Saturday Shoutout / Dr King Goes Bonefishing
I’M SURE THAT WHEN THE FOLKS AT DENEKI OUTDOORS ASK FOR THEIR READERS BONEFISHING STORIES THEY NEVER EXPECTED THIS WONDERFUL RESPONSE.
The author, identified as Brenda, tells a story so touching I choked up when I read it. No surprise, Dr King is a personal hero of mine. I had no idea there was any connection at all between he and the bonefish I love.
Here’s a teaser.
Ansil stood in the bow of his boat resting his chin on his oar. Then, with one arm, he gestured to the sky, the water, and the mangroves. “Dr. King asked me what I told people who came here and still doubted the existence of God. I told him I didn’t have an answer for him then, but I would when he returned to Bimini.”
Read More »Winner of the Photo Caption Contest
Just wanted to thank everyone who participated in the photo caption contest this past week. It was really tough picking a winner with all the great entries, but after a cold beer, I picked the entry that had louis and I laughing our butts off in the airport weighting to catch our flight back from the Bahamas.
The winner is……
Read More »Choosing a line for your switch rod Part one: Understanding lines and line tapers
SO YOU BOUGHT A SWITCH ROD…NOW WHAT?
The idea behind the switch rod is simple. What if you could have the best of both worlds? What if you were nymphing under an indicator but you had the length of a Spey rod to highstick? What if you could cast a dry fly eighty feet without a backcast? What if you could swing flies on a skagit head and sink tip in the morning and dead drift dries in the afternoon without going back to the truck for another rod? Is that a world you’d like to fish in?
Switch rods are a wonderful and versatile tool for fly anglers but they can be as vexing as versatile. In fact, it is their versatility that makes them so confusing. There are about a dozen ways you can set up and fish that new switch rod. They range from nymphing for trout to swinging for steelhead and even casting in the surf for stripers. How your rod will fish starts with the line you choose and it all adds up to make selecting a line for your switch rod the most confusing choice in fly fishing.
I know a lot of guys come to the switch rod from a single-hand casting background. They hear all the talk about two-handed casting and get to feel like they are missing something. The switch rod offers the option of single-hand performance and seems like a friendly way into the world of two-handed casting. The trouble is that lots of those guys never get comfortable putting their left hand on the rod, usually because
Read More »Sunday’s Classic / The Fish That Took Three Anglers to Land
I’ll never forget the epic battle that took place between three anglers and a trophy salmonid one freezing December morning in 2010. I was having the time of my life on a steelhead fishing trip with my great friends Louis Cahill and Murphy Kane. We had made the long drive up from Georgia to chase after Great Lake steelhead for a week. Many of the rivers that feed into the Great Lakes hold huge numbers of salmon, steelhead and brown trout. Unfortunately those large concentrations of fish also attract every fishermen within a 100 plus square mile radius. We all agreed we couldn’t handle putting up with shoulder to shoulder fishing conditions, so we came up with a strategic plan to avoid it at all costs. Our strategy was simple, watch the extended weather forecast, and try to plan our trip around the nastiest weather we could find. This way, angler traffic would be at its lowest and we’d hopefully have plenty of water to ourselves.
Read More »Saturday’s Shoutout / Jamie Rouse Podcast, and Hog Snare Streamer
This week we give a shout out to Orvis, for a great Podcast with fly fishing guide Jamie Rouse on winter trout fishing tactics. We then finish the shout out up with a fly fishing video and a fly tying streamer video.
Read More »Fly Fishing Photo Caption Contest – Gear Giveaway
Photo Caption Contest and Gear Giveaway: The holidays are over and the presents have all been opened. That’s no fun, so we decided to run a photo caption contest to continue the festivities. Come up with a “funny” caption for this photo and leave it as a comment on the post for a chance to win a great basket of fly fishing prizes.
Read More »Sunday Classic / The Need For Speed, Line Speed, That Is
Joel Dickey is one of the most dynamic casters I’ve ever seen. One of the hallmarks of his dominating casting style is truly awesome line speed. It enables him to shoot massive amounts of line and hit distant targets with accuracy, even in high wind. In this video he explains how you can build your line speed.
Read More »Saturday Shoutout / Brookies and Steelhead
At the risk of being self serving, I’m shouting out to an essay I put together for the good folks at Filson. They are putting some energy into beefing up the Filson Life Blog and it’s looking pretty good.
Check out Yellowhammers and Specks
On the other side of the continent, my good friend Jeff Hickman has put together a killer steelhead film with Todd Moen of Catch Magazine. It’s been selected for the 2013 Fly Fishing Film Tour.
Check out Fall Run
Read More »Sunday’s Classic / Tying the Chronic Egg Pattern
Sometimes in fly tying it’s the little things that really make a difference in the quality of your finished fly patterns. When I first started fly tying I always hated the look of my egg patterns because I could always see my thread down the center of my finished eggs or they wouldn’t end up symetrical. They caught fish but they weren’t as pretty as the egg patterns in the fly shops and it used to drive me crazy. Since then I’ve adopted using a really cool fly tying tool called an Egg Yarn Dispenser . It allows me to tie my egg patterns super quick and I get true consistency from one fly to the next. Watch this quick fly tying video of me tying my chronic egg pattern. Hopefully you’ll pick up a couple tips to improve your own egg patterns.
Read More »Saturday Shoutout / Reds & SUPs, SCOF Winter Issue
This week’s Saturday shout out we give props to Vantage Point Media House for bringing us a sneak peak of their latest fly fishing project, Fly Nation Season 2, and a quick link and congrats to our homies at S.C.O.F for the completion of their 2013 winter issue.
Read More »