Largemouth Bass, Lake Devernia

Mar. 24, 2007 - Ed Kirkland

"Nothing makes a fish bigger than almost being caught."   - Anonymous

I think this is the key to making another great year. If you have an idea about the ETFF, feel free to call or e-Mail me.

Pat Caldarera, Membership Chairman
(H 903-297-8335, W 903-237-6228, e-Mail), tells me that many of you are once again club members in good standing. But a few procrastinators remain, so please remember to pay your $25 club dues.

 

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• May 13
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DVD & BOOK REVIEWS

River of Dreams by Lani Waller
West River Publishing, Grand Island, NY, 2004
240 pages, Hardcover, illustrated B&W drawings, suggested price $24.95

Lani Waller has spent a lifetime living the dream. Now he has taken the time to share clips of this life movie with all of us. While he is best known as a steelheader and for his steelheading videos, he is truly an all-round fly fisher. From sunfish to billfish Lani loves to fish with a fly rod. His love of the sport and of the quarry and their habitat is clearly evident here. What makes this book such a great read is that the author shows the blemishes as well as the triumphs over the course of his journey.

Fly fishermen will see something of themselves in these well written stories. Those that do not fly fish may well be able to glimpse the lovely insanity that drives fly fishermen. In the end this is a superbly written vignette of a life of fly fishing by a man that has lived it. Wonderfully written and edited with pencil sketches that add to the beauty of the words.

 

Wotton's Top Ties, vol. 1 by Davy Wotton
Cascade Mediaworks, LLC, Portland, OR, 2007
DVD, 120 minutes, Color, suggested price $34.95 - DVD

Davy Wotton shares five of his best fishing fly patterns in this two hour DVD of fly tying instruction. The patterns are Davy's Sculper (sculpin pattern), Wotton Bugger, "SLF" Transparent Caddis Emerger (an exceptional caddis emerger pattern), Wotton Shad, and the Black & Silver Spider (softhackle pattern). Because of the length of the DVD Davy has the time to teach the viewer now to select and prepare the materials, how to tie the fly, tips and tricks in mounting the materials and general tying tips that will allow the viewer to tie better and better looking flies. In addition, Davy takes the time to suggest alternative materials for each pattern as well as the attributes of the materials that are important for each pattern.

This DVD is especially well done in that there are no forgotten, missed, or secret steps or procedures. If the viewer pays attention there is no way he will not tie a good looking, durable, and fish catching fly. The cinematography, sound, and lighting are superb. The viewing area of the vise and surrounding area is well presented without clutter and distractions. Davy's pet parrot also presents a few choice comments and does a few funky dance moves. This is a very enjoyable DVD that does an excellent job of teaching these five patterns.

 

Fishing Float Tubes by Rickey Noel Mitchell

THE FLOAT TUBE is a craft that enables you to position yourself in the water using only your feet, while your hands are free to cast. It’s like casting from your favorite easy chair.

Getting into the water, however, can be a whole different matter. If your tube is the traditional style, start close to the water’s edge. Put your fins on, carefully step into the doughnut, slide it up around your belly, and carefully walk backwards into the water. While you’re walking backwards with fins on, be careful with your rod. Always carry your rod handle in hand, tip pointed forward, as you walk backwards. This simple technique could save your rod should you fall.

Do not — I repeat, do NOT — try to walk forward in a pair of fins; you’ll be asking for disaster...

Read the full article at: MidCurrent.com

 

Project Healing Waters
By Terry Kirkpatrick - Taken from the Suncoast Fly Fishers Newsletter

The Lakeland FFF Fly Fishing Expo was off to a flying start. Guys were tying flys, booths with all kinds of FF gear, trips and related stuff were well manned. (Our club manned one of them) Two casting pools were waiting room only. In the back rooms, guys were teaching fly tying and Nestor Monllor was doing a workshop on building with bamboo.

I'd agreed to donate a bamboo rod and was looking for someone responsible to take it. I stopped by my club booth to say, "Hi." and was pounced on by Capt Pat Damico. "You've got to meet this young lady at the next booth."

(It was only about two months ago that I'd read the article about a drift boat that was under construction. Not really that big a deal, until you realize that the people who were building it were all at Walter Reed Army Hospital. They were mostly Vets from the current wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Part of Project Healing Waters Fly Fishing, a FFF supported operation. Of course I'd mentioned the project to our club president. Never mention anything to your club president. You become head of the committee. Capt Pat, an old Navy guy, was interested too, so we made a committee of two.)

The booth next to ours was Project Healing Waters FF and the young lady representing the vets was Diane, one of the folks who are working on the drift boat. She was currently assigned to Walter Reed, but called Tampa her home. I ask her if she'd been approached by the Tampa Bay Fly Fishers. She said she hadn't. Our club president was standing next to me, talking to another volunteer at the booth, so I figured it's pay back time. "Ken," I said, "why don't we make her an honorary member of our club?" And so, without asking the board or the general membership, it was a done deal.

