Lack of posts…
But heavy on the tying…since its been cold here and I’ve had very little fishing so I’ve been tying a lot lately. Here are some of more recent pictures…
Mobile Fly Tying….
Mobile fly tying at its best…as I mentioned last week, I recently purchased a Windsor 8 drawer wooden tool chest, well this past weekend I got to fill it up with a good bit of my fly tying material. As I said this is no Gerstner in material or craftsmanship but for under $100 you can’t beat it. So here is a breakdown of how I set up from top to bottom…
Top Shelf – EP Fibers, vise base, Superglue, Ultrawire rack, Clear Cure Goo Syringes and other miscellaneous items, I’ve also got the painting Anna did for me and I’ve added a felt covered piece of foam for a drying spot for finished flies.
Top Left Drawer – 35 spools of thread and floss
Top Right Drawer – this is the drawer I added the dowel rods and I’ve got my vinyl d-rib, tinsel, lead wire, and extra ultra wire
2nd Left Drawer – since 90% of my tying is saltwater now, this drawer has a my rabbit strips, rubber legs and some chenille
2nd Right Drawer – Flash
3rd Left Drawer – hooks, beads, eyes
3rd Right Drawer – Tools, bobbins, scissors, whip finisher, hackle pliers
4th Row Large Drawer – Feathers
5th Row Large drawer – vise, rubber bead mat, bobbin cradle, 3 hook assortments, mono for weed guards, CCG Light, SHAN, Silly Putty, toothbrush
As you can tell, you can fit a good bit of material, this definitely something you could carry to the campsite or vacation if you needed or in my case to keep from taking up to much room.
A lot of fishing…
And not any catching… Came home for the weekend and decided since the flats go dry during the winter, it was time to hit the home waters. The weather has been crazy here in Ga and most of the waters were blown out, so I decided to hit the hooch Tailwaters. I hit Settles by 8am and was breaking ice heading to the water. I tried Settles for a little over an hour and had no luck and no prospects for anything. So I decided to switch to the Dam and give it a try. I fished there for about an hour and only saw one riser and nobody catching fish. By 1030, it was time to pack it up. I will say it was great to hit the water, although it was cold as can be. It was 33 degrees on the way to the river…
A new beginning…
Life is funny and in the past year as you’ve seen on this blog I moved from my home state of Georgia to Charleston, SC, now with this move we downsized from our townhouse to an apartment. Now with this downsize I’ve gone from a basement where my fly tying area was a desk, book shelf and pretty much the entire basement to needing something that can be out of sight out of mind. So I searched the Internet for some ideas on what to do because I live by the creed of “happy wife happy life” and when the wife says she wants my fly tying gear to be neat and easy to put away that’s what she gets. The first thing I thought was to get a Rubbermaid but its not very organized but I liked the idea of a chest of sorts. I remember seeing on NGTO people using a Gerstner Machinist Chest for fly tying so I started looking at those. I must say they are gorgeous pieces of woodwork and the prices for them are very much right on, which is expensive. So I looked into restoring one which was still an expensive move so I started looking into imitation machinist chest and found this Windsor 8 drawer tool chest. The price was right so I got one ordered. Once it got in I started checking it out and planning how I was going to setup and the first thing I noticed the top two drawers had little dividers that will be perfect for thread, ultra wire, or even d rib spools. So the first thing I decided was to add some dowel rods to one of the dividers so I can just pull off what I need and cut it off.
After that was done, time to add some stickers for some flair. First you got to represent Southern Culture on the Fly, Simms and I’m waiting on Patagonia to hook me up. Next I’m going to have get some Fiberglass Manifesto stickers to add the box. The last and most important is on the next run back home I’ll have to get it stocked and ready to start tying. Especially since I made some new fly boxes ready to be filled for some redfish flies.
2012 in review
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
600 people reached the top of Mt. Everest in 2012. This blog got about 4,300 views in 2012. If every person who reached the top of Mt. Everest viewed this blog, it would have taken 7 years to get that many views.
This is awesome…
How many of y’all can do this??? Walk from your front door right to the flat, this guy right here can. I checked out this flat last weekend and hit it today hoping to find some late season redfish. Sure enough after about 30 min without seeing much action I saw a disturbance in the water. I threw my crab fly out there and over shot it a bit, but he turned around and smashed it. After a good fight I landed this guy right here…
He stayed around for a few pics and I let him go. I ended up seeing one more red due to almost stepping on him and that was it for the day. One fish to hand, landed on a fiberglass rod and it made one heck of a day…
Chasing tail…
…and getting some action. Hit the flats early this morning in hopes of finding some tailing reds. I got to the flat as the sun came up and the tide was starting to flood the flat.
