I May Never Need Reading Glasses Again

In the process of scheduling a trip to the Mack with Clif and the Stream Stalker my eyes wandered over to the ad bar in Gmail. The Google Ad claimed "The Easiest Fishing Knot". So, naturally, I had to follow it. The specs say it's for hook/lure eyes 2.1mm loop inner diameter and larger. That would cover every tackle setup except for most trout flies. It ties a 5 turn Uni-Knot, and according to Lefty Kreh it's one of the stronger knots he's tied. If you shop around you could probably pick one up for under 30 bucks.

...and it's only $150,000 (plus shipping and handling)

Most bass fisherman I know believe in the thought that if you want to catch the bigger fish you need to throw a bigger lure.

I was out on the web today and I followed a link to the folks at Round Rocks Fly Fishing. The image in the item offering doesn't do it Justice. You have to read the product description to get the big picture, and I mean BIG.

So if you have a large disposable income and you're in the mood for the really big fish, and I mean fish bigger than your modest, middle America, two story house, have I got a lure for you. (Update:  It's no longer for sale.)

"The Vermilion"

"There's a trail through the trees that goes down to the river. Come on, it's not very far." The year was 1969 and my older brother, a Boy Scout at the time, was leading me down to The Vermilion's Wildcat Canyon at Mathiesson State Park south of the Illinois River. It seamed such a long way from the parking lot where the scout tents were pitched to the trail head at the tree line. I don't remember much about it. I was only seven years old. You see, I did most of my growing up on the Little Vermilion in an area known as Forty Steps on the north side of the Illinois River. It was there where my friends and I would make half attempts at being fishermen hooking less than average bullhead and bluegill, and spending most of the day swimming, catching crawdads, and pulling the occasional leach from our shins.

Last Saturday I decided to take Jonn Graham's advice and revisit the The Vermilion with my brother-in-law Steve. The walk to the tree line was much shorter this time, even with all my cold weather gear, hip-waders and boots. As we followed the trail down we ran into Tom Levy, Site Superintendent for Starved Rock and Mathiesson parks. He was inspecting the trails for Sunday's mountain bike race. The three of us chatted for a few minutes about the trails, the river, and Jonn's blog at Prairie State Outdoors. It turns out that Steve's son James worked for Tom at the park a few years ago while he was studying forestry. Today James is an Indiana District Forester.

Steve didn't bring fishing gear so he played photographer while I fished. I spotted some nice rip-rap behind a boulder about 20 feet from shore and hooked a nice two pound Bronzie on the fourth cast. My blood was racing because this guy was a fighter, and I was thinking, "This is going to be a great day!"



It was the only fish of the day. I spent the next hour trying different approaches, different boulders, different flies, but nothing developed. Steve, on the other hand, was quite successful.











The Vermilion is a perfect refuge for smallmouth bass. There are plenty of rocks, boulders and rapids to make a happy home. Caution is advised. Footing can get tricky if your used to trekking mud. The Vermilion offers the only true white water in Illinois. Check this out for some interesting facts about Vermilion's Wildcat Canyon.

I'll be making many trips to this river.

I Have to Say It

The only thing outstanding about Rush Limbaugh is his teeth.

And you can quote me on that.

There's a Kayak in My Future Present (Part 4)

Be Happy...



Ahhh... if that's not a picture of happiness I don't know what is. No sooner did I bolt the unpainted rack to the trailer did Clif and I hit Banner Marsh after work. We put in about 5 PM. I brought both fly and spinning tackle. Clif went solely on fly. I started the evening with a plastic worm on the spinner but quickly lost interest. There's something about casting line that tickles my fishing fancy.

Clif was first to hook a nice largemouth. I raced over to snap a couple of pics. After he weighed in we decided to do a fly-by. I started the sprint with an easy peddle to avoid cavitaion. After I reached a good speed I turned it up to 11 about 30 ft from the frame. If you listen closely you can hear the fins slapping the bottom of the kayak. I'll have to work on that in the future to avoid scaring the fish. Don't blink!



(Note: The next day at work we ran some calculations, as engineers tend to do, and estimated a top speed of 3 1/2 mph.)

About an hour later on the water I hooked the specimen in the first pic on a chartreuse popper. I doubt it reached 3 lbs, maybe 2 1/2, but it still put up quite a fight on my 6 wt. Clif paddled over to capture the moment. And what a moment. First fish in the kayak on the first time out and on the fly. Thanks Clif! It was the only fish of the night for me. It didn't mater. I was just happy to be out there in the new toy.

There's a Kayak in My Future (Part 3)

Buy Kayak...



There she is in Ivory Dune as received from St. Louis Sailing Center via the UPS stork, although much dryer than the day received. Included are: standard Mirage Drive peddles, two piece adjustable paddle, high back deluxe seat with lumbar support, dry bag, one liter water bottle, bungee cord for rear deck storage (not shown), and an 8 inch drop in tackle tray with cover. Other items integral to the kayak are two 8 inch round sealed mid and rear storage ports, large sealed front hatch, two mesh pockets, two scupper plugs to keep the rear deck dry, two molded-in rod holders, flip-up rudder, and something the boys at Honda forgot to include in their S2000 two seat'r sports car offering... a molded-in cup holder. She's 13 ft 5 in long, 28.5 in wide, weighs 58 lbs empty, and costs the full 1,749 US dollars (oak leaf not included). You can search the world over and never find a cheaper price for a new Revolution. Believe me, I've tried.

