I would have loved to have been on the water somewhere this weekend but unfortunately , as always , that four-letter word WORK had other plans for me. Working every other weekend is bad enough , but it never fails that a buddy will call and want me to hit the water! This seldom occurs on weekends I'm off , but I can almost count on a call if I'm relegated to a weekend at work.
I decided that the next best thing to fishing was filling a few holes in my flyboxes , namely my big streamer box. It's that time of year when I can't help but think about big water , big flies and bigger fish! I'm looking forward to a couple of trips down to the White River in the next month or so in search of a big brown and decided to lash a couple of chickens to some steel in preparation.
Streamers are much more fun to tie than your average nymph , simply because it's hard to go wrong , just start wrapping materials on a hook (or two preferably) and see where the process takes you. I'm not going to say that it's always pretty , because sometimes it's not , but generally you'll end up with something that will catch a fishes eye.
I like to take ideas and methods from other tyers and incorporate them into my own concoctions , sometimes I tie from a known pattern and follow the recipe , but not usually. That being said , I'm not laying claim to any new fly patterns for sure , these flies are simply variations of patterns created by other more talented tyers than myself. There are several guys that do some incredible work with big streamers and I've utilized many of their methods and recipes to fill my fly boxes throughout the year...Rich Strolis (http://www.catching-shadows.com/) , Mike Schmidt (http://www.anglerschoiceflies.com/) and Kelly Galloup (http://slideinn.com/blog/) are three that come to mind right off.
I was on a limited time constraint this weekend due to work , but I still managed to turn out a few flies as was evident from the disaster on my tying desk (as my wife would say..."It looks like someone put a whole chicken through a wood chipper in there again!").
I'll be spending a few more nights at the vice working on the streamer box in the next week or so... more to come.
Tis the season.
ReplyDeleteHow long are these streamers?
And how long is the rod you fish these with and what weight?
Alan - the ones pictured are about 5-6 inches long. These are relatively easy to throw and don't require a big rod to fish.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite streamer rod (at the moment) is a 9' 7 weight fast action , although if I'm using a 250 grain or heavier sinking line I usually move up to an 8 weight.
Now if I can just sweet talk a big ole brown into playing along!!
looking forward to seeing the fish caught. I'm headed up to the white in February for a couple days of fishing with Steve Dally. Hopefully they will be running more water than they have been at that time.
ReplyDeleteCasey - I saw that they got a few inches of rain down that way yesterday , probably not enough to change generation patterns but it can't hurt. I've been watching the generation lately and the Fork is about the only tailwater running anything consistently , at least it's close enough to be a good option if you're down there.
DeleteSteve's a good guy for sure , even with piss poor water conditions I'm sure he'll be able to put you on some good fish.
How could Mr. Brown resist. Weekend is looking good?
ReplyDeleteKevin - I'm sure hoping he'll take an interest , we'll see.
ReplyDeleteThat's a good ugly.
ReplyDeleteThanks Jim...I hope the fish agree!
DeleteI don't fish with streamers that often but I sure do like the looks of those.
ReplyDeleteThanks Howard...You should try tossing around some big hunks of feathers sometime , nothing else elicits the same aggressive strikes as a big ole streamer.
ReplyDeleteMy hobby is fishing every weekend, Its really great to see your blog on fishing.
ReplyDelete