Physics because there’s a lot less water and rather than flinging high atomic weight, I may drag bottom with bead chain. Smaller because the absence of all that water suggests the prey may well be discriminating – shy of big flies in that shallow water …

Biology because the off season led to a wealth of papers on the American Shad, their eating habits, and my surprise to find out that the reigning angling wisdom on what and how they eat – has no basis in reality.

… and while they might seine all manner of smallish creatures in the salt and brackish estuaries (mostly small shrimp from stomach samples), the oddity of their attraction to bright colors may well be that of an expatriate dining on foreign cuisine – snacking on visual cues or the opportunistic feed when an item resembles something familiar.

Which is all that a burgeoning fly inventor need know … armed with a pocketful of bright will still work, but a cornucopia of experimental caddis and mayflies, minnows, moths, tee shirts, tennis balls, and discarded Doritos, might actually yield a Secret Fly of Complete Shad Dominance (SFoCSD), something that’s rumored to have surfaced many times in as many zip codes.

I’ve got a pocketful of unknown and untested and am proof against both parking lot catcalls and all-knowing snigger. I’ve got buggy and somber, drab and motile, bright and bug-shaped, and every other combination a fertile mind can summon …

… and now I’ve got them in trout sizes, out of respect for low water …

You lads can flee to elevation and keep all those fragile trout company while I defend the local waters from the Silvery Invasive Menace surging upriver from the deep. All those bony palates, buck teeth, and feelers, paired with loose morals and lower standards, exactly what’s needed to keep a fly dresser thinking he’s distilled pure genius to a hook shank.

Campfires and the out-of-doors have always been associated with a return to the simple, unsophisticated life of our adventurer-hunter-gatherer ancestors, and the measure of what we can do without is stressed as the new masculinity.

… or at least that was my Poppa’s take on his Poppa’s lectures …

It didn’t matter if it was battery-operated, solar-powered, or threw off enough BTU’s to render tents and bags unnecessary, unless it was hand-cranked and raised blisters, you didn’t get to bring it.

What we didn’t take into account was how the younger crowd would be so much smarter than us. Our generation watched Gus Grissom punch out early, a president take the rap for covert misdeeds, and discovered that John Wayne wore four inch lifts, and we unknowingly communicated our mistrust of authority to our kids …

… who question everything taught them by Poppa, including dumping both beer and the out-of-doors in preference for faux-sophistication and exotic cocktails.

Baby boomers prefer wine, while millennials like exotic cocktails. Compared with those beverages, light beer is about as exciting as a glass of milk.

- via MSN.com

It’s not rocket science to understand that juggling Grenadine while filching a fistful of capers out of a darkened container at the campfire, could wind up as a finger full of Pautske’s dipped in the last of the good liquor, and “shaken not stirred” won’t prevent your pals from spitting up all over their sleeping gear …

Start by giving your child an appreciation for straight liquor, then work your way up to mosquito bites, skinned knees, and sandwiches with sand in them …

With laces and uppers intact the thought of resoling the boots crossed my mind, but getting new felts alone wouldn’t have worked, everything below the instep needed replacing.

Some time later, and quite by accident, I stumbled across a company that resoles wading shoes (all makes and models) and refits felt soled boots with Vibram’s Streamtread sole, should you wish to get additional use out of the uppers.

That led to a search of other companies that perform the same work, which also took me to the Simm’s website that lists additional cobblers, and I got an quick education on the subject.

I would think that those states that legislate rubber soles would find many thousands of anglers with relatively new felts that would prefer to convert than buy new …

… and then there’s those economic patriots that would rather pay full retail a second time …

Nice to know an option exists.

Tackle Trade World has easily one upped me by presenting the rumors of Cortland’s demise were premature, Hardy & Grey’s lays off 27 staff (31% of their Alnwick workforce), and both Hardy and O. Mustad & Sons have been hemorrhaging money and Mustad is about to be taken over by a private investment firm …

It is interesting to note that similar US Industry-focused rags are touting percentile increases in fishing as a means of cheerleading, whereby any ray of light in a darkened tunnel has to be the exit …

Also interesting was the reference that the Cortland CEO made to having trouble with banks and financing, and how the economic malaise seems to have caught up with a luxury business. These being consistent with the economic commentary of numerous CEO’s in the Fortune 500.

