Simply No Time

With so much going on this time of year, there’s simply no time to do all the fly fishing I would like to do.  I’ve almost given up the idea of destination fishing as I can’t even seem to make it to the pond in the backyard more than a couple times a week.  Things have GOT to slow down!

What’s more, the weather has still been rather crappy.  It has rained on and off for weeks on end, it seems.  If it isn’t raining, the waters are so muddy you can’t fish anyway.  Who knew we would go from moderate drought to a water surplus the very first summer here at the new house AND the very summer I decide to start a new fly fishing hobby.

I fished a while in our pond yesterday and caught several bluegill on a black fly that hasn’t done much until now.  We have a “hot spot” that keeps our lines tight when using spincasts and hot dogs, but the fish are so spoiled for Gwantly dogs that they could care less about a little fly hitting the pond.  I decided to walk around to another spot we don’t fish often and was surprised to see a dozen or more bluegill beds.  I threw the little black fly out and WHAM!  The bluegill in that spot were almost striped-looking under the water and they were extremely aggressive.  Nearly every time, I could see one slowly edging in to investigate and after a few seconds, it’s whole head would come up out of the water and GULP!  Way cool experience!  I guess I caught about 5 or 6, lost maybe 3 or 4 more others, but it was certainly fun.  I definitely have a new “hot spot” now.

Forget Fishing on Mother’s Day

Note to self… Don’t ever plan a fishing trip on Mother’s Day weekend!  A couple of weeks ago, I went to some local river access sites to scope them out as possible fishing spots and found one that I felt was ideal.  I put the word out to my family that, come Mother’s Day, I was going to the river to try out the fly rod in truly open waters. 

I do ok here in our pond, but with all the trees and brush, I can’t really do a long cast.  I needed somewhere with lots of room and this particular spot I had in mind offered just that.  So Sunday, my husband, our son, and I loaded up and headed out.  As soon as we pulled into the entrace of the parking area, my heart sank!  There were cars EVERYWHERE!

Keep in mind that when I found this place a while back, the grass had grown up to my knees, tables were broken down, there was trash all over the place… it looked like a long abandoned park.  Now, it was cleaned up, mowed, and crammed full of people!  So much for scouting out a good spot!  Still, I walked down to the end where I had planned on fishing, thinking it would be far enough out of the way, but lo and behold, there were people SWIMMING!  Mid-May, with the horrible weather we’ve had, and there were people swimming?

We packed it up and figured we would try park #2.  When we arrived, there were only a couple of cars there, but there was also a conservation officer.  Oh wait, I think in NC they are called:  Wildlife Enforcement Officers.  As we were walking over to the access point, I said, “Are you going to break my heart and tell me there’s no fishing allowed in this park?”  He laughed and said, “No, but you really aren’t supposed to fish off the (boat) ramp and I think the water is way to high and fast to wade out from it.”  He was right!  The water was up and extremely muddy so I couldn’t even see the bottom of the shallow path I had spied earlier that would have led me downstream quite a ways.  He took pity on me though and said, “There’s really not a lot of people here today so if you want to give it a try off the ramp, I won’t say anything to you.”  Now wasn’t that nice!  WEO are people, too!

Unfortunately, I was only there for a very short while before a large group with canoes and kayaks showed up to launch.  I packed it up and called it a day.  So my first real fly fishing outting was a total bust.

Oh the Obstacles!

The weather finally broke and I got the chance to go fishing today.  I took Kaden down to the pond with me, set him up on a rod with a hot dog, and tied on one of the new flies.  Before I even got the chance to experiment much, I heard Kaden’s rod whipping in the wind… he was snagged up.  Despite my yelling at him to stop, he kept yanking and jerking, ultimately breaking his line.  Luckily, it was snagged on the bank and I walked over to find the hook, sinker, and weight (those are a commodity around here).  I was carefully scanning the bank for a glimmer of fishing line and found the fellow below instead…

Not sure what kind it is, but I don’t think it is poisonous.  After going after the hoe, I backed out on killing it.  He stayed down on his end and we stayed well out of his way.  This is the second time I’ve seen this one, so if he IS poisonous, SPEAK UP!  We have kids and dogs so we can’t allow the deadly ones to hang around.

I went back to fishing and as I was ever cautious of Mr. Snake and his kin, I about crappe my drawers when something jumped out of the water at my feet!  After I collected myself, I realized it was a FROG!  Actually, TWO FROGS, doing what frogs love to do, he, he.  I took the following honeymoon photo as a keepsake for them…

They snuck off at some point and left behind a string of eggs.  I’ll be amazed if they make it through the night with snakes and hungry bluegill keeping that spot hot.

Once I FINALLY got things quieted down, chased off, or otherwise dealt with, I was able to fake out a decent little bass!

And Kaden caught a couple, too…

However, trying to flyfish with him under-foot wasn’t working out too well.  So I switched back to the Zebco and hot dogs.  My best fish of the day was this 14 1/2 inch bass…

Hmm… posting pics on here isn’t so simple, so we’ll only do the highlights.  Aside from the snakes, frogs, wild child, and a few phone calls, it was an okay day!

Take me to your leaders… and fly line, tippet, flies…

I have found the mother ship!  Great Outdoor Provision Co. in Winston-Salem has everything a fly gal could want when it comes to fly fishing supplies!  Rods, reels, line, flies, apparel… you name it, they have it.  They also have a fellow on staff, Jason (I hope I’m remembering that correctly), who was SO helpful.  Not only did he help me pick out some flies that are suited to the fish I’m after in the area I’m fishing, but he even took me out back and showed me some pointers on casting.  I’ve got a couple things to work on, for sure, and it was great to watch someone in action and actually be able to ask them on-the-spot questions.

