Monthly Archive

custom of course, 9ft 7wt and 4pieces of love! Built for the smallies, but carp or catfish would be nice. I did a few things different on this rod than I would for a customer, I didn’t do a winding check, just thread and epoxy, no hook keeper and for a 7wt I didn’t do a fighting butt. I think it came out pretty nice.

Got into some nice crappie yesterday with my buddy Jeremy and his son. Nothing of real size. but we did catch about a dozen all on Clousers. I even had a few bumps on a prototype Ice Dubbing minnow I have been working on. I thought it would work and it proved me right. Now if I can get the bait profile right without messing up the way it swims. Anyways I will have some pictures of my new minnow prototype up tonight, but here are some pictures from yesterday.

are great flies. But I hate working with deer hair, so I rarely tie them. but I tied a few for an upcoming pickerel trip. They are very effective and they catch tons of smallies. Although I add my own thing to them. Instead of doing a flashabou wing, I buy hackle flash, and wrap that around the chenille instead. works great, and I like it better because I also don’t like working with flashabou. These act alot like Dahlberg Divers, but they also will sink if tied correctly and they will push tons of water and get any fish going. Needless to say I feel this pattern is on the same level as the Stealth Bomber.

Went to the Chagrin today without much hope of catching anything, and I was correct. Now many of you will say, “why even bother going if you know you won’t catch a thing?” The main reason behind todays outing was to introduce a new person to fly fishing. So we had fun, lots of laughs, some swearing and lots of looks as if; “how in the hell do I do this?!” He had fun and so did I, I did snap some pictures of some flowers. I was kinda of miffed at the weather though. Yesterday, 70* sunny, today 60* rainy. Gotta love Northeast Ohio’s version of spring. Tomorrow should be a little bit better for fishing. I wish I could just get into a consistent smallmouth pattern already… Although I guess it is still too early to get the consistently. A few more weeks and we will be there… I hope.

Here is the Stealth Bomber. For the body, I used black Ice Dub, and Waspi Oil Slick Foam. Great stuff. I also used white deer hair for the tail. I normally throw rubber leg’s and krystal flash in the tail. But I figure with this foam, and the flash in the Ice Dub, leg’s and krystal flash wasn’t needed. I really like how the fish blow up on this pattern. They absolutely tear it up, and normally I will go through a few a day just because the fish smash it so hard it will fall apart no matter how much head cement I use. I say for any place you are fishing for bass this pattern is a necessity  to have.

Well it’s been a long time since I last posted. I haven’t been doing a whole lot other than trying to find a new job, which I might add isn’t going too well.. This economy can’t get much worse I don’t think. But I’ve been wrong many times before.