Some-thing was owed … and mightily …

As he’s a product of a “broken home” whose owners flit about the Northern Hemisphere slurping aging grape juice, ignoring any real responsibility, which is the hallmark of the true Californio, given we only tinker with Sushi so we can amuse tourists…

… and as Little Meat lacks any real pals to play with we did the Mud Junket, only this time absent any real supervision …

So we spent most of the day catching fish and making crayfish swim so we could capture their silhouette accurately. The gaily colored “mud bugs” being lightning fast swimmers, and appear only as a set of claws being drug behind the body, with no other movement apparent.

Except the jaws on Little Meat, who finds them quite the treat when they’re exhausted …

… and outside of the week-old flatty cottontail we met on the trek into the creek, offers an opportunity for the rare roll should we find them already deceased and upwind.

Now that I’ve properly tuckered his fuzzy little arse out, I’m permitted to boast of our outing …

I’ve been lazy given the repair is easy enough. I just need to find something with a fine point to spritz a little epoxy under the rear hood to make the problem go away.

While the RISE rod performed admirably under the steep, rock-hopping climb of the plunge pools, it didn’t like the back of the truck much – and after a small tangle at the tip between a partially strung rod and a fly imbedded in a fishing vest, I lost the top 3” of the tip without having a chance to defend it.

It’s not a defect so much as the odd leverage of the tangle, and while I’m still unsure how it happened, I was thrilled at the prospect of owning a second tip. The next morning I’m back on the water blessing that choice of foresight and frugality, and with a march ahead of me I put the rod together, but saved stringing the rod until I got closer to the water.

It’s one of the things I learned as a guide, what you think may be on the water never lives up to reality, so I hike down from the parking area to scan the water versus force feeding fish with my best guess.

/beginrant

I’ve not been a fan of the trend in four piece construction – mostly because every ferrule deadens the rod regardless of how light the material is, and figure most rod makers are victims of their own press, which assures us that four thicknesses of graphite when mated flex like two.

As they’re no longer asking us anglers what we want, three ferrules must be better than two, which is why a nine foot rod is now broken into four 27” sections, even though there’s no need.

/endrant

… and as I’m parting the bankside willows, ensuring I creepy-crawl slowly to blend in with the foliage until I can scan the water for working fish, I suddenly realize that the top 27” of my rod is missing.

While working through the willows, something had hooked one of the guides and pulled the tip right off the rod, and now I’m on hands and knees looking for a two foot length of brown, amidst a lot of brown things.

This didn’t end well. A 27” section of brown rod tip resembles every willow twig imaginable, and there was no chance of my finding the missing section.

I learned an important lesson given that it could of been much worse, and the car and my backup rod weren’t close by. Always string a four piece rod – even if it’s the end of the evening and you just broke off your fly, and can hardly see.

Reeling all that line into the reel is the expedient thing to do, but 27” of your rod tip can be removed without your ever knowing, and that fly line is the only clue you’ll have about being hung in a branch.

Small streams offer an intimacy that large streams do not, and I’ve been too long away from their welcome tinkle; where the muddy footprints are yours, the scrape of a cleat on granite sounds jarring, each plunge pool a mystery, and each fallen log welcome shade from which some silver lightning bolt will materialize or vanish.

They’re always physically arduous, doubly so when wearing the restrictive rubber band of waders and the full fishing regalia that accompanies new water – where you’re not quite sure if you’ll need every fly ever made, and double that for tippet …

… where with a precarious foot on the uneven rocks of mid channel, you can wipe the sweat from your hat band, gazing backward at the steep grade you’ve already fished, and forward towards the unknown – and the steeper incline it hides. Where you can pause for a welcome blow that comes from knowing that those out of shape couldn’t last – and only D. Boone and his ilk are fit company.

Silver Creek drains Silver Lake (Ebbet’s Pass) and offers something pretty to look at while plunging down Hwy 4 to the East Fork of the Carson below.

Access is limited to the occasional gravel pullout and from the Wolf Creek and Silver Creek bridges – which bookends the long downhill run from Ebbet’s Pass to the East Fork.

All the fish are planted and seem to distribute themselves throughout the watershed, in contrast to the balance of milling, confused throng in the bridge pool.

A Silver Creek rainbow pulled from a deep plunge pool complements of an experimental dry fly.

