Spinners

Tying 24's, not recommend after a couple of cold ones.

Since it's winter, and there isn't a lot of angling going on, and there is a lot more tying taking place, we figured it would be fun to share some of what we've been working on. I actually enjoy winter, because it's a bit of break from fishing and a chance to focus on tying. To me personally, tying is the other part of being a fly angler. An important part. Do I tie all of my own flies? No- I'm not that fast. There are certain patterns that I purchase by the dozen. Then there are times when tying feels like a chore- like in July, at 9:30 at night, when I need to slam out half a dozen Slumpbusters and get lunch together for a trip the next day. 

But winter is a chance to sit back, and enjoy the process. Brew some good coffee for an early morning session, maybe get together with some friends in the evening and crack some cold ones and fill the empty spots in the boxes, whip up some hot new pattern, and maybe even dream up the next fishy concoction that just might be THE ONE. 

With the streamer boxes full, lately I've been cranking out some bugs on the vise. Spinners. Don't underestimate them. I like to carry them in a range of sizes. Rusty colored ones cover a pretty wide range of bugs. Make sure to carry some small ones like those above to cover trico and BWO's. I tie them in a bunch of sizes, colors and styles. Dubbed bodies, quill bodies, thread bodies, micro-fibbett tails, hackle tails, yarn wings, poly wings, hackle wings. They all work. Spinner wings are generally clear, and the spent egg layers usually lie flat on the water, wings extended out to the sides and flush on the water, as opposed to upright like a recently hatched dun.

The easiest to tie might be the Compara-Spinner as described in Caucci and Nastasi's classic Hatches. Real simple, tie in tail fibers, dub a tapered body with some super fine, tie in a dry fly hackle in a light dun or cream color (spinner wings are clear), dub to the eye, wrap the hackle over the thorax dry fly style, tie off the head, then clip the hackle flat on the top and bottom so the fly rides low on the water (hackles only extending off the sides of the fly). Fish them on top or just below the film. Can't see them? Add a small dab of strike putty two feet up the leader, or fish them as a dropper off a visible dry fly that acts like an indicator.

Think spinners aren't important? One of the better browns that I've seen come out of the Kennebec in the last couple of years (a solid 20" fish) sipped a size 12 Compara-style March Brown spinner on a bright sunny afternoon in May. 

Spinner Sipper.

The next time you run into rising fish eating something "invisible" on top or in the film, pay close attention. Are there mayflies hovering en masse above? Look in the scum lines where the garbage collects. Look closely at the water. Usually a spent mayfly is flush in the film or subsurface and very hard to see on a casual glance. And finally, break out a seine. A small piece of screen works fine and can save you some fly changes as you start dialing in the code. 

Have fun out there!

Tyler

Gold Standard

This Gold never loses its value.

Fishing for fall browns is something that we look forward to each season. Things can be pretty good right up until December, which means we have a solid month of decent fishing left until we hunker down in our caves for the dark season. Cold days are perfect for a half day walk wade. Give us a shout- the fish are here, they are eating, and it's going to be a long cold winter.

Roctober

I love October.

Tyler

A Summer in Southwest Montana

So many fish, so little time. That became my mantra for a summer spent in southwestern Montana.


Arriving in Dillon on May 15th after a 2700 mile trek with Clacka in tow was the start of a trout fishing adventure I could only dream about prior to retiring. A job in a local flyshop was the touch point for this endeavor.


Montana had incurred the most severe winter in quite a number of few years. There was at least 10 feet of snow pack in the Pioneer Mountains threatening to blow out most of the rivers in this region of Montana. The potential for this event caused a great deal of angst amongst local guides and outfitters. Heavy rains contributed to this dilemma. The drought in Montana was over.


It began to become apparent that the fishing season would lag the normal time table by at least two weeks possibly three. For those out-of-state anglers who had planned trips around the various hatches this would be disastrous.


There was one bright spot in all of this weather related impact on the Montana fishing industry. The Beaverhead River. This tail water emerges from Clark Canyon Reservoir and became the go to spot in the southern tier of Montana. Although, the reservoir was essentially completely full the lack of need for downstream irrigation enabled the Army Corps of Engineers to establish a river flow rate that was easy navigable by wade anglers and those anglers in drift boats.


