Fly Rod Selection For Bonefishing: Video
You’ve booked that bid bonefish trip, what fly rods should you take?
Saltwater fly fishing requires he angler to respond quickly to changing conditions. Having the right gear makes a huge difference. The problem is, if you don’t have a lot of experience, you may not know what is going to work when the fishing gets tough. In this video, I’ll try to help you sort through it.
The big factor in saltwater fly fishing is wind. Either too much or too little of it. A lot of beginning saltwater anglers want to fish on dead calm days. Believe it or not, it’s just as tough to have too little wind as too much. Bonefish can get really spooky when the water is flat calm and the setup you love in the wind may not produce.
“Which rods should I take,” is the question I get all the time.
In my opinion, the fly line is an even more important choice. How the rod and line work together to present the fly is what’s really important. I start by choosing the line I want to fish, then I choose the rod I like to cast it. I find I can carry fewer fly rods and catch more fish.
WATCH THE VIDEO AND LEARN ABOUT FLY ROD SELECTION FOR BONEFISHING.
Read More »Confessions of a Trout Guide
WHAT HAPPEN ON THE RIVE, STAYS ON THE RIVER…USUALLY.
So this time of year in Colorado, the rivers are blown, there is no one in town and all the guides are hanging around the shop bullshitting about their worst/best days on the water. It got me to thinking that I should tell some stories about the worst possible guide trips/situations that we’ve had on the water. Hopefully this does not reflect poorly on our guide services, but it will shed some light on what happens in the day-to-day life of a fishing guide. I know there are a ton of guides out there who will want to one-up me and please do, I love this stuff. Names have been changed to protect the innocent.
Guide #1 (me) was floating with a mom and her son. We were catching tons of fish and having a great time. The son was maybe 12-13 years old and was a stud fisherman aside from giving me a fantastic Hank Patterson “snap it!” cast. As we floated down the river, mom was snapping pictures left and right as son caught fish after fish. At one point we were back-rowing a riffle when all of a sudden mom jumps out of the boat and starts running through a knee deep run towards an island in the river. My first thought is “wow, she really had to pee,” my second thought is “this woman is trespassing, and we are going to be issued a ticket at the takeout.” Lost in all my jumbled thoughts is a calf elk stranded on the island. This woman took it upon herself to rescue this thing. Next thing I know
Read More »Articulated Nymphs, All Hype or the Real Deal?
If you pull any serious streamer fisherman aside and ask them to name their favorite streamer pattern, chances are the fly pattern will be articulated.
Ask the same question instead to a serious nymph fisherman, and most will answer with names of nymphs that aren’t articulated. I agree you don’t have to fish articulated nymph patterns to catch trout, but I do find it a little odd that we aren’t seeing more of them in the spot light today. As far as I can tell, the concept has been around almost as long as articulated streamers have. The last couple of years I’ve started to incorporate articulation into my fly tying for many of my nymph patterns. Just about all of them have done very well for me on the water. In some cases, my articulated versions have caught trout 3 to 1 over the traditional non-articulated versions. You can’t tie all nymphs articulated because many fly patterns and species of aquatic micro-invertabrates are far too small. However, with some practice, most fly tiers will find it’s pretty easy to tie articulated nymph patterns as small as a standard size
Read More »Accidental Fishing, Keep Your Gear Close
I’m a firm believer in a well laid plan, so why has some of my best fishing been an accident?
I guess it all started because I have a weak bladder. Anyone who has been on a road trip with me can tell you that. Be prepared to make frequent stops. As much as I try, those stops don’t always coincide with gas stations and rest areas. It was on one of these unscheduled pit stops that I noticed a small stream in the North Carolina mountains. The sound of running water always helps to get the plumbing moving, but this water deserved closer inspection.
I tromped back to the car for a 3 weight and within a couple of minutes I was catching wild brook trout fifty feet from the road. The little stream was lousy with them and there were no trails, beat down banks or any other sign of human traffic. Wild brook trout were thriving there in spitting distance of the highway with no one the wiser. I caught eight or ten and was back on the road without ever knowing the name of the stream.