I also learned that Jason works at the same fire department as my husband.  Small world, huh?  I had called GOPC earlier and was told to look for this particular fellow, but while in route, Brian called and told me to ask for Jason, not realizing they were the same person, ha, ha.  I told Brian he has to bring him out to the pond and let me pick up some more good habits.

As luck would have it, though, it appears to be monsoon rain season here in Pfafftown and I can’t try out my new arsenal today.  In fact, I think it is supposed tobe yucky like this for a couple more days.  Guess I’ll have to be patient.

Obstacles

I’m fast learning that there are many obstacles that can stand in the way of fly fishing.  Weather has been a big one, here of late, with more rain than this area has seen in a long while.  On top of that, a bout of the flu a month ago has apparently triggered an asthma flare.   I didn’t even know I have asthma until a trip to the cardiologist on Monday!  I won’t say it is confirmed, but it is highly suspected.  It has kept me “on the porch” more days than one would expect.  What’s more, we’ve had two birthdays (mine and Haley’s), mountains of yard work, and having to also squeeze in the day-to-day stuff… just when is a woman supposed to get time to fish?

When I do find the time, I’m still losing more fish than I catch and I’ve about cleaned Dick’s Sporting Goods out on flies having to replace all the ones I’ve lost in the bellies of fish and on branches of trees.  Fly fishing isn’t very popular in this area and supplies at Dick’s are limited, at best.  I’d say I’m certainly off to a rocky start and at a major disadvantage trying to learn a sport that isn’t very popular in my area.  However, I’m enjoying it all at least.

The new fly rod from my Dad arrived and it is a Scientific Angler 9 ft 7/8# rod and reel set.  It has a lot more play in the tip than my other rod and makes using poppers and such a lot easier.  However, it seems to have been pre-spooled with a doube taper fly line and it is causing me some issues.  Mostly, the problem is the fly and leader sliding back through the eyes of my rod when I raise the rod to cast.  My other rod had a weight forward fly line and was much easier to handle.  At the same time, I have to appreciate the way the double taper line presents the fly… hardly any impact on the water.  So I’m a learning a little about the differences in lines in having used the two different set-ups.

Hooked on Fly Fishing

Last weekend, my husband’s grandfather came by to fish and he brought a fly pole.  That brought back some very fond memories of seeing Grandpa Thompson fish with his fly rod.  I remember thinking how peculiar his rod looked and almost feeling sorry for him not having a rod that would cast out as easily as my Zebco 33, ha, ha.  But he was quite successful with his rod!

Anyway, Andy, Brian’s grandfather, offered to trade me rods for a bit and let me try out fly fishing.  It was the first time in my life that I had ever held a fly rod (that I can recall), let alone tried to fish with it.  I had watched him fairly closely and recalled tid-bits from how my grandfather use to do it and… well… I STUNK at it!  Our pond is hardly open enough for a spincast reel and here I was… trying to learn to fly fish in it?

I gave it up rather quickly, but then I got to thinking about it.  What if I had done this or tried that?  I stewed on it for a short while, then found myself looking for a fly rod on my next trip to Big Kmart to get other tackle.  It was driving me NUTS that I couldn’t get any line out in the water on that rod!  Something HAD to be done!  I was just going to price them, if they had any, and see what kind of flies were available that I might could somehow rig onto my spincast.

Lo and behold, they had a little cheapy combo set for about $20 and I figured that would be enough for me to practice with in the open yard.  Brian helped set it all up and we took turns trying it out.  In just a short while, I was actually getting line out!  But I didn’t stop there!  I tied on a fly and gave it a whirl.  I caught SIX fish in less than an hour!  Three bluegill and three bass!  Then I lost the one and only fly the fish were interested in up in a tree somewhere.  I tried the others several times and the fish wouldn’t even look at it.  I was incredibly deflated.

Still, I was stoked about it.  I absolutely LOVE to fish, but my experience has been limited to well stocked ponds and tried and true rivers and creeks.  I’ve fished a few lakes with my family, but not enough to really learn a lake well.  I’ve been fishing since I was about 5 years old… maybe younger… but my memory only goes back that far, where fishing is concerned, and I like to think I’m pretty good at it.  However, this fly fishing thing seems to be exactly suited to me.  I’ve always loved the strategies behind fishing.  You don’t just drop any ole lure or bait in the water and hope for the best… you observe the habitat, know what you are fishing for, take things like sun and shade into consideration.  There is truly a science to being a successful fisherman and with fly fishing, that science is taken to the extreme!

Like a junky needing a fix, I wound up making a trip to Dick’s Sporting Goods to buy myself for more supplies.  I grabbed some flies I thought would do well, some more leaders and tippet line… a few more things than I had intended on getting, but I was there, ya know.  And I am glad to report that I am back in business!  The fish are responding to the flies I selected and I even managed to land a few today.  I’ve learned a lot from reading “how to” articles on the internet and I think I’m off to a pretty good start.  Of course I’ve also seen all the photos of monster carp and gorgeous rainbow trout being yanked out of rivers and streams so I’m sure at one point, I’ll have to do that too!

I had to call my father and ask him if grandpa had ever taught him to fly fish and he said he knew the mechanics of it, but never really got into it.  GASP!  He also told me that folks who take a strong interest in it usually wind up converting, if you will, and will love it for life.  I think he’s right!  He called me today to tell me he’d been out shopping and found me a better rod and reel which he sent via Fed Ex today.  I’m so excited! 

Forgot to mention that my loving husband had assembled my rod and put my reel on backwards!  Just figured that out today, too.  Sad to be so new to something that you can’t even tell when your equipment is working properly.  I must say, now that I have everything assembled as it should be, it is much easier.