The Beaverhead starts at the reservoir and flows to Twin Bridges where it becomes part of the confluence of the Jefferson and ultimately the Missouri River. My fishing efforts were concentrated from Buffalo Bridge to Henneberry takeout. I waded and floated both these stretches numerous times and was never disappointed by the size and fight of the wild Montana trout.


There were many go-to patterns used on these stretches of water. Primarily small nymphs and streamers were the order of the day. I wasn’t in Montana long enough to see the fish start looking up in great numbers. I will remedy that in the near term. One surprisingly effective subsurface pattern I had never used in Maine was that of a Crane Fly larva. These huge bugs were as long as your little finger and just as thick-they were a huge bite and a deadly combination with a small PT Cruzer or Flashback nymph.


The amount of aquatic insect life found in the Beaverhead was amazing. I would kick up some bottom sediment into my sample net and the Yellow Sallie nymphs would literally swarm off of it. Being the geek that I am I filled numerous sample bottles and took them to the shop to show the visiting anglers the types of bugs they needed to match and what would work best. The enormous Crane Fly larva were always good for shock value.


If you get the chance to fish this amazing river you should. You will not be disappointed at the size or the number of trout.


Thanks for reading.


Mike

Switching Gears

The busy summer season and the bulk of our bass trips are winding down as most of the summer visitors are heading home.  There is still plenty of really good smallmouth fishing to be had, and as usual, they have been getting a little more aggressive as the water temps start to recede. I'm sure their instincts say "EAT" before they enter a half-frozen state of suspended animation. We had a great smallmouth season- saw some old friends, made some new ones, and caught a bunch of fish!

It's time to switch gears for the "second season." Crisp days, bright fish (with adipose fins!), and the hills on fire in an autumn glow. Fall is the reward for rowing 10 hour days under a blazing sun with temps and humidity in the 90's.

Bring your A-game and get ready; it goes fast from here on out.

Tyler

March Madness

The Foam Is Home

Deep and slow will put a bend in your rod in March. Whether you drift a nymph or strip a streamer, getting the fly down and moving it slow should earn a strike if you hit the right spots. Look for deeper, slow holding water. They won't be laid up in the same places that you will find them a month from now. A streamer is a good choice for a searching pattern during the early season. Fish them on a sink tip to get them down, and don't be afraid to throw something with a little meat on it- you might be surprised how far they are willing to move in 34 degree water for a good mouthful.

Is that a piece of bunny fur with pink rubber legs hanging out of his mouth?

Tyler

Tie One On

I have been tying flies and playing around with a new camera. I don't consider myself to be a very talented fly tier (or picture taker for that matter), but the end results have a utilitarian purpose after all. So as I was in the cave lashing some animal by-products to Japanese steel I decided to snap a few photos. Here is one of my favorite crayfish patterns with (almost) step-by-step instructions. These are fun to tie and fish and a little more realistic than  a standard woolly bugger. It's basically a Clouser Crayfish with fur claws instead of mallard breast feathers. I tie these in a size 4 TMC 5263 (nymph hook: 3x long, 2x heavy)... anything smaller and I typically go with a standard bugger.

As far as colors go... I try to match the shell back, hackle, rubber leg, and claw colors as close as possible. One thing that remains the same however is the white underside. I've messed with darker undersides but the white really seems to out fish ones with dark undersides.

Here is what you need:

Hook: TMC 5263 

Weight: Dumb bell eyes

Claws: Pine Squirrel

Legs/Antennae: Sili-Leggs

Shell Back: Furry Foam

Eyes: Mono Eyes

Body: White Chenille

Hackle: Saddle or Neck to match the shell color.

Rib: 3x Mono

Here is how you do it:

1.  Lash on the dumb bell eyes. I usually pre-assemble a bunch of these and glue them up once they are tied  onto the hook.

2. Tie in your fur claws. These should be about 3/4 the length of the hook shank.

3. Tie in Sili-Legg antennae (x2) about 2" long. They should be longer than the claws.

4. Cut a strip of Furry Foam about 3" long and tie on to the top of the hook shank extending off the back as shown. This should be cut about as wide as the hook gap (pre-cutting these helps).