Clif was on site during the delivery. I thought he was going to faint but he stayed tough. My wife arrived from work a few minutes later and just rolled her eyes at the two kids with a brand new toy.

Happiness is just around the corner.

There's a Kayak in My Future (Part 2)

Buy Car Rack Trailer...



Okay, So, it's not really a flat bed but it was inexpensive and it has everything I need for the purposes noted in the previous post. It's a 4x6 with 12 inch wheels. The first thing that was apparent was the trailer is designed for landscaping so the suspension was very stiff, easily remedied.



(Before I go any further I have to admit I've pulled the kayak on the trailer with the stiff suspension (Thanks to Clif). But for the sake of the blog we'll pretend that hasn't happened yet.)

The first thing I did was remove the middle springs and flip the lower springs. This had a significant and positive affect on ride. I also reduced the tire pressure from 90 psi to 15 psi. I'm not concerned about over stressing the springs or the tires. The trailer and tires are rated for 2000 lbs. I won't get close 200 hauling the kayak and all that goes with it. The next thing I did was build a rack out of 2x4's, painted it black, then added soft plastic threshold beading to the tops to protect the kayak hull. Because the trailer is for landscape work I had to remove the tilt pin and add a bolt to eliminate all the rattling during roading. Here's the final result.



Part three coming up. And this time I won't make you wait 4 weeks for an update. I promise!

There's a Kayak in My Future (Part 1)

Last year I spoke with Bill during a family gathering. I hadn't seen Bill for a over year. Among other subjects we talked of fly fishing. "Dave, you gotta get yourself a kayak. It's the new, hottest thing. You can get right up in the reeds, sneak up on `em real quite." Later when we were saying our goodbye's he rings in again, "I'm tellin' ya, kayaks are the way to go." The seed was planted and over the next few months I was obsessed with canoes and kayaks. I eventually narrowed my desire to the Hobie Mirage kayak line. In an earlier post a wrote about test driving one in Florida. So, yesterday I drove downtown and ordered a hitch for my Toyota Camry. I know what you're asking. Hitch. Kayak. What's the connection? Well, it's like this...

Buy car rack. Buy kayak. Be happy.

I was scoping out Yakima's car top rack system last month, but the `05 Camry limits the rack spread to only 30 inches, which limits the haul length to approximately 10 feet. And since I'm seriously considering the Hobie Revolution, which is over 13 feet long, the rack system would require the extender kit. Being an engineer I realized that the extender kit doesn't increase the foot print on the roof of the car. Lots of questions arose. Plus, I miss my truck. (That's a story for a different blog.) So I got to thinking, Maybe a trailer would be a better option. I can mount a storage box for all the "stuff" and add a rack for the kayak. I can also use the trailer to haul "other stuff" from Home Lowes-enards. I even have the boss's approval. It's all coming together

Next, a small flat-bed trailer. Stay tuned...

It's Been a Dry Month...

...for fishing. We've had so much rain in May that fishing is nearly shutdown except for die hard retirees and those with private lake memberships. The water on the Illinois river in the Peoria area is so high that the Coast Guard posted a no boating policy over the Memorial Day weekend.

I'm looking forward to doing quite a bit of Smallie fishing this year in the local rivers, but I'm worried the spawning season has been interrupted with high, muddy, fast moving water. Never the less I'll be out there. After all, it's not just about fishing.

A Nose Full of Rabbit Hair

Clif has been bugging me for some time about instructions for the double weed guard I use on my bass flies. Last night I tied a few so now I've got some photos and I'm ready to post. The nice thing about weed guards is they don't interfere with the tying method of most flies. It's simply an added step in the recipe. I'll use an eyeless modified Mad Tom pattern on a Mustad #2 streamer during this instruction.

Begin the tying session normally. Start with wrapping the hook shank with thread and tie on the zonker for the tail. Then build up the body as shown here.



There's no need to build up the body to the eye, just go forward enough to place the weed guard. The guard will be sloped back but still in front of the hook tip by 1/4 to 3/8 inch. The goal is to allow the fly to glide over an obstacle as you strip your line slowly but deflect enough to set the hook.

Let's attach the guard.



In case your wondering where the hook point is, when I tie I place the hook in the vise so the point is just inside the jaws. I do this to allow the thread to slip over the jaws, instead of getting caught up on the point as I wrap, and also to avoid getting poked. Now, back to the guard.

Cut off about 4 inches of 40 lb mono, straighten it with your fingernail, fold it in half with a crease, and place it over the hook. Then wrap it with 5 or 6 turns of thread as shown above.

Add a couple of over and under wraps, similar to the second step of tying on weighted eyes, to spread the mono to a "V". Add a drop of your favorite glue to the turns to set it. As the glue dries hold each end of the mono in position so it looks like this.



After the glue sets push the guards to the hook tip and trim the ends about 1/4 inch past the hook tip. Finish your fly as you normally would. Here's how mine turned out.



I'll call it a Mad Bugger. The body is made with an
anemic black zonker so it ended up looking more
like a woolly bugger.


Here's a couple more.


No name yet, it's a zonker tail with a maribo body and Flashaboo. Maybe I'll call it Dave's Clam Shouter. Think about it for a while, it'll make sense. ;)


The Red Green Show (In honor of our fearless leader of the Possum Lodge)

I'm going to tie more Red Greens because of this...