What's Catching You Fish?

iveofione said:
All those years of learning to tie flies and what am I catching them on? Blobs!! A jig hook with a gold bead and 2 small pieces of Fritz. If you can tie your shoes you can tie this fly in a minute or two. Another thing that flies in the face of reason is how effective it is when stripped fast. I fished a lake a few days ago that has a lot of downed sunken logs around the perimeter and stripping a blob over the top of those logs I would see fish dart out from the depths and attack the fly. What are they thinking?

The usual cast of fall flies has not worked well so far and catches are about 50/50 on blobs and small soft hackles. The fish's favorite soft hackle has been with a pheasant tail body counter wrapped with fine wire, a small peacock herl collar and either a partridge or grouse hackle. This worked on the North Fork of the Flathead, the Madison and Rock Creek a couple of weeks ago and did well on two local lakes again this week. With a fresh supply tied yesterday it will see duty again on Sunday for some high jumping rainbows, I hope they like it...
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That's just not right. I go to a couple fisheries where the only thing I can catch fish on is a booby. It just feels so dirty, like putting PowerBait on the end of a wooly bugger.
 
Anybody who thinks they actually know why trout prefer a particular pattern is full of shit...but people have said that about me forever....

So I'll venture a totally anecdotal and unqualified opinion regarding Blob fly effectiveness.

Earlier this year, at a flyfishing only lake, big rainbows were aggressively hitting hot pink blobs.

Hooking a very big fat hen...when netted she started spewing eggs that had a very pronounced similarity to the blob colors I was fishing.

I should note that the other blob colors I've tied and fished have not been productive.

A coincidence? I think not!

I'm thinkin' fishin' Blobs is just the flatwater version of 'dirty bead nymphers'.
 
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I have never had much confidence fishing really small flies. I fished Diamond for the first time on Thursday and tiny mayflies (tricos???) were hatching. I couldn't buy a fish. I didn't have any small mayfly nymphs with me so I looked in my chironomid box. Tried a small zebra midge, but it was getting in the weeds too fast and I didn't want to fish a bobber. At 3/16" ling this little guy cracked the code and got me my first ever tiger and 4 of his buddies - so small it makes 5x tippet look thick! Thanks to the fly shop guy somewhere who convinced me to buy these things - they have been in that box forever! I was surprised how well they hooked the fish and stayed buttoned - only LDRed one fish out of 6 hooked.Little Green Midge in Lip.jpgLittle Green Midge.jpg
 
Something in here:
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Caught this a a few close friends...
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Headed out after class to wet wade and serve up a couple takes on Hare's Ear with the Leonard.
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Fish didn't have a fave between them, just preferred those two swung as opposed to any other stuff I tried today.
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So when I was tying up the October Daddys I posted I had and a place, and in particular, a fish, in mind. As I was driving out I was visualizing the approach and the cast I needed to make. Hoofed it up the trail bypassing lots of spots, tied on the daddy with the white tail, then took about 5 minutes to get in position and wade out. Worked out some line to get the distance, chilled a bit, then made the cast. Perfect cast and skate. Almost peed myself when I saw the fish came up, and could hardly hold still till it had the fly in it's mouth. Fish folded itself in half, gave me the fin and the tail slap on the way back down under the log, and .... it was gone.
Tied on the replacement
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and was soon in business with some of the regulars
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This fly took a lot of fish
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and ended the day pretty worn out.
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Tom Butler said:
So when I was tying up the October Daddys I posted I had and a place, and in particular, a fish, in mind. As I was driving out I was visualizing the approach and the cast I needed to make. Hoofed it up the trail bypassing lots of spots, tied on the daddy with the white tail, then took about 5 minutes to get in position and wade out. Worked out some line to get the distance, chilled a bit, then made the cast. Perfect cast and skate. Almost peed myself when I saw the fish came up, and could hardly hold still till it had the fly in it's mouth. Fish folded itself in half, gave me the fin and the tail slap on the way back down under the log, and .... it was gone.
Tied on the replacement
View attachment 129490
and was soon in business with some of the regulars
View attachment 129491
This fly took a lot of fish
View attachment 129492
View attachment 129493
and ended the day pretty worn out.
View attachment 129494
Click to expand...
That spectacular fish and the almost peein’ oneself never gets old. Memories are made… 😉
 
a Hothead black leech was the call on the two lakes I've been fishing..on Friday a thinner version on a hover line was getting seriously tugged by some nice bows' over the weed beds in 5' of water, highlighted by watching a flotilla of seriously big browns slowly fin by in the crystal water, which of course ignored my casts...I'll be back there tomorrow for another crack.
today at the second lake a chunkier BL got the action..letting the wind drift me mid-lake, giving the leech pauses between small strips, missed initial takes until I figured out that instead of stripping on the take, give line so the biters could truly chomp down on the hook. That flare at the hook tip courtesy of a pig that after blowing up the surface water burrowed into the bottom and found something to wrap on. All good, have the rest of the month to find another...

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