5. Lash the Mono-Eyes as far back as possible on the top of the hook shank and Furry Foam.

 6. Cut a 8" to 10" piece of chenille and tie onto the top of the hook.

 7. As you begin to wrap your chenille push your mono eyes forward a bit. I usually double wrap the abdomen to get a thicker, more realistic profile.

8. After wapping back two widths of chenille, tie in Sili-Leggs about 2" long. Tie these to the side of the hook.

 9. Make two more wraps of chenille and tie in another set of 2" Sili-Leggs to the side of the hook shank just like before.

 10. After you tie in the legs, tie in your hackle and about 4" of 3x mono ribbing.

 11. Leave the hackle and ribbing behind and complete wrapping the chenille forward to the hook eye. Tie off and trim the excess chenille away.

 12. Wrap the hackle back to the eye, tie off, and trim the excess.

 13. Pull the Furry Foam back to form the shell back. Pull it enough that the Mono-eyes stick out back at the hook bend. Secure the Furry-Foam to the hook, just behind the eye.

 14. Counter-wrap the mono ribbing at even intervals and tie off behind the hook eye. By counter-wrapping you should be going opposite the direction that you wrapped the hackle and chenille- this makes a more secure body.

 15. Whip finish and trip the excess furry foam.

 16. You can leave it alone or color it to match the naturals. I like to keep some markers in my boat bag and color them on the river so that they match the color of the river bottom, like the naturals. I like burnt orange, dark olive, and slate-gray blue.

 Usually I fish these on a sink tip and strip them along the bottom.  They don't hang up as much as you might think. They can also be deadly dead drifted under a large (1") Thingamabobber.

Smallies attack these things with abandon, but don't over look throwing them (or dead drifting them) at trout- especially if your in an area where you suspect a large brown may be hanging out. On that note, I talked to Dan "Rooster" Levans out at the Stonefly Inn in Twin Bridges, Montana this past September and I asked him if the predicted "epic" hopper invasion ever materialized in Southwest Montana this summer. To his dismay, he said it didn't, too much rain, and the high country never dried out enough to push the hoppers down into the river valleys. He lamented that he only had one "real" hopper day all season, but in the same breath added that most of the big trout that were taken out of the Jefferson and Beaverhead were taken on... crayfish.

Maine rivers are loaded with crayfish and trout are trout whether they live in Maine or Montana. If the food is there, you better believe they will eat it. Throwing size 4 anythings as a salmonid generally won't keep your rod bent all day long with 12" stockers, but it might land you one of your better fish of the season. So don't be afraid to skip the size 12 Hornberg and try something different.

Tyler

Turkey, Trout, and Grandma

Happy Thanksgiving from Wild River Angler! 

While you are at the family gathering doing this...

It's ok if you would rather be doing this...

Happy Holidays!

November

November can be temperamental. Warm and mild, or cold and bitter. But when the sun is shining and the air is warm, you better be taking advantage of her good side before she turns her back on you and old man winter comes calling. We can make all kinds of excuses to sit on the sidelines- it's too cold, too hot, the water is too high, too low, it's deer hunting season, there is firewood to stack, the Patriots are playing, my wife won't let me, etc; or you can get your priorities squared away and go catch some fish. One thing is certain, it isn't going to happen if you don't get out there. It takes commitment and a certain amount of grit to get results sometimes- but those who are willing are paid with memories that last the long winter. 

Tyler

Bid Adieu

The 2010 season is quickly coming to a close, and it won't be long before the serious cold gets here and ice begins to form. We had a chance to fish in our first snow, complete with iced up guides this Friday. It was fun, because it is a rite of fall fishing- but also a bitter reminder that it won't be long before we are hunkered down under three feet of snow suffering from a bad case of the shack nasties, tying flies, and wishing it were June.

We wrapped up our last scheduled trips this weekend and we would like to say thanks to all of those who fished with us this season!   We made some great new friends and look forward to seeing some familiar faces and some new next season.

If you want to fish give us a call- there is still time!