It’s the kind of “shortened-leader, slam-it-down” dry fly fishing favored in these small stream, steep gradient creeks that drain both sides of the Sierras. The fish are not overly selective so much as opportunistic – given the insect will be lost in the bubbles in a fraction of a second, and their diet is equal parts aquatic insects mixed with odd bits of pine needle, leaf fragments, cigarette butts, or anything looking about the right shape and size.

It was completely delightful to simply exhaust yourself in the climb, lose yourself amid the intimacy and charm of the small stream experience, and then scrabble up the slope to the freeway, reminding all those air-conditioned faces pressed to the glass that the woods is an awesome fearful nightmare, populated by scratched and sweaty fat guys on the verge of a heat-induced coronary.

… and how the local chamber of commerce, in an effort to woo those painfully scarce vacation dollars have decided to treat us fishermen especially good, by paying for a constant stream of brood stock to be pumped into the shaded pool at each local highway bridge.

There to be fought over in a hail of pre-dawn Kastmasters, Rooster-tails, and every BB equipped nymph known to Angling-kind.

Rather than accidentally enrage anyone at the concept, I’ll go on record as having no issue with carnage of any kind – fly or otherwise. Nor do I care whether a brother angler kills his fish or spares them. I’d suggest an only caution that at this late stage of the game, it might be prudent to only kill what you can eat, given most of the world’s fish supplies are dwindling and many are already farmed, and wild-caught anything is in ever-shortening supply.

As I’d not been to the Carson River before, and eager to begin assimilating data, I slowed to a halt at the first bridge and its gaggle of parked cars drawn onto the shoulders, to present my hindquarters to traffic while I peered over the rail and into the depths below …

… there to see six or eight anglers frantically lobbing death at an imaginary spot 14 feet under the bridge, wherein lay the precise phalanx of recently baptized hatchery fish finning silently amid the concussive thunder of thrown polished steel.

A stringer at the bank attests to fly fishing’s superiority, and the owning angler proudly displays a limit of five 4-pound fish, most belly up, but the occasional movement of a fin suggests while imminent, death is still at arm’s length.

I complement the angler on his catch, while ducking him and a pal lobbing two BB shot and a beadhead nymph back-hand under the bridge.

His advice was to be repeated by every grocery store, gas station, waitress, motel employee, or good natured local, who like stock market pundits – each had a favorite bridge and the knowing wink that accompanies, “ … and they just planted there last week.”

I’m just not used to it.

The bulk of my excursions in recent years have had some wild trout agenda or restriction, or I was simply far enough removed as not to have a lot of human interaction, angling or otherwise. While none of this makes me blanch overtly, the scene was repeated so many times over the course of the next four days, it makes me wonder whether the contented angler, as defined by Fish & Game’s “Put and Take” hatchery management – isn’t having the out-of-doors removed from his piney woods experience.

Certainly a concrete abutment isn’t a pine tree – nor is the constant hum of overhead traffic, which can never be confused with normal “woodsy” wildlife noises or the sigh of a light breeze in the tops of tall pines. Whether you’re parked on a sunny rock or Styrofoam cooler, the watchful gaze of those spectating – and those coveting your spot – must make the multi-hour drive no different than the checkout of the local grocery store, with the warden displaying momentary outrage when you’re discovered  bringing 9 items to an 8 item checkout.

The thoughts about bridges came unbidden, in part because of the reflex stab at the brakes when you encountered them undefended, and part because I wondered if there wasn’t a larger notion involved.

On one level, twenty pounds of hatchery fish dipped in five days worth of clean water, isn’t quite like dry-rub ribs, which can be smoked for eight hours then flamed to perfection. Rather, six months in a concrete trough eating dough-bait and floating excrement from the fish next to you, then baptized in a bit of clean water will make you pasty-flavored at best, given the temperatures of that trough aren’t cold enough to build firm and succulent flesh …

… which means my brother angler is about to show his spouse (and his entire neighborhood) 20 pounds of pasty white flesh that tastes only a bit better than licking the glass of an aquarium …

… and fourteen pounds of it will likely wind up lining his or his neighbor’s trashcan.

Which is the tiny bit of censure I’ll allow myself, given that wanton body count is a feature of my Dad’s sport (and his Dad’s sport) and we can no longer afford such waste.

But the other thoughts that came unbidden – was how the bridges serve as some unlikely metaphor of us as anglers; how we leap into the sport as young and impressionable, largely unaware of anything other than catching – and how with a bit of maturity and some experience do we realize much of what draws us back is between the bridges, and how as we acquire experience and preferences, spend most of our angling careers there.