A couple of years later I was in Colorado when nature called. This roadside bano took me in sight of a small mountain lake. I couldn’t help but notice a cutthroat about sixteen inches cruising the bank. I zipped and trotted back to the car for a different rod. A single cast was all it took. The optimistic cuttie swam right over and ate my hopper. Nothing breaks up a road trip like an unexpected fish.
All of my accidental fishing isn’t related to public urination.
Read More »How I Almost Owned A Trout Stream
By Jon Tobey
NOW THAT THEY ARE SELLING IT, I CAN FINALLY TELL THE STORY OF WILLIAMSTOWN GULF.
When my dad was in high school, he and his 3 best friends bought a trout stream. I know it sounds like something out of Trout Fishing in America, but they really did. Can you imagine, getting out of school and heading out to your own trout stream, as a teenager, to fish with your best friends? Somehow, that story makes me feel like I really got my priorities completely wrong at a very early age. I didn’t even own a fly rod until I was 40, but I heard about this stream my whole life and finally one day when I was home I asked if I could go fish it. They’ve been stocking if for years even though nobody has fished it for 20 and my dad had to call his one surviving friend to get directions to it. It’s a little creek that becomes a tributary of the White River.
When we finally got there it was in an incredibly dense and verdant valley, but unfortunately the stream had been beaverized, with dams about every 100′ on it and a lush swamp in the resulting river bottom. I had to walk through a very dense swamp to get to it and I was a little nervous because it was filled with moose tracks and from what I’ve heard you would rather run into a bear than a moose. When I finally got to the stream it was about 8′ across, and beneath the dams almost that deep. In the crystal cold water there I could see the fry, every pool holding hundreds and knowing what cannibals trout, especially brook trout, are I imagined each stretch must hold one lunker or so. I mean 20 years….
Read More »Saltwater Short Shot: Video
A 100 FOOT CAST WILL CATCH YOU SOME FISH, BUT A 30 FOOT CAST WILL CATCH A WHOLE LOT MORE.
There are days on the flats when you never cast to a fish that’s more than 30 feet from the boat. When you don’t have sun, bonefish and other saltwater species can sneak up your skirt in a hurry. Even on clear days a good short shot will serve you well.
It sounds simple but it’s one of the hardest things to do well. If you think casting a fly rod 100 feet is hard, try casting one 10 feet. Especially a fast action saltwater rod. Making a short cast and landing the fly accurately with a straight leader requires a specific set of skills.
THERE ARE FOUR KEY SKILLS THAT MAKE THE SHORT SHOT WORK.
A good ready position
When fish are close to the boat, there’s no time to think. You have to be ready to present your fly immediately. That’s impossible without a good ready position. You need a good leash, nine feet of fly line plus your leader, outside the rod tip. This will allow you to load the rod with no false casting. You also must hold the fly in a way that you can release it cleanly and quickly with out it catching in your clothes, your line or on the boat. (MORE HERE)
A short stroke
You can’t make an effective short cast by lobbing the fly out in front of you. The only way you can land the fly accurately with a tight line is to load the rod. You can’t load the full rod with only 9 feet of fly line so you have to make a short, powerful stroke that loads only the tip. (MORE HERE)
A good target picture
There’s no time for strategy when fish are at your feet. You have to know where the fly goes without thinking. Put it
Read More »Cut A Dovetail Every Day
Woodworking has taught me a few things about fly fishing.
Before Gink and Gasoline I was, for a time, very involved in the world of woodworking. I was fortunate to photograph and spend time working with some of the most talented folks in the field, many of them are still great friends. I still build my own furniture, in fact I just finished making a new set of cabinets for my kitchen, but it’s a hobby, not a job.
It was the early 2000s when I met Frank Klausz, a Hungarian-born furniture maker working in New Jersey. Frank specialized in high-end custom furnishings and reproductions and wrote books and magazine articles as well as instructional DVDs. An old world craftsman with a sterling work ethic and a great sense of humor, his name will be familiar to anyone who has studied the craft.