-Tyler

Page Six Chix

Fishing on the K is red hot right now. Look for the Hendrickson hatch mid-afternoon and spend the rest of the day fishing for sippers! Fish a CDC wing emerger dropped 24" behind a visible dry fly. It is nearly impossible to see a CDC emerger fished in the film, so use the dry fly up front as your indicator. Your emerger will out fish the dry 10 to 1.

Don't be afraid to ignore the hatch and strip streamers to to risers either. The water temp was 52 degrees yesterday, so fish metabolisms are in high gear. They are acting like a bus load of teenagers who just hit the buffet line at a Golden Corral. Often times a streamer stripped through the feeding window of a rising fish will get a take.

This is a shot of a sculpin eating Kennebec brown taken by our buddy Andy Molloy on a float earlier this week.

Screaming Reels!

Tyler

River Drivers

The last time logs were driven down the Kennebec River was in 1976. Pulpwood, cut in the headwaters of the Moosehead Lake region, was driven downstream to the Scott Paper Company plant at Winslow. Thirty-four years later there remain signs of the past, although they can be subtle.

This log was stuck in the mud of a back eddy located in the Kennebec near Solon. Close inspection reveals that both ends are sawn even. Although it's hard to tell in the picture, the log is just about 4 feet in length. It's most likely a piece of spruce or fir, since only softwoods were driven down river because of their buoyant characteristics compared to hardwoods. It's a piece of pulpwood that is at least 3 decades old. Millions of these 4 foot logs were driven down the river for over 170 years from the early 1800's until 1976, and they can still be found today. My dad, who grew up on the banks of the river in the 1950's, tells stories about collecting stray wood with his friends that would lodge on the banks. They would stack the wood in a pile 4 feet high and 8 feet long (and 4 feet wide per the cut length- which makes one cord) and resell the wood to a timber buyer from the paper mills in Augusta. I guess the paper guys could have just taken the wood since it was really theirs anyway, but my guess is they appreciated the efforts of a band of industrious 10 year-olds who probably imagined themselves a bunch of salty north woods river drivers as they salvaged that wood and stacked it for the mill man.

This is a rectangular island below a braid on the Solon stretch of the river. Nature doesn't make square islands. It's actually a cribwork structure, made of logs and filled with river rocks. These were used to divert logs into or away from different areas. In this case the cribwork was likely used to keep logs out of a side channel off of the river's main stem. These days it acts as a nice structure for the trout that live here to escape the currents and collect food, like this brown.

Chris and Todd and I floated Solon, and it was a blast to fish with these guys. They were catching fish and stoked to be doing it. Here is Chris with a nice brookie that ate a black bugger.

This is a shot of Todd, who was super-psyched to complete a Solon tri-fecta with a brookie, salmon, and this little brown who made three charges and swipes at his streamer before he ate it. He put on a show, and we had a great view of the action from our vantage in the boat. A little brown with that kind of gumption has the potential to grow up and become one of the big boys that make this stretch so much fun to fish.

Water temps were hanging in the mid-40's with good flows. The big hatches of Hendricksons and caddis should kick off in earnest any day now as water temps approach the magic 50 degree mark.

Have fun out there!

Tyler

Bring out the GINK...

This is no Pulp Fiction... Dry fly season is here! Fished a local stream today and fish were rising everywhere. There were at least 4 different species of caddis, some hatching, some ovipositing. There were also good numbers of spinners, like this one on the inside of my wind shield. Fish of the day was this wild brown that was mad as hell and pulled like an ox. He sipped a tan para-caddis with a bright yellow foam post and a dark sheen wing... my bet is that it mimics a dead egglayer because it rides super low in the film... and that yellow post is really easy to see!

Water temps are steady at 56 degrees... despite the recent cold nights with frost... so much for my predictions about that!

Sure Bets:

Lawson EZ Caddis tan #14-16

Dark Sedge Caddis #18

Elk Hairs #14-18 (to match the egg layers)

Green Graphic Caddis #14-18

Mahogany Spinners #12

Rusty Spinners #14-16

Midge Larvae #14-18 droppers fished deep...

Early Season Brown

The cold front has put a bit of damper on things at the moment. Here is a shot of an early season brown that took a midge larvae in a local stream.