Tiger Hunt

Catching big Tiger Trout at almost 11,000 feet in elevation is downright groovy. The hour-long rock-hopping jeep-trail ride and subsequent hike isn't so groovy (hat's off to Jed for the ride) but it's an adventure.... queue video recap....




The rewards are big, colorful and pretty toothy.







Throw in a lot of nice cutts and smaller Tigers lashing out at dry flies and it makes for a pretty fun time....

Strawberry Cutthroats

Word on the street was some good cutts were popping up on a local stillwater to snack on dry flies. Ben is the stillwater ninja so we packed up early and headed to fish it.

Got on the water a o' dark thirty and got a few risers before the sun came up. Strawberry Reservoir isn't super well-known for it's dry fly action, but the fish are known to hit up top from time to time and today was our chance to hit it. Unfortunately for us, the inlet flows had changed and the bigger cutts decided to stay down more than come up -- so the big fish count wasn't as we'd hoped. The planter rainbows were easy to get on the dry though, so it wasn't a total loss.

A day on Strawberry without needing to throw leeches, wooley buggers and the normal stillwater fare is good no matter what. Fun day all the way...

Red-eyed Demons

The drive across the lake Saturday morning was colder than I figured. By the time we had driven to our fishing area, my forehead felt like it had 100 needles being driven into my brain at 50 MPH by the wind. I think it took a full 15 minutes after we started fishing before I stopped shivering. Luckily, I didn't have a lot of time to cry about it as the smallie hunt was on in full.

Fly box: Crawdads -- Check. Perch minnow imitations -- Check.

The first fish just about ripped the rod out of my hands. It was a demon fighting for it's dinner (crawdad pattern pictured above) and it didn't give up easily. It was one of the most fun fish I've ever caught. From the hit to the fight and the fish itself, it was memorable.

------> Come here you little devil....

---------> GOTCHA!!!

And the proud papa with his smallmouth bass:



It was, after all, the first smallmouth on the aptly named "Smallmouth" rod. Seeing that fish bend the 8 wt into a pretzel was downright scary.

And some final shots of other fish that great day...

The smell

I officially ended my trout hiatus the other night. Long overdue. Walking down to the stream, the first thing that hit me was the breeze -- a perfect mix of warm and cool ribbons of air carrying the smell of a trout stream in the summer. I think that's the pavlovian trigger that starts my mouth watering in anticipation of dry flies and wet wading. At the very least, it's a cool welcome back reminding me of the style of fishing I like most.

Summer small streams = minimalistic fishing. One or two boxes, one rod and a lanyard to carry what I don't want in my pockets. I'm a relatively recent wet wading convert so waders are taboo after spending last summer without them. There's just something about standing in the cold water like a nut-job mano-a-mano with the elements.

Starting off, it makes sense to throw the Grumpy Frumpy (hat tip to Cheech for the pattern and photo).



One thing about small streams is that trout find a way to work themselves into every nook and cranny big enough to hold them, provide them food and protect them from roaming herds of hyenas. The first such strip of water across the stream from my entry point holds promise. Two casts later, and a nice brown trout is wondering what happened to the Grumpy looking dinner he had planned and why he's being yanked out of his hidden abode. Next hole up a few boulders away, I find a couple more of his good friends including one with the nerve to swipe the fly. And on it continued...

Later, the caddis would swarm, the GF gets the boot to make room for some new caddis patterns screaming at me from the fly box direct from the testing department. Good times there too as the fish took kindly to what I floated by them. These flies earn a spot in my caddis box.

Finally, as the sun slithers down behind the canyon walls, I stood there and soaked it all in for a few minutes while the water carried on its whisperings to the trout. It's been a good evening. I headed back to the trail, my shorts were soaked and my wading socks were sloshing with water. I was short a few flies but I made a few new slimy friends that evening. The breeze is cooler now and it pushes me back to reality and my drive home. Times are good, my friends...times are good.

What's a trout again....???

It's been a while now since I've seen or let alone touched a trout (not to mention almost a full month since my last post -- ouch). Last trout contact was somewhere around the end of March or early April. That has to be a record for me. For the first time in a long time, I didn't hit any stillwater at ice-off. I didn't fish the Green during the Baetis hatch. Ouch again.



In the meantime, I've been chasing the bucketmouths and a few fiesty bluegill around. Pelican Lake on a 21 1/2 Foot Cobra Bass boat is the way to go. We hunted largemouth all day long and I took some time here and there to hook into a few nice bluegills too. I found that even small bass like to ambush fish close to their size (small 1/0 Bluegill imitation) (top picture).

Then after spending 15 hours on the water, we get attacked by a swarm of some sort of Trico hatch focused just on our boat and saw a cool sunset (props to the Cheechster for the sweet photos)

And a nice sunset....

