Ut på tur, aldri sur: Wyoming bound

Mike is finishing up his last final of the semester within the hour, and then it's West.  South Platte, North Platte, Wind.  That's the agenda, though we don't have any set plans, and have a few other spots in mind.  We are well stocked gear-wise, and pretty much prepared for anything.  Of course there are no guarantees heading out on a trip like this, but we're expecting good things.

You can expect trip reports to start being posted a week or so from now.  In the meantime, we're gone fishin'!

In a row boat

Josh and I got out yesterday morning for a windy trip around with an anchor-less rowboat.  Despite the lack of ideal conditions, we got a few fish to play and checked out some new spots, agreeing that it was definitely going to be worth a trip back there.  I'm seeing bass, pike, divers and backwaters in my future...

Oh, and the title is a lot cooler if you listen to this song (hat tip to Mike V.):

Snackin' fatties

"I just wanted one more little baetis nymph..."

I've been fishing a lot of streamers lately, but the water I've been streamer fishing also has a lot of little spots that just aren't as effectively streamer fished while wading upstream (shallow lies in riffles, tight pockets, etc.).  So today I decided to give the three-weight an exercise, and I had a blast.

Probably my all time favorite way to fish for trout is to nymph a small stream with lots of riffles that fall into medium sized pools.  I enjoy fishing these because they are perfect for swimming one to two nymphs without an indicator.  In fact, for me I think it's easier to fish spots like these without one.  Today I hit up all the spots that had failed me with streamers and came up with some great fish.  Some smaller than I normally would catch on streamers, but a few really fine fish.

And every last one of them had an absolutely bulging stomach.  I don't know what it is they're feeding on right now (didn't think to keep one to check the stomach), but they consistently took the #18 soft-hackle pheasant tail over the #12 Hare's ear that I had tied on.

Oh, and it's gorgeous out.

The world is green, the smallies are in, life is good.

Mike and I got out for a super fun day fishing yesterday.  Levels were way up from what we're used to at this spot, but clarity wasn't bad.  Really not too many fish were caught, but it was just fun.  We each got a smallie (both on leech patterns) and a few carp to play along as well.

The "Hybrid"

 Some kid had caught a bunch of carp and dammed them into this little pool.  We thought they might be easy pickins, but not so much.

To cap it off I even got a largemouth!  They're pretty rare in this part of the river so it came as a bit of a surprise.  I'll take it though.  Boy, fish are gorgeous.

Evening on the River

It was one of those nights I just had to get out.  Despite donating two poppers to pike and only bringing one six-inch bass to hand, I think I'd still have to call it a darn fine evening out on the water.

BadAxe All Over

I'm flipping through the new issue of The Flyfish Journal and noticed some art that looked familiar (volume four, issue three, page 100).  It was like when you know who a song is by without ever hearing it before.

This art was by Jonathan Marquardt.

Jonathan is a Wisconsin dude, and a super cool one at that.  He did the artwork for The Fiberglass Manifesto's blue gill shirt (it's T.F.M.'s Year of the Bluegill), and has done work for the Wild Steelhead Coalition.  As far as I know this is the first that his art has appeared in The Flyfish Journal, and it's well deserved.  He does some awesome stuff (I bought his "carp fly fishing" t-shirt a while back, it's dope).

Check out his stuff.

Tyin' Friday: Unwanted tying chores

I'm pretty sure I lost my dry fly box a week ago today.  There was a moment before I headed out streamer fishing with Josh when I said, "I won't be needing this!", and then, poof! it disappeared.  So yesterday I spent quite some time restocking my box of dries with Wyoming and Montana in mind (not on the same trip that Dave is about to head out on, so yes, there is possibly probably going to be a lot of West coming to the blog this May).  Reading about what should be going on bug-wise out there in the middle of May, it's BWOs, BWOs, BWOs.  Some PMDs (depending on the river), and even the possibility of running into some Salmon flies (maybe).  But given that this year has been the opposite of last year, it's going to be BWOs, BWOs, BWOs.  Lots of grey and olive:

And that's about all I did yesterday.  It's a bit of a lame Tyin' Friday, I know.  No video, no revelations, no step-by-step fly with a cool new material, but you know what?  If you don't tie comparaduns or sparkle duns, you need to.  After tying a bunch of parachute style BWOs and Adamses, comparaduns are simply the slickest, easiest, and darn near most effective dry out there.  Wing, tail, dubbing, done.  Need I say more?