(For 28 years I worked at a plant in Oldsmar, Fl; most of that time in the IT department. Early on I'd met a fellow, about my age. I'll call him Bill. Bill and I had both been in Vietnam. He'd been in an armored cav unit and I'd flown "above the best." Bill had been awarded several medals, including a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart, but he'd never received them. I was there the day they finally pinned them on his chest. But in the long run it really didn't help. Bill left the plant on medical due to "back problems." The company's way of saying emotional problems. Bill was one of the guys who never quite made it back.)

Diane and I talked about Project Healing Waters, and she promised to get the national coordinator to e-mail me. I showed her how to cast a bamboo rod and we talked a little about the military. That connection that you have with someone who's "been there, done that."

I was reminded of my cousin, Bob, who was a WWII vet. One evening, we were sitting around his table talking war stories and his experiences in the Southwest Pacific and my experiences in Vietnam merged together. Which let me to paraphrase Maclean's ending to "A River Runs Through It"...All existence fades into being with my soul and memories and the sound of the military and a four count cadence and the hope that a fish will rise.

"Eventually all war stories merge into one and a latrine runs through it. I am obsessed by warriors." My eyes filled up as I Drove home. For all the Dianes and all the Wills out there. Diane was very proud of the small pin on her blouse. Her Purple Heart.

 

Less Can Be More...
By Jay Forrest - Taken from the Alamo Fly Fishers Club Newsletter

One of the things that seems to appeal to many fly fisher persons is the diversity of gear, gadgets, and thingamajigs that are available. Forty years of observing fly fisher people leads me to the conclusion that most of us display a definite pattern in the amount of stuff we carry with us when we fish. From one rod, one reel, maybe one fly box, etc. we accumulate nippers, knot tools, fly floatant and fly sinkant, leaders, tippet, fly boxes of dries and nymphs and streamers and (one for each of course) other stuff, vests, chest packs, backpacks spare reels, spare lines, and on and on. While this hoard tends to grow throughout the life of a fly fisher person, the amount actually carried need not.

Rather than carrying everything you own (a common phase that typically ends with the fisherperson looking like a walking store display) the habit gets established and fisher people often carry far more than they will ever be likely to need. At some point the fisher person begins to get smart. At first the fisher person will probably strive to remove things that aren't needed, say pulling shorter bass leaders and flies from the vest for a trip to the Guadalupe. That can work reasonably well, to a point, but I know members of the club (author included) who have arrived at the Guad and rigged up only to find that they have only 0X and 1X saltwater leader material to use to tie on a size 22 nymph. (If you can figure out how to get an 0X tippet through the eye of a size 22 hook or to get a size 12 nymph to drift properly on 0X tippet, you are a wizard and don't need to read this!).

The answer many of us arrive at is to assemble gear bags with appropriate tippet, flies, etc for each type of fishing we do, say one bag for trout, one for bass and sunfish, and one for the coast. While this does tend to encourage multiple nippers and such, it has the advantage of simplifying life. One can simply grab a bag for the right type of fishing and be ready to go.

Perhaps more importantly, it begins to simplify what one carries as well. And that is one of the typical signs of more experienced fly fisher people. While more experienced fishermen often have more junk, they often carry less - only what is needed.

Over the past few years I have increasingly focused on simplifying my gear. On the coast I strive to carry on my person no more than nippers, a spare leader, tippet (10 pound and 12 pound test) and no more than four to six flies. I will have more in the boat or kayak, but that is all I will typically carry. For bass and sunfish the list would be similar but with say 8 and 10 pound tippet and a few more flies, possibly one box. For trout I typically carry a similar kit with 4X and 5X tippet on the Guad and two fly boxes - one with a variety of dry flies and one with wet flies.

I find that carrying makes my life simpler and lets me find things faster. Even better, it encourages me to get rid of those shoddy, ratty old flies I tied years ago and that I carried for years. Try it! Try paring down your gear and see if simplifying will make your life easier and fishing more fun!

 

Assembling A Fly Rod - The best way to assemble a fly rod
By C.W. "Don" Coleman - Taken from the Tampa Bay Fly Fishing Club Newsletter

ASSEMBLING A FLY ROD - The best way to assemble a fly rod is to first connect the tip of the rod to the next section and the butt section last. You should twist each one quarter turn while pushing the sections together. Of course to disassemble the sections twist in the opposite direction. As wear occurs, tiny groves will form like a screw thread and keep the sections from separating in use. Assembling the sections by pushing them together forms straight groves and often results in loose connections during use. If a connection does become loose, wiping the male end of the connection with candle wax-not canning wax-will provide a temporary solution.

I have watched fly casters go through ridiculous-and often dangerous-motions trying to assemble a multi-piece fly rod while seated in a canoe or small boat. The best way is to lay all the loose sections in front of you and first put the reel on the reel seat. Then pull off about 20 feet of loose line and lay it on the floor. Thread the line through the guides on the butt section and through the guides on the next section in succession and assemble the two, and continuing until all the sections are connected. You do bend over the tip of the line into a loop first so that if the canoe rocks and you drop the line it does not slip out of all the guides, don't you?

