Steeheading Spring 2014 - Part 1

Well the trip up to a Lake O tributary has come and gone...normally I would go into great detail on the trip, events, how the conditions were, techniques and flies...however I am still exhausted from that trip and hitting the local waters today so I will just briefly go over what went on.

I started off the day swinging flies and after three hours I switched over to nymphing stonefly-esq patterns and boy did the action pick up. Over the entire two days of fishing I hooked 55+ fish easily and landed perhaps 9 or 10. The reason for so many long distance releases I think was due to the fact that I was using barbless nymph hooks and in a few cases hooks that were not up to the task of fighting feisty steelhead. On the second day I started swinging again for a while and hooked two fish that I did not land. After that I started to accidentally foul hook fish in the run so switched back to nymphing for the remainder of the day. Here are a few photos of fish that I caught, as well as a few caught by my good friend Mike B and some of the flies that did not stand the test of Mr. Steel.

Frank Sawyer Favorite Flies - Video

Just stumbled across this video on you tube that talks about and
shows how to tie some of Frank Sawyers favorite fly patterns. I really
enjoyed watching the video and will be tying some of these patterns to
stock up the nymph box in the future. Wanted to share it with everyone here
who follows the blog and hope you found it as interesting as I have.

Preparing For Battle

I am finally a free man...for the next 10 days I am free from the restraint that we call work and am able to explore the rivers and swing flies at beautiful silvery fish to my hearts content.

I plan to drive up to a Lake Ontario tributary this evening and tuck in for a few hour nap in the car before hitting the river before first light. I have brought the whole arsenal , flies for swinging, flies for nymping, rods, back up rods...I am set for whatever situations come my way. When I get back I will add a report on how things went and perhaps a few pictures...if it was anything like last spring I cannot wait to wet my boots in the river!

Double Standard

Double Standard tied on Hanak Wet Fly Competition hooks in size 10 with Heavy Metal tungsten beads

For a long time now I have been watching the video series produce by Tight Line Productions known as Practical Patterns. Looking through all of their videos I am amazed at the how clear and well done the videos are and have used many of them to copy patterns to stock my fly boxes with.

I wanted to share here with you guys a simple but deadly nymph pattern that I fell in love with immediately after seeing this video. A cross between a pheasant tail nymph and a hares ear nymph this pattern is just dynamite. Since finding this pattern I have tied and fished it for trout, pan fish and more recently suckers and the fish seem to find it irresistible. By varying the material used for your bead (Tungsten, brass, glass) and the amount of lead wraps used as the under body you can change the weight and characteristics of this pattern. I prefer a heavily weighted tungsten bead used to get the fly down in faster currents which works wonders on dropper rigs. This is a very versatile pattern and I tie it in many different sizes and weights to cover all of my nymphing needs.

Competition - Part 3

The Draw: For the draw I got  #1, which put me in A1, B3,C5 for my beats. A1 and C5 are on the far end of the pond furthest away from the feeding area and while the tournament was getting setup I did not see much action in this area on either side of the pond as far as rises and fish activity went. After seeing these two positions I figured it was going to be a tough day. B3 was on the corner on the near side of the pond, just to the left of the feeding area and I figured if I was going to have a good session it would be here.

SESSION 1

I started off this session with my 6wt voyant rod with a full sinking 3ips fly line. My flies consisted of a hares ear variant nymph on top and a pheasant tail variant on point. I started off casting right out in front of me and allowed the line to sink before slowly stripping the fly back towards me.

This went on for a while without any action but I tried to stay calm and focus on what I was doing. At this point a few of the other competitors on my section started to hook and land fish, not going to lie it was at this time that I started to panic. I switched over to my dry dropped rig for a few casts and allowed it to sit before slowly working it back. To be completely honest the dry dropped setup for me is not something I am confident in so I ended up switching over to my streamer rod fairly quickly. After 5 or so minutes without anything showing interest in my streamer I jumped rods yet again back to the 6wt.

 I tried moving my casts around and started fishing a little further towards the right of my section. Same method, cast out, allow to sink for 4-6 seconds then start the slow hand retrieve. BOOM I felt some resistance and set the hook getting into my first fish of the comp. I brought it to net and asked for a measure, it came in at 64cm. At this point I relaxed a little bit and calmed down. During the rest of this session I managed to get my fly stuck in a tree and after breaking off I quickly re-rigged with a pre tied leader I had coiled up and ready to go. I did not manage to get into any other fish during session 1.

Getting my first fish of the competition measured.

Ranking: 4 of us tied for 1st place with 1 fish on this session, giving me 1pt towards the final ranking.