Dry fly Purism, Wild trout, fly tying, conservation, and entomology, are a small fraction of the many wonders of that journey, as is the out-of-doors and the incredible environments wherein we find ourselves and our quarry.

… and later, when old age and infirmity permits only a short shamble from the car, how we return to those bridges – and how welcome they are given the certainty that one day, from some unfeeling hospital bed, even they will be lost to us.

Like you – I am still mid-journey. I left the comfort of the bridge and its supply of wallowing fat fish and walked the entire valley following the West Fork of the Carson while it wound through grassland and willows. A bit down the trail was a park bench with an inlayed brass plaque inscribed, “May all who fish here enjoy it as much as I did” – with a brother-anglers name who died some eleven years ago.

While the water and watershed were intact, there wasn’t a fish to be seen in the entire three mile walk.

A stunning watershed with classic undercut grass banks and deep outside bends that would have held large wary fish – requiring hands and knees sneaking versus marching to the edge and flinging a downstream cast.

It was a rare glimpse of some fellow’s treasure, a relief that he was no longer part of any issue, nor could see his past glories diminished – and a bit of thought towards our unique form of stewardship given those Bridges of Alpine County.

Dry fly dubbing is comparatively humdrum when compared to the litany of clever things that can be incorporated into nymph dubbing. We don’t get to play with special effects, loft or spike, and the only texture that’s helpful is soft and cloying, aiding us in wrapping it around thread.

As the fly derives so little benefit from its presence, other than the hint of color, and as it’s more hindrance than asset, we should apply a bit more science to its selection than merely whether it makes a durable rug yarn.

As beginners we were introduced to fly tying with the natural furs available from Mother Nature. We tried everything from cheap rabbit to rarified mink, and while we could appreciate the qualities we were told to look for, none of the shops carried them in anything other than natural.

There might have been three or four colors of dyed Hare’s Mask, but everything else on the shelves were the miniscule packets of synthetic dander – not the aquatic mammals mentioned in every book about dry flies written in the last half century.

Shops don’t dye materials anymore, and jobbers don’t dye real fur – as synthetic fiber is sold for pennies to the pound – and it’s shiny, which appears to be the only requirement that matters much. Real fur is expensive, has to be cut, attracts moths, and doesn’t come in pink …

When closing that gap between tail and wing, “shiny” doesn’t make our radar much, floatation does, as will fineness of fiber, flue length, texture, and color. It’s the second most common reason for fly frustration, either grabbing too much, or reaching for something ill suited to make a delicate dry fly body.

Floatation being the most desirable given our fly is cast and fished on the surface. Fineness of fiber results in a soft texture that’s easy to apply to thread, and fiber length allows us to plan how big an area of a “loaded” thread we’ll make – sizing the fur to the hook shank, ensuring we’re not needlessly causing ourselves grief when tying smaller flies.

Given that a #16 seems to be the most common size of dry fly on my waters, as it was the most common size ordered during my commercial tying days, sizing dry fly dubbing for a #16 would make my tying much easier.

That extra bit of tearing or trimming could consume 20-30 seconds, especially if you’re looking for scissors, making it one of many shortcuts that could trim minutes off a fly, enhancing whatever miniscule profits are to be had from commercial tying.

“Sizing” the dry fly dubbing to the hook shank is done by testing different fiber lengths, and determining which length yields the minimum necessary to make a complete #16 body.

Assume you have a typical synthetic dubbing like Wapsi’s “Antron”, which has a flue length of just over 2.5” . If you decant a tiny bit and all two and a half inches of the fiber were wrapped with concentric turns onto a thread, what size hook would it be the body for?

Hint: a lot bigger than you think …

We can’t wrap the fibers on top of one another as it would make the dubbing too thick and would add to the moisture absorbed. We don’t want fibers too long – requiring us to snip or tear it off the thread, and it’ll burn time as we doctor the shorn area to lock it down. Extra turns of thread and time are also our enemy, making our experimentations with fiber length and the optimal thread load valuable.

If you think back to those same aquatic mammals that were our introduction to dry fly dubbing, only the beaver had fibers that might’ve been longer than an inch, the balance of those animals; mink, muskrat, and otter, are all short haired critters.