A LAST RESORT - Some times fishing with a fly rod is just not feasible. The wind may be blowing in excess of 20 knots, you may find a hole in the mangroves where you can see fish holding but where back casts or even roll casts are not feasible, or want to fish a beach where there is a line of walkers and shell seekers behind you who have no understanding that you need to back cast in order to fly fish. They can get mad when you accidentally hook them. In these cases I prefer to use a short, 5 1/2 or 6 foot, one-handed bait casting rod capable of handling lures between 1/4 and 3/4 ounces. As one of those old time patriarchs who learn to fish long before thread line fishing (spin fishing) was invented, I find it much the best solution. But you do have to learn to use a plug casting reel-anyone can use a spinning reel-and I find enjoyment in the accomplishment. Just keep an inexpensive plug rod in the car, together with a bait casting reel (a Shimano Calcutta 250 is a pleasure to use but expensive. You can buy a nice reel for less) and a small box of lures and you are instantly ready for those occasions when you are driving over a causeway and see pods of bait being torn up by... whatever.

I keep a small plastic box containing a couple of spoons, a few bucktail jigs, and maybe a Mirrorlure She Dog for "walking the dog," in the car. You can't beat a Johnson Sprite spoon to which you have added a stainless steel split ring at the front, and exchanged the treble hook with a single hook dressed with yellow bucktail. Adding a few bucktail jigs will cover nearly all bases. No need to mess with plastic lures or snap swivels. I prefer to load the reel with 30 pound Power Pro and add a 6 foot long leader of 20 or 25 pound monofilament. Keep a cheap pair of needle nosed pliers from the hardware store in the car and you are all set for a lot of fun at any time. Just keep things simple.

 

The Jig Is Up by Henry Cowen

Sixty-degree jig hooks are putting a new slant on traditional patterns and inspiring new creations.

NINETY PERCENT or more of all saltwater flies are tied on some sort of "J" hook. Whether you purchase flies at your local fly shop or twist up your own creations, this is the standard used by most fly fishermen. Tiemco, Gamakatsu, Mustad, Eagle Claw, Daiichi, Dai-Riki, and Owner (to name a few) offer "J" hooks in a plethora of styles designed to hold the many different types of flies saltwater fly fishermen create.

In the last seven to eight years, however, there has been a movement among salty brethren on the left coast toward tying saltwater flies on jig hooks — specifically, jig hooks with 60-degree bends. Now, this movement has grown and spread its way eastward, riding the buzz from a lot of anglers who believe that patterns tied on a 60-degree jig hook are superior.

Read the full article at: MidCurrent.com

 

Muddlers Made Easy by John Likakis

THE ORIGINAL Muddler Minnow was actually a very simple affair. Minnesota angler Don Gapen invented the pattern back in the 1930s to tempt the big brookies of Ontario's Nipigon River, and it has been undergoing constant tweaking, revisions, and reinventions ever since. For example, digging through some fly-tying books from the early 1960s — not long after Joe Brooks popularized the pattern in the pages of Field & Stream — we can find examples of Muddlers that consist of nothing more than a tinsel-body streamer with a short bucktail tail and wing, and a single untrimmed clump of deer hair for a head.

Read the full article at: MidCurrent.com

 

From The Online Flytyer

• Fox Statler's Mudbugs

• N2 Cocktail Cray - Concept Fly

• Fly Tying 101 - The Wooly Bugger

• Micro Woolheads for Warmwater Fanatics

• Attaching Thread - Visual Reference

• The Half Hitch Knot - Visual Reference

• HPU Patterns

Ric McNulty, former manager at Jones Creek - Orvis in Tyler, is now the fly fishing manager at Winchester’s Sportsman’s Outfitters located at 4111 Gilmer Rd, Longview, TX. 75604. Ric can be reached at 903-759-0638. Winchesters will be a full line Orvis Dealer with a large in-store inventory of fly rods, reels, accessories, and fly tying materials. They also will have access to all Orvis catalog products. They placed their initial order last week and should be fully stocked by mid August.

Ric, along with Greg and Shelly Winchester, are extremely excited about being able to continue to keep the Orvis franchise alive in East Texas. They invite everyone to come by the Longview location for a visit. For those of you that can't make it to Longview, please feel free to call Ric with an order or some needed advice. We can drop ship to any location and remember, “We pay the shipping and handling”. Ric looks forward to visiting all his former East Texas customers.

The Federation of Fly Fishers is pleased to announce that it has entered into a Strategic Alliance with Ask About Fly Fishing Internet Radio. FFF members, you will soon see the new fly fishing internet radio show, appearing on the FFF website in several ways…..as a menu item under the Education menu tab, as a banner ad on the home page, and as an FFF Fly Fisher Forum category.

A new Internet radio show, Ask About Fly Fishing, has introduced a fresh approach to educating fly fishers. Interviews with industry experts are broadcast LIVE over the Internet and also via teleconference calls for an international audience.

Visit AskAboutFlyFishing.com or FlyFishRadio.com and sign in free to receive advance notification of their upcoming fly fishing Internet radio shows and to receive a free report on improving your fly casting.

Knots For Flyfishing Use them or talk about the one that got away! Click here to view the PDF

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