Session 2

Off Session

Talking strategy

Session 3

Off Session

Session 4

The second session that I was assigned to fish placed me in the corner of the pond at B3. This area is just left of where the fish are fed and drops off quickly into 5-7 ft of water after the ledge. I had spent session 2 watching other competitors techniques and methods and conversing with other anglers waiting to fish. While waiting for the horn to sound to start the next session I choose to change the first fly on my rig from a natural hares ear nymph to a bright colorful blob fly to hopefully catch the trouts attention. I clipped off the hares ear only to realize I had not left enough of a tag to re-rig another fly. I spent the last 45 seconds of the break trying to get this blob tied only only to have to clip the tag right off and fish one fly, a p.t nymph variant.

I started off the session casting out to the middle of my beat and allowing my fly to sink for 6-7 seconds before starting a slow retrieve in by hand and then small strips. During this time the person in B1 started hammering fish right out in front of the area where the feeding is done. Before I knew it he had hooked into 4-5 fish and landed 2 of them. It was then that I hooked my first fish, landed it and showed the controllers. After releasing it I kept on with the same technique and hoped for more fish. I switched briefly to my streamer rod without any luck and then over to my second rod that I had now rigged with a bright blob and natural blob. This was on my 8wt single handed rod with floating line so when cast the flies did not sink quickly at all leading me to think some weighted blobs would have been a great addition to my fly box for this competition.

My second fish came a while later and was the smallest catch of the tournament for me, roughly 9-10 inches but a point none the less. I started to worry about not having measured my first fish in case of a decision that came down to the length of all the fish I had caught so I told myself the next fish I hooked was getting measured regardless of size just to put something on the board. Luckily I hooked another fish and the second it was on yelled to the controller that I would measure this one. It came in at around 53cm if my memory serves me right and was the last fish that I caught during this session.

Ranking:  2nd place with three fish, 1st ranking had 5.

 Session 5

Off Session

Session 6

The last session I almost dreaded. C5 had been some tough fishing all day, only giving up a few fish on the first session as far as I know and blanking a few very talented anglers. I knew that this session would make or break me and that I needed to get a few fish on the board early to secure a good ranking.

I started off with my 6wt and full sinking line again with a chartreuse and fire orange blob as my first fly and the good ole p.t variant on point. Taking notes from some of the competition anglers who I had watched fish during the day I fished 95% of this session from my knees to keep a lower profile. I started bombing out casts as far as possible to a little past the middle of the pond, letting it sink a little longer, perhaps 8-9 seconds then starting a VERY slow hand retrieve back to shore. It was not long before I felt a tap and hand stripped the hook set into a fish. I quickly landed it, took the point and got back to fishing, as a side note the fish took the bright attractor fly. The second fish came not long after using the same technique, this one taking the nymph.

At this point again I am thinking my next fish needs to be measured just in case it comes down to a tie so the next hook up I yelled over immediately for a measure. Unfortunately this fish was foul hooked in the belly and was released without a point. I managed two more fish during this session and got a measure of around 47cm as my big fish. I was beyond happy knowing I was able to produce fish from this beat and could not help but to smile walking back to my car to unload my gear and wait for the official results.

Ranking: 1st ranking with 4 fish



The competition was a great success and I think that lots of fun was had by everyone involved. It took months of planning and many sleepless nights I am sure to put everything together and I would like to thank Cosmin and the Sotto Fly Fishing Club, Angling Sports, and all of the companies that donated prizes for the event for making this a truly memorable day

The man who made it all possible, a big thanks to Cosmin for organizing this whole event and putting in LOTS of hard work so that the 30 anglers competing could focus on fishing.



Official Rankings

 

Top 10

Accepting my prize, a gift certificate and many packs of Knapek competition hooks to keep me busy at the vise.

 

 

 

 

Top 5

Don't Drink The Kool Aid

This post will go over a quick and easy way to dye different natural furs and feathers using kool aid and vinegar.

As I understand it the reason kool aid works so well to dye feathers fur and hair is due to the fact that the coloring used is a weak acid dye. By adding some vinegar to the dye bath we can set the color into the material so it does not wash out as we fish it, or bleed onto our fingers as we are tying. Starting off with white feather and furs is the easiest as it is often hard to get consistent results when dying over a colored material.


Materials Needed:
-Kool Aid (Make sure it is the mix WITHOUT SUGAR)
-Metal Mixing Bowl
-Tongs or Spoon
-Microwave
-Vinegar
-Material to dye
-Understanding Spouse/Wife



Step 1:
Assemble all your materials in a safe place and put down plastic bags, news paper, or a section of wood to protect counter tops. A better idea is to do this outside or in a garage, one spill on the carpet, counter or floor will bring out the wrath of your significant other.

Measure two cups of  hot tap water into your mixing bowl.

Step 2:

Add two packets of kool aid into the hot water and add 2-3 caps of vinegar and mix well. After mixing transfer to a microwave safe bowl or dish. You could skip the mixing bowl step I just find using the bowl allows me to mix and dissolve the kool aid better.