I waited a good hour and was getting eaten alive by bugs before the flat started to come alive. Finally with enough patience I finally had a tailer in casting distance. I cast my shrimp Razmatazz over to it…
…the fly landed right next to him, he spun around and with a quick strip set, FISH ON!!!! After a great fight with some knuckle busting runs and getting tangled in the grass I finally landed this guy. Took a quick picture and sent him on his way. One great way to start a Sunday…
I ended up seeing only one more tailer but it never got close enough to cast to. I must say catching a tailing red can get quite addicting…
Turned 30 today…
And it was one heck of a birthday…to get things started my wife once again out did herself and surprised me with a guided trip from LowCountry Fly with ScottyD…and I must say for those of you that haven’t taken a trip with Scotty your missing out…the first flat we hit and there were tailers everywhere…unfortunately they were being a little hardheaded, but after a bunch shots I hooked up…and sure enough landed my first red on the fly…that hookup I’ll never forget…we tried for a bunch more no dice…we hit a few more flats and landed a trout…we tried one last spot and hooked up with another one and he tore off into the grass as we followed and he u-turned out into the flat and broke me off…all in all it was a trip I’ll never forget…
Not much fishing…
Haven’t been fishing lately but I’ve been hitting the vise a good bit. Since moving to Charleston I’ve had to learn a whole new style of tying. I’ve been practicing a lot with Enrico Puglisi style streamers and using the EP fibers for crabs. Also, I’ve been playing around with Silly Putty and CCG making some spoon flies. They are looking alright but I’m still not very happy with them…hopefully I’ll hit the water soon and find out how effective they are.
From Trout Bum to Salt Life
This weekend was a big weekend for me…first and foremost come Wednesday I’ll be moving to Charleston, SC! My wife recently moved up there to finish her bachelors degree and I’ve had to wait until I found a job to get up there and those prayers were answered last week. So I wanted to get as much trout fishing in this weekend as I could. Yesterday I hit Buford dam for most of the day and was covered by bait chuckers. With all the crowd though I still ended up with around 8 or 9 to hand and missed at least that many.
Most came on a soft hackle, so last night I made sure to tie up some more.
Today I hit settles bridge and it was a good thing I tied up those soft hackles last night…I picked up 8 today on a size 20 hares ear SH. All in all it was a great weekend, now to the lowcountry for some redfish.
The proof is…
The proof is in the pudding, hit the dam today with a new fly for some testing. The wind was blowing something terrible all day, plus it was well in the high 90s all day. Thankfully with a long sleeve SPF shirt and a Hoo Rag I was able to handle the sun without getting burnt to crisp. Fishing was slow most of the day I hooked into 4 fish and had 2 hang around for pictures. I ended missing a good bit as well. I hooked 2 with my zebra midge that I coat with CCG and the other 2 on my CCG Copper John. All in all a great day on the water.
Dukes Creek Heaven
Hit Dukes Creek this afternoon and this was by far one the best days of trout fishing ever. I hooked up with well over 30 fish and probably landed around 20. Most were bows and a few suckers. I hooked up with a bruiser that went a couple good runs and went to land him and a quick release. Never in my life have a needed a net as much as today. What made it better, I was using a my 6’6″ Wright & McGill 5 wt glass rod. It was a great day, I can’t wait to hit it up again.
Memorial Day Fishing
Hit the lake this morning with my father in law for a little early Memorial day fishing. I ended up catching two on the fly rod while he was out getting some bait. We hit the lake a little after that and ended up catching one more spotted bass on bait. So all in all a great start to memorial day.
I see gold….
Got out on the lake tonight…and finally hooked up with some golden bones…I picked both up on my super Y2K. I got one 8wt and finally broke it in and the other on a 5’6″ 5wt glass rod…needless to say it was a better challenge on the 5wt…all in all a great night
A quickie on the lake…
Headed over to the lake today for some fun. First we took Houston to do some swimming and boy did he have some fun. I threw for him, let him play some and even let him chase after a duck.
After that I decided to wet a line for a quick minute. I started out throwing a foam hopper with soft hackle hares ear dropper. I picked up 5 bream one right after another. Then I found a spotted bass guarding a bed. So I switched to a Beefus Swimming Carp nymph. After a few casts he finally took the fly and after a quick fight and a quick release he was back to guarding. A few minutes later I landed another little spot. So all in all 7 hooked and 6 landed it was a good day.
It’s been awhile…
It’s been awhile since I’ve posted on here…I’ve been too busy working, but things are starting to slow down so I’ve been hitting the vise lately. These pics are great due to them coming from cell bu you will get the idea. I recently bought some Clear Cure Goo and have been playing around with it. Now if you’ve never heard of this stuff the quick and easy of it, is that it’s a one part epoxy that with the help of a UV light it cures in 10 seconds. Once it cures just hit with some clear nail polish and it’s tack free and ready to go. Here are some of the patterns I’ve been playing around with lately…
The Thingamahopper
If you nymph fish you probably use an indicator of some sort, if your like me and most other fly fisherman you use what is called a Thingamabobber. It was developed out west from guides using small gallons for indicators. Recently I purchased some Thingamabodies made by the same company that that gave us the Thingamabobber. So I started playing around tonight continuing with the hopper theme and came up with the Thigamahopper. Now I just need to hit the river and test all these flies out.
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