matt Draft is back for part two of our video series on how to restore an old bamboo fly rod.
Today Matt will cover two approaches to restoring a rod and show you hoe to map out the rod and mark important features so everything goes back together like it should. Whether you choose to do a faithful restoration or a modern update, these important steps will ensure that your project goes smoothly.
Read More »My Favorite Bonefish Reel
Best of all it only cost $285
I remember standing on the beach at Andros South watching my buddy Bruce Chard teaching his annual bonefish school. Bruce was illustrating for a first timer what he should expect when he encountered a bonefish. He held the line and let the student feel how hard he should strip set, then he took off running down the beach a fast as he could. The student did a good job of clearing the line and getting Bruce on the reel but I’ll never forget the look on his face when Bruce turned and ran straight back toward him. He stood slack jawed, line piled up at his feet while Bruce and I laughed.
That’s exactly what a bonefish will do to you. They can swim thirty miles per hour and at some point, as they go ballistic and criss cross the flat they’ll head straight for you. You had better be ready to pick up some line in a hurry. The first time it happened to me I struggled. My reel wouldn’t pick up the line and I resorted to stripping it in by hand. My guide told me to, “get rid of that trout reel.” Of course, it wasn’t a trout reel but it clearly wasn’t a bonefish reel either.
The next time I went bonefishing I had to be better prepared. I knew I needed a reel with a really large arbor but didn’t relish the idea of dropping the cash on another new bonefish reel. Fortunately there was another solution. I had a Nautilus NV Ten-Eleven, a great salt water reel. I bought the Nautilus G-8 spool for it. The G stands for Giga. This spool turned my Ten-Eleven into a super large arbor eight.
It’s a brilliant product. The spool is fast and easy to change and really gives the reel some power to pick up line with it’s 4.25″ arbor. It’s highly vented so the line dries quickly, which cuts way down on the chance that you spool will corrode from holding wet line. It’s light (7.2 oz) and holds 225 yards of 30 lb backing with an eight weight line. It lets me take
Read More »Scientific Anglers Amplitude Bonefish Line: Review
By John Byron
Looking for the perfect bonefish line? Good luck. Ain’t no such thing. But a really good line for bonefish, those are out there in growing numbers.
With COVID kicking trips into next year and restricted access to the flats, the driven bonefish chaser then turns to gear. I did. In good shape on rods and reels, I set out to find the best flyline for my eight-weight.
I’ve found one I really like, Scientific Anglers Amplitude Bonefish with AST-Plus.
I have been fishing Rio lines and good they are.
Early days I fished the Bonefish Quickshooter — one weight heavy out of the box and with a short, compact head, it’s ideal for the beginner to fight the wind and learn the short shots. Caught a lot of bonefish with the Quickshooter and it’s still my choice for big winds.
I then moved up (as I saw it) to a Rio DirectCore Flats Pro with the six-foot Stealth Tip. A bit overweight and front-end loaded like the Quickshooter but not as much. Caught a bunch of bonefish with that line too. But … both these excellent lines are a bit splashy when they hit the water, not the perfect presentation.
So I then moved on to the Rio DirectCore Bonefish line and I really like it. Haven’t fished it on the flats yet, but did spend a ton of time practice casting as I describe below. Verdict? It is a splendid line. Lays out nicely and I’d be happy using it in all but heavy wind.
But then my new penpal Ákos Szmutni in Hungary (he’s building a Stickman T7 for me) suggested I try other lines, including one from Scientific Anglers. I looked at the SA profiles and though I didn’t order the specific one Ákos recommended, I did find one that looked even better. It’s the line that’s subject of this review and I think it’s super. Thank you Ákos.
My test runs were not those fancy shootouts with expert casters measuring all of a line’s esoteric dimensions under perfect conditions. No, I just went out on my dock and tried these lines over and over until I felt I knew what I had.
VERDICT? OF THE LINES NOTED ABOVE, I LIKE SA’S AMPLITUDE BONEFISH BEST. BY A LOT.
Venue: small dock on an east-west canal off the Banana River, open water for about seventy feet to my neighbor’s dock.
Rod: Scott Sector eight-weight.
Leader: twelve-foot with typical weighted bonefish fly.
Casting: right-hand caster, to the east into the wind.
Wind: sometimes flat calm, sometimes into the coastal sea breeze maybe 15/20 MPH wind (gets much higher, I’d use my nine-weight with faithful old Rio Quickshooter line).
FIVE THINGS ABOUT THE SA AMPLITUDE BONEFISH STAND OUT AGAINST THE OTHERS:
Fishing Buddy
IN MY YEARS OF FLY FISHING I HAVE FISHED WITH MANY DIFFERENT PEOPLE.
I’m sure that many of you, like me, have a small group of 2 maybe 3 “fishing buddies.” Guys we can run with at a moment’s notice. Guys who, when we get to the water, need no words spoken as to who starts at what spot. No jealousy or fish envy. No competition other than being out and netting as a team. If one guy is hot, the other gives in to the better looking water until things “even out”. Sometimes one would even sit and simply watch the other fish a run, encouraging him.
“Nice, good drift, that’s the spot, he’s gotta be there, let that bug hunt, there he is!”
I live in the west, wedged between Montana and Washington in that little sliver of Idaho. I’m a sales engineer for a big company and about 14 years ago I got a new regional manager, Tom who was a sportsman, fishing and hunting, but never fly fishing. He was raised in Northern Illinois and Michigan and was now in Southern California. While traveling, we would got to know each other, as is natural, and I regaled him with stories about the rivers and places I would fish.
Being both outdoorsman we made a strong connection. One day he said, “I’m coming up to work in your area and I want you to take me to one of your spots.” So I did. It was late in the summer and the water was down but I wanted to take him to a beautiful place for living the moment and not just the fishing. A wonderful spot with a wall on one side and semi open flat behind to make back casting easier. We were on the inside bend and it was perfect for a first timer.
It was hot and we didn’t really catch much other than a few little fellas, but he had been afflicted. Some of us are very susceptible to certain diseases and we called fly fishing “The Disease” and we both joyously relished the affliction.
Our range extended from