And finally, a wicked awesome day on the Stans Berries throwing the Tiki Fly where the pigs were abundant and my arm was full-on sore at the end of the day. Thanks Cheech!

Utah Lake Bonefish

So I've been following a bunch of white bass around Utah Lake the past couple of days. Fishing has been pretty good and the white bass are willing to take my flies.

Anyway, I woke up early this morning and figured I might as well go harass some more of them since I didn't have to work. The water was calm and I got into a few little guys right off the bat. After that, it slowed down a bit and I switched to a different colored fly. After a few casts, as I was stripping in the fly and felt a solid stop in the line. I figured I was hung up on the bottom until the line started to peel off the reel and head to deeper water. I thought for sure it was a nasty carp, but kept up the battle anyway. After something like 10 minutes, I'm not making any headway on the sucker and figured I had corn-holed him. My arms are getting tired and finally the fish starts to give up. As I end up getting it closer to shore, I realize the fish is HUGE and it's not a carp. It's a catfish. My accurate catfish weight estimating skills put the fish at a solid 7 or 8 pounds easy. And as luck would have it, I beached him and readied the photo, only to have it flop back in the water and break the fly off. Adios catfish dinner!

I figured that was a one-time deal, but a few casts later, I hooked into a smaller catfish and lost him just as he was making it to shore. The same fly then drummed up two carp as well, so all-in-all I caught a bunch of big fish today. Mixed in with the white bass, it wasn't a bad day after all.

Viva, Utah Bonefish!

Bass Dry Fly Nirvana

We've all had those times when the stars aligned, the fish were hungry, bugs were active and there was something cosmic in the way it all came together -- sometimes in ways you didn't expect. For me, it's been an epic Baetis hatch on the Green River in June or a crazy PMD/Caddis hatch on the Owyhee or a weird emergence of some unknown bug on Matt Warner where the fishing steps up to an almost surreal level of fun. And the fact that it's something 100% totally unexpected and unplanned creates a whole new sense of excitement.

This time it took a lot of driving, braving a hurricane in Hurricane and listening to some helium-induced horrid whacked-out singers at the pizza joint -- but it was worth it.



The Southern Utah bass trip had started a little slow the first afternoon. The bass were deep and my fly rod wasn't getting the job done. So I switched to a baitcaster and landed a nice little bass on a whacky-rigged Senko. My first fish ever on a baitcaster. Pretty fun, actually.



Next day, we motor over to some weedy flats and start to see some bass hanging in the brush. They weren't super-agressive or hungry so when we came upon a nice school of bluegills, we switched over and started pounding them. Cheech was drop-shotting a mixture of flies and I was fishing Chironomids under an indicator. (If you ever wondered what Bluegill like to eat -- even when they're picky -- see my previous bluegill chironomid story). For better or worse, my new Bass fly rod got broken in with a plump bluegill and many of his friends for the next couple of hours.



Anyway, back to the story...

As the bluegill onslaught continued, we heard a big splash closer to shore. Cheech says it's a bass. I didn't think so. A few minutes later, it happens again. And again. This time, it's pretty obvious the splashes weren't coming from the annoying ducks. Moving in closer, we realize there were a lot of bass that had moved into the shallow reedy flats. "Cut off your fly right now", Cheech yells at me. As he handed me a huge nasty dry fly of some sort, I did as I was instructed. The fly now attached to the end of my tippet was a big foam dragon fly imitation. Time to match the hatch, sucka.

Sneaking the boat a little further into the reeds, we see a few deeper channels for the boat to snake along. The splashes become more and more frequent and the dragon flies more and more actively buzzing around trying to get it on with each other. I throw the big bug back into a shallow weedy area (weedless hook) and it lands a few inches from a bass. The fish slowly swims up to it, looks it over and gulps it down. Fish On! Not. Didn't hook him. Tried it again with the same result. The 3rd time he just swipes at it and swims off.

Next cast goes a little further to the next weed and reed clump. This time the bass didn't hesitate or look it over too closely. The take was savage and the fish fought like a demon all the way to the boat. This was fun!

(note: the fly in his mouth)

For the next two hours it continued like this with bass taking the ol' dragon fly dry. Absolutely amazing. Any time you would see a dragon fly or dragon fly pair buzzing over the water, you'd see a few bass stalking them. The flats were alive with activity and we were following them around and casting to them. I would cast Cheech's foam dragon fly, it would land and be attacked and devoured by a hungry bass. We even saw some 3 to 5 lb fish jumping out of the water to grab dragonfly couples in mid-air, effectively ruining their post-coital embrace. No wonder they liked this fly.

Finally, the wind came up and blew off the dragonflies and the only fly I had was missing a set of wings on it's side and it's weed guard was all bent out of shape after having been smashed by so many attacking fish. It didn't float well any more anyway. Out of respect, I retired it to my hat where it will cheer on future generations of bass snagging dragon fly imitations...