Step 3:

Place your container in the microwave and set the time for 1:45. Allow the mixture to heat up and carefully remove from the microwave and set on a safe surface. Add your materials to the dye bath, in this case I am using natural colored rhea feathers.

Step 4: Allow the materials to soak and check periodically for the intensity of the color. The longer you leave the materials in the bath the more color will take to the feather or fur. Always remember that the color you see while the materials are wet will always be a few shades lighter once dry. When you have reached a color you are happy with take the material out and wash it with hot water followed by cold until you no longer see any dye leeching from the material. Place the materials on some paper towel in front of a fan or near a window with a breeze to dry out.

Once dry fluff the feathers or fur up and check to see if the color is satisfactory. In this batch I did two feathers in orange and two in purple opting for a long bath time to get bright orange and dark purple respectively.

Above are the feathers after drying. The orange is a very bright very heavy dye job as is the purple, making the picture look almost black. In person as you move the feather around the tones of purple come through. You can dye any natural feather or fur with kool aid using this method and by adjusting soak times, amount of kool aid used and heat of the dye bath achieve different results. Below is some red fox dyed with kool aid in a few different colors. As you can see a lot of variation can be had by adjusting different variables.

Warning: I would always suggest trying smaller batches of materials at first instead of trying to dye a $100 saddle right out of the gates. By starting with smaller batches or on less expensive materials you can get a feel for dying and know the limitations and expectations of using this method. Some materials will dye better then others and keep in mind that sometimes things do not work out as you want. For example I have a beautiful snow white arctic fox pelt that I purchased to dye for steelhead flies. The skin on this pelt is paper thin and I find if I dye using a hot water bath the skin wants to rip apart and almost dissolve on me. This has caused me to use cooler baths and longer dye times to avoid this, so keep in mind smaller batches are better to see how materials react to the process and how colors take with the specific material.

Also do not be afraid to branch out to salt fixative dyes and proper acid dyes for dying materials once you are more comfortable with the process. Kool aid is just a cheap easy way to get your feet wet and see if this is something you would like to pursue further. Below is a picture of some other rhea feathers I dyed using salt fixative fabric dyes, while not as bright and vibrant as acid dyes they still get the job done.

Competition - Part 2 - The Setup

In this post I will be going over the rods I had setup as well as what rigs I planned to use on them. I will also be going over a few things that I did ahead of the competition to save my time while fishing on the water.

Rod #1
6wt Redington Voyant 9'6 - Greys GX500 Cartridge Reel - Rio's In Touch Deep 3

This rod I setup with a two fly dropper rig, attaching 7 or so feet of 8lb fluorocarbon to the fly line and then using a dropper rig about 50-60cm from the point fly. I started the competition off with a hares ear variant as the first fly and then a pheasant tail nymph variant as the point. Later in the tournament I switched out the rig to a bright blob and natural p.t nymph variant combo.

Rod #2
8wt Redington Pursuit 9'6 - Lamson LiteSpeed 3.5 - 8wt Steelhead/Salmon Rio

I figured I would use this rod as as backup for running nymphs as well as a dry/dropper rig. I set it up with a size 10 stimulator as the first fly and then a p.t nymph variant as the point fly. This is a technique and method I am not very comfortable with but I figured if the fish started taking flies higher in the water column then the ability to suspend my offering from a dry fly would be a good option.

Rod #3
7wt Switch TFO Deer Creek - Van Stall 912 - 420 Grain Snowbee Integrated Switch Line

I figured this rod would be best setup to throw some weighted streamers. I brought a box stuffed with buggers, clousers and other staple streamers but settled on using a twisted little fox which has proven itself a very effective streamer in the past. From the head of the fly line I attached 8lb fluorocarbon to the streamer which I debarbed.


Ways I Prepared

Tying rigs and leaders ahead of time is one way I figured I would be able to save time. I had a walleye rig tube with 12 sections for rigs and used this to coil up leaders with nymph dropper rigs and rigs without flies in case of a tangle or the need to re-rig during a break or off session.

Before the competition I tried to tie up the flies that I would need on barbless hooks to avoid the chance of losing fish if the controllers found the mashed down barb not mashed down properly. The penalty for the fly not coming out of cloth cleanly and quickly was losing all fish caught prior in that session.

I went to the dollar store a few days before the competition and purchased a rectangular white plastic tote to house my fly boxes, leader tube, floatant, forceps, nippers and other items that I would need on hand at the competition. As well  figured I could rest my rods on top of this tote so as to keep them off the grass were perhaps a controller may accidentally step on them while measuring a fish or verifying a catch.

The Game Plan

I went into the competition with the plan to start fishing slow and deep with two fly rigs and adjust as needed depending upon the results and activity of the fish.

The next post will go into a little more detail about the individual sessions along with my thoughts and reasoning on using different techniques and methods.