Frank is specifically known for his hand cut dovetail joinery. For many, hand cutting dovetail joints is the skill which separates the hobbyist from the artist. It is the kind of skill that’s bedeviling to master, while the master makes it look almost automatic. I had hand cut a few projects before I met Frank, but he was the one who really turned the lights on for me.
Cutting a perfect joint is really a matter of hand skill and muscle memory, much like fly fishing. There is some theory you need to understand but when it comes down to it, your hands must function independently from your head. The only way to achieve that is by repetition.
“I couldn’t really cut dovetails until I cut three-hundred for one project,” Frank told me.
“Cut a dovetail every day for a year and you’ll never have to think about it again.”
That advice ended up being a life lesson. I didn’t make it a whole year, but I cut
Read More »Fly Fishing Stillwater by Gareth Jones
THE OTHER HENRY’S
Mention to any flyfisher that you’re heading for Island Park, Idaho and they’ll immediately think you’ll be packing a selection of CDC and biot creations intended to deceive the wonderfully selective leviathans of the Henry’s Fork.
However, my latest visit to see Rene Harrop and the boys at the TroutHunter, was all about fly fishing the incredible Stillwater’s of the region, and more specifically, Henry’s Lake. The plan was to see how fishing UK flies and techniques would work on the great Cutthroat and Hybrids that inhabit the lake. This wasn’t the first time I fished the lake. I’d visited it ten years earlier, and I remembered enjoying some wonderful sport-fishing from a float tube, fishing damsels through the gaps in the summer weeds. Needless to say, I was fairly confident that some of my own fly patterns and techniques would produce on this trip, and I was excited to hit the water.
Read More »Don’t Let Go of the Fly Line in Your Rod Hand During the Hook Set
Have you ever set the hook on a fish, and the next thing you know, you’ve got your arms spread apart in the shape of a giant slice of pizza, leaving you unable to reach the fly line with your rod hand?
Do not be ashamed if this happens to you every now and then on the water. You’re not alone, I promise. Many fly anglers do this regularly, and the reason they get themselves in this situation is because they’re letting go of the fly line in their rod hand when they set the hook. You can completely eliminate this problem on the water if you make sure you keep a solid grip on the fly line with your rod hand during and after every hook set. Doing so, it will allow you to maintain tension and control of the fish while you’re stripping in fly line or getting that excess fly line on the reel.
I know some of you that have found yourself in this situation have probably used your mouth to hold onto the fly line until you can get your hands back into the correct position. God, I know I have plenty of times.
Read More »What Is The Future of Fly Fishing?
HAVE YOU HEARD THE TERM “FLY FISHING 2.0”? DO YOU KNOW WHAT IT MEANS?
If you do you might be ahead of me. Whether it’s marketing, zeitgeist or a true sea change in the nature of the sport one thing is for sure. Fly fishing is changing, but into what?
The signs are all around us. Let’s take you for example. That’s right you are part of ‘Fly Fishing 2.0’. Your are sitting in front of your computer, or tablet, or smartphone reading about fly fishing while you probably should be working. The enthusiasm for fly fishing on the internet is almost unreasonable. Just a few years ago the idea that you could visit a site and read a new article on fly fishing every day of the year would have seemed crazy. And yet, here you are.
If you had a parent, or grandparent who fly fished, they had no such outlet. Fly fishing was whispered about, if that. Now the internet is full of sites where you can read about fly fishing, watch videos and look at cool photos. This is not just a function of the ubiquitous Internet. There are hundreds of times as many folks into conventional fishing as there are in fly fishing. Do a quick Google search. There are far more fly fishing sites online. Why?
Perhaps fly anglers are a more tech savvy group. Maybe they have more time on their hands. I doubt it. Personally, I believe it’s raw passion, but I may be personalizing the issue. Whatever it it is, it’s real and it’s powerful, but to what end?
It’s fair to say that moving out of the media closet is bringing more people into fly fishing. That’s a great thing. New folks discover fly fishing every day and as they matriculate into the community they bring with them ideas and aesthetics from their other passions and interests. These ideas broaden the base of an already diverse fly fishing community. Diversity is good but does diversity mean dilution? The culture of fly fishing is changing, but is it for the better?
The first time
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