Bluegills and Rosie O'Donnell

The reputation Bluegills have for pickiness in what they stick in their mouths ranks right up there with what, for example, Rosie O'Donnell might be willing stuff in her face. In other words, they're not known for being too selective when it comes to food choices. Well, uh....yes and no.

Anyway, the morning started out with us heading out to the Uintah Basin for some early season bass and bluegill fishing. The fishing was a little slow for us as we made our way from the boat ramp towards the north side of the lake where the water would be a little warmer. I kept thinking maybe it was too cold and the fish would not be coming out to play today.

Arriving at the north side of the lake, Herb and his crew were at least getting into fish pretty good. A couple of nice bass and a number of Bluegills. That's a relief. But to my dismay these little fish weren't too interested in my bluegill flies (crud I tied up to be gaudy, buggy and irresistible to the "stupid" bluegills).

Long story short, after some trial and error and honing in on Herb's fishing mojo, we cracked the code. These little fish weren't after my Bully Spider or my rubber legged crazy flies, they were eating tasty chironomids (they also liked smallish leech patterns and other similar food imitating bugs). They also didn't like their food if it was just sitting there, so imparting a little action to the flies was almost a must -- but not too slow and not too fast. And for the most part, you had better give it to them close to their hiding spots in the reeds. I found that out, again by trial and error, after Herb's friend Harry was catching fish after fish right next to our boat, while I was catching only the bottom of the lake.

The rest of the day was incredible. Using mostly chironomid patterns suspended from strike indicators, we caught large numbers of bluegills and even a few nice Bass (note the big bass fly, er, I mean chironomid in his large mouth).



I also ended up betting Cheech dinner he couldn't catch a bass on a buzz bait (some sort of "toy" lure bass fishermen use to piss off fish) using a bait casting rod. I'll let him tell the story, but he didn't have to pay for his dinner and the lure isn't a toy.

So the moral to the Bluegill story is this:

• Match the hatch
• Bluegills aren't dumb
• Fish it close to home
• Bluegills aren't dumb
• Presentation is very important
• You can catch them early in the season in big numbers.
• They fight like demons.
• Bluegills aren't dumb

Peanut Butter and Jelly -- Bass Style...

Here's something to match some popular Bass bait colors and hopefully add enough flash and/or body to the fly that it will pass as something "bassy". Enjoy...

The Craw Bouncer

Ok, back to Bass. I went out and bought a few hooks with built-in weed guards and figured I'd try them out. This pattern is a combination of a bass fly I did well with fishing my friend's small bass pond for bucketmouths and another crawdad imitation I used while fishing Brownlee Reservoir in Oregon a few years ago.

The other little key to this pattern (yet to be fished officially -- but hopefully will see water this weekend) is the olive and orange verigated "Painted Lady" chenille a la Herb Patterson. Herb's "Painted Lady" bugger is a killer trout pattern and I think part of that success is due to it's colorful resemblance to basic crawfish colors. Just a guess, but who knows. I do know it catches a ton of fish.

My other line of thought on this pattern is to keep the rabbit strip that runs along the length of the fly (on what turns out to be the bottom when riding upside down) flapping in the breeze. I don't tie it in "zonker" style with the strip tied in at the bend and close to the eye of the hook. If it holds true to the bouncing action, I think that strip will get jiggy with it.

Anyway, it should knock the snot out of some stupid bass this year.

What is Fly Fishing??

Over the course of my time fly fishing (going on about 18 years hard-core and even longer if you count the dabbling I did while in High School), I've progressed from various stages of fishing skills, likes, dislikes, focuses, types and methods. During that time, I've fished for Bass, Trout, Bluegill, Crappie, Carp, Wipers, Catfish, Salmon, Steelhead and probably a few annoying ducks or otters. I never really sat down and asked myself "Hmmm...is using this strike indicator really fly fishing?". Or "Is using foam on a fly really fly fishing?". I guess I never worried about it and it probably never crossed my mind much.

It wasn't until a number of years ago, when I was in a local fly shop and one of the employees was taking it upon himself to deride me for using nymphs (wasn't "real" fly fishing I was told), that I became annoyed at someone trying to label something as fly fishing.

Being the analytical nerd I am, I thought about the definition of fly fishing and tried to think back to the origins of the sport and compare some of the methods and materials we use today against what was used back then.

This is how I imagine the same conversation might have gone back then (re: elitist snob vs a guy just wanting to catch some fish) cerca 1800's:

Elitist Snob (ES): Say, chap, have you been out to fish yonder chalk stream?
Guy Wanting to catch a fish (GWCF): Yes indeed my kind man. Many a fish were taken using ye olde wet flye fished with a slight swing nearst the drift's end.
ES: What say ye, man!?? That is blaspheme at it's finest!! Thou shalt fish the dry fly and the dry fly only. Tis heresy to consider the lowly wet fly. Ay, it be a form of bait fishing no less. Fly fishing 'tis not.
GWCF: Do tell, I say. The silk line I throwe proves to float well and serves to cast my feathered hook great distance.
ES: Silk! What manner of evil is this! Horse hair carried by the wind alone suffices any angler worth his salt. Gentlemen do not "throwe" their line. Nature's breath carries the line and fly to the proper destination.