Transferring that knowledge to flue length, suggests somewhere between 1/2” and 1 1/2” should give us similar handling qualities of the aquatic mammals, assuming our materials share their tiny filament width and softness.

Above is that “too small” mist of 1” fibers rendered onto thread. Spun tightly, it renders nearly an inch of body material.

Swapping the 1” fibers for 1/2” only decreased the amount of material slightly, perhaps a 1/4” less at most.

Predictably, our longer fibered Wapsi “Antron” dubbing with its 2.5” flue length covers much more thread, and despite the small diameter of its fibers, shows its unruly nature in the thickness of the noodle it makes.

After a half dozen turns, the remainder of the above will have to be pulled off the thread and removed. Given that implies more than half of what you grabbed, isn’t that a horrible waste?

From the above picture I’d make the claim that Wapsi doesn’t market this product as a dry fly dubbing (the label mentions only dubbing). The fly shop this was purchased at had a wall full of Antron colors, and outside of some Ice Dub and a few strips of natural fur, had standardized on this product for both nymphs and dries.

What actually may have happened is that they were tired of stocking 18 different flavors of stuff that didn’t sell all that well, and reduced the collection to a single flavor – because it’s all the same right?

Wrong, and I doubt your shop manager ties flies at all.

I’m still fiddling with fibers, colors and blends, but am almost done on the flue length tests. I’ve got a natural fiber that’s as fine as an aquatic mammal – which plays hell with blenders, but I’ve got that solved. Now all that’s left is blending of colors and dyeing – and an entreaty to those that want to field test at my expense.

Until then – and using the above photos as a reference, you can eye your local shops offering to measure what fiber length their products provide. Now that you understand that flue length is directly proportional to the amount of thread covered, you can more easily understand why you’ve consistently have more fur than you need, and how you can take a pair of scissors to the package to shorten the fibers to a more useful size.

We’ve been in a synthetic rut for the most part of a decade. Vendors are often lazy and package their materials in whatever form is easiest, often the way they receive the product, not what form makes the best fly or tightest noodle on the thread.

Scissors or a hint of natural fur added to a synthetic can tame its rug yarn roots, making it much more useful than it exists when pulled from the rack.

… add the pressure of yesterday’s post, where at this young age we can BUY precious eco-votes for the price of a single candy bar or cold coke, and the even the most optimistic parent begins to blanch …

I call it the “15 minute rule” – add the ages of all the participants and divide by their number and you get the number of minutes you can fish without complaint.

Watch as I use my jovial fat guy powers to undo all that stern tutelage about not talking to strangers, and undermine their natural shyness around strange adults. Cringe as I swear like a sailor, and find gross things for kids to throw at their brother – while I show a couple of potential fly fishermen where “Eewww” grows, and how much fun you can have doing things your Ma would have a fit over …

Failure isn’t an option anymore, we have to package a time honored snooty old profession into something that rivals a massively multiplayer online pseudo-reality.

Which is yet another reason to celebrate warm water and the appetites of coarse fish, most of which are willing to bite anyone or anything that comes within range, and will hurl themselves at a bit of wrapped flash with a fluffy tail and a come-hither action.

Above is my client, Garrett who thought a fly and bubble pretty lame, the spinning rod and Rooster Tail not much better, and insisted on the fly rod and measured retrieve just like his Pop and older bro, below …

… and while he attempted to remain good natured about double skunking his older bro and his poppa, his cool handling of the voracious Brackish water Barracuda (aka Sacramento Pikeminnow), revealed his outdoors nature in the face of mano y mano encounter with a known man eater.

Actually, it was all those parental lectures on respect for elders that allows me to assist a young fellow thrust into unfamiliar and odious surroundings.

He assumes everything I say and do is gospel, and everything Dad says and does can be ignored. That gives me the upper hand in reminding Dumpling he should keep his rod tip low so he can feel the slightest nibble …

… especially when we get to throw rocks at cars – which makes enormous metallic smack noises and with Pop urging us to further mayhem and to get wet, which is foreign to anything we’ve ever believed about adults – none of which know how to have fun as they never throw rocks at anything …

Which provides just the type of break from fishing so that we can drink Gatorade and eat “fart bars” and relax in the shade – and then try fishing some more on the way back …

… where both proceed to cast their own rods, hook and land their own fish, and the smile on a proud poppa’s face is a mix of relief and outright fun, suggesting the scene to be repeated many times over.

Eco-votes, baby – go get you some…