Planning a quick scout trip tomorrow for smallmouth and largemouth bass, chores are completed so I can raze havoc at the tying bench.
I’m not sure what I’ll find as it’s a new lake and a small feeder creek, can’t fish the creek as it’s closed until April, and the lake is a man made impoundment [...]

Following up on a comment from Phil Huewe on the “Cheaper Ice Dub” post I did about a week ago. I knew I had the right fiber, it was the right “flavor” of fiber that was my consternation.
I contacted the maker of Angelina, the Meadowbrook Inventions Inc. and asked them what I was looking [...]

I’m still in a state of enforced idleness, waiting for water levels to resume some semblance of clarity. I keep checking hoping the stream flow meter has malfunctioned, but it keeps telling me to stay home.
…so I ignore it, and wander out for some visual confirmation.

The good news is there are two separate colors instead [...]

My gal was out of the house this weekend so I made melancholy until her car left the driveway. Seizing the opportunity of her absence is important, if she knew what I was up to she’d swivel her head 360 degrees and chase my ass with a butcher knife.
The trick is in hiding your tracks [...]

I don’t know why I expected anything different, I wrote enough articles on the decline in “genetic diversity” to know better. It’s part and parcel of the “WalMart” phenomenon, small Mom and Pop business’s forced out of existence by sinister and cavernous chain stores.
It began innocent enough, I’m low on the special hooks used for [...]

I’m always in awe over any form of craftsmanship, it doesn’t matter whether it’s Shaker furniture or a finely tooled gun butt, it’s the skill of the craftsman that allows a novice to appreciate the difference.
There are many kinds of fly tier, while most tie flies for fishing, others are enamored of the craft [...]

Singlebarbed reader “San Mateo Joe” sent me some of his seed bead creations - instantly driving me into a paroxysm of creativity. The medium is fur and feathers, but we’re prey to all the foibles and idiosyncrasies that mainstream artists endure.
All it takes is some pretty color or odd shaped fiber and we’re willing to [...]

All I need is more things to fiddle with and nothing stirring to eat my creations. They say that’s what Winter is for and it appears as if I’m going to give Old Daytripper a run for his money…
Togen fish hooks caught my eye recently, a Japanese hook marketed by the Togen fly shop [...]

I found a better retailer for the Angelina (”Ice Dub”) fibers, Joggles.com features a better color selection of the “straight cut” Angelina, and the price is a buck cheaper.
These are half ounce packages, which is equivalent to about 4 packages of Ice Dub, featured at $3.75 per half ounce. 36 colors are available as [...]

I’m perusing yet another entomology tome that discusses the phases aquatic insects endure to finally get their wings, each author insists the “post-lactating-pre-nuptial” phase is overlooked by anglers, and fish knock snot out of flies that imitate it.
A dark spinner, looks innocent enough and you’ve got plenty in your flybox..

I got your “phase” right here, buddy. It’s [...]