I guess my point is any sport evolves and progresses. For someone to say using a foam strike indicator is not "fly fishing" I would ask is it fly fishing to use a foam hopper as an indicator? How about the end of my synthetic fly line? Different colored sections of leader? All synthetic, all point to the tug of a fish.

Is a propeller tied onto the hook considered a "fly"? What about a bead head? What about lead wrapped around the shank? So nickel in the shape of a propeller isn't but a rounded bead is? Now I'm confused.

Some say, "no" to synthetics on flies period. So do you fish with a graphite rod? Plastic fly line?

A pre-formed plastic tail on a bass "fly" is out of the question, but a feather from a genetically engineered chicken is kosher? Neither is natural. Hmmm...more confused.

Split shot used to weight a tippet & fly down are considered taboo, but wrapping a metal hook with lead is no problemo?

In the end, it seems the distinction is too often based on what is typically associated with other "lesser" forms of fishing (bobbers, spinner blades, rubber skirts, jigs etc) even though some are actually derived from "fly fishing" in the first place. Even more confused? Check.

To each his own, I say. Let me throw my propeller headed fly deep into this pool with my sinking tip lead-core line and use my foam indicator to help me detect a strike. I tied the bug and I'm using a fly rod to cast it. Who cares what label applies to what. End result is a fish and my tools are flies and a fly rod.

ES: Say, lad. Can you spare some dressing for my line? Tis required I coat it thoroughly once every four hours whilst I avoid it soaking in too much water.

The Foamerger

So I've been fishing a small stream during the Baetis hatch the past few weeks. Unlike a lot of small stream trout, these fish aren't the typical slam-anything-that-moves dummies.

With a decent mix of midges and baetis, it's been a fun time matching the hatch and finding the right bug combination.

As it turns out, one pattern has far outpaced any of my tried-and-true Baetis patterns. I can't remember why, exactly, I tied it on one day a few weeks ago, but it turned a so-so day fishing into a great day of dry fly fishing for nice Brown Trout. So I made a point to keep it in the mix even when the Baetis hatch grew stronger and the midges less important. Time after time, this little stupid looking fly kicked the snot out of my Baetis patterns. I'm guessing it's the way it hangs in the surface film or maybe just the overall general impresssion of an emerging bug, but either way, it's been good to me.

The pattern was designed out of pure frustration. I was fishing a phenomenal midge hatch on the Green one day and after three hours of fishing my traditional midge patterns (griffith's gnats, true midge dries etc), the score was: Picky Trout -- 1000; cold dumb midge fisherman -- 1. I landed only one fish in three hours. As I packed up and picked the pieces of my ego up from the rocks, a dude comes walking along the trail, sees the rising fish, takes one cast and nails a fish. Must've been luck. Next cast: fish on. I suck.

As I walk by, he actually strikes up a conversation and I came to find out he was fishing a fly his son had given him and he wasn't sure of the name. It was a variation of a palomino midge and it was designed to sit in the surface film.

With new hope of redemption for my next midge encounter, I got busy trying to understand what it was about that style of pattern that made such a difference. I came to understand, as a lot of people already know, midges have a tendency to hang vertically in the surface film as they struggle to emerge from their pupal stage to an adult. With this in mind, I sat down at the vise to figure out a pattern that fit the bill. The palomino was ok, but when I tried to get it to float vertically, it didn't look much like the pictures of real insects I was looking at. After a bit of trial and error using different materials and patterns, I found one that floated vertically and resembled the bugs. I tied up a few more and set out for the Green the following week.

The fish gods were smiling on me that day as my new little midge invention did the trick. I fished the same hole and came up with much different results as I lost track of the number of fish I hooked that day. My friend fishing across the way, ended up with 1 fish as he refused to change from his good ol' Griffith's gnat. Anyhoo...the fly was dubbed the "Foamerger" and earned a permanent spot in my midge boxes from then on.

Hook: TMC 2488 #18 - #32
Thread: UTC 70 Denier Black
Shuck: Micro-chenille in black or brown
Thorax: Gray or Black dubbing to match natural
Head: Gray or Black open cell (or Evazote) foam

Bass it up

So I've been on somewhat of a bass fly kick. I have a number of bass trips planned this year and I've made a point to focus more on bass (yeah, I've been saying that for years, but this IS the year). Anyway, Cheech got me inspired to kick up my hair spinning skills and I've been working on that.

Here are the results...