A Slow Summer

I hardly fished at all this summer.  The early summer rains swelled the streams to unfishable coffee flows early in the season, and life got in the way.  When I did make it out, the time spent was usually short and I was greeted by the skunk.  I did have a great time fishing in Michigan on the annual trip.  Here is a highlight reel.

Big rock bass

my smallest fish

Dad setting the hook in the background.

This bass had taken both mine and
my dad's lures!

Unreal!

 One of the nicer fish of the week.

I only made in into the Milwaukee twice this summer.  I caught a couple fish both times

My happiest day fishing was just a couple weeks ago.  In the Menomonee, I had a light hit on a scud, so I set the hook.  I gave my rod to Cleo after I was sure she could handle it, and I let her bring it in.

Isn't she the cutest little thing?  Of course I filmed it.

Sorry it's been months again, I still don't have regular computer access.  I'll try to post more regularly.  I'm feeling like the salmon are going to run very soon!

How To Tie a Woolly Bugger

If you are only going to learn to tie one fly, it should probably be the Woolly Bugger.  I know that I can approach any body of water that holds fish anywhere in the world, tie on a size 10 Woolly Bugger and have a pretty good chance at catching a fish.  They are pretty simple to tie, and easy to modify with various materials.  Once you learn how to tie a Woolly Bugger, you can easily tie an Egg Sucking Leech, which is a productive fly for steelhead and other anadromous species in the Great Lakes.

Below is an 8 minute video on how to tie a size 10 black bead head Woolly Bugger.

If you're new to fly tying, I have a post about commonly used tools and materials, and another post demonstrating basic fly tying techniques.

I usually tie a size 10 Woolly Bugger for stream trout and panfish.  If I'm  going for smallmouth,  I usually start with a size 8, if I have a lot of short strikes, I'll go to a 10.  I usually tie size 6 Woolly Buggers for largemouth bass and for salmon migrating up the streams.

Sometimes I'll tie black Woolly Buggers with grizzly hackle instead of black.  I almost always tie olive Woolly Buggers with grizzly hackle.  The olive dye from the marabou will leach into the lighter grizzly hackle and make for an interesting fly.  A few strands of Flashabou in the tail of your buggers may increase their attraction.

Here are some Woolly Buggers and variations I've tied this year.

Size 6 conehead 

Size 6 beadhead with Flashabou

Size 10 Egg Sucking Leech

Size 10 Force Choking Leech, a fly of
my own design.

Here are some fish I've caught on Woolly Buggers.

Summer 2012, Minnesota's Otter Tail River 

fall 2007, Otter Tail.  Biggest smallmouth I've
ever caught

Grizzly hackle bugger, Milwaukee

Milwaukee River smallmouth

Olive and grizzly bugger, Milwaukee

That's a nice Milwaukee River Smallmouth
caught within city limits

Nice rock bass, Milwaukee River

Chinook salmon from the Menomonee

See the Bugger in her mouth?

If I were only going to carry one fly, it would be a black Woolly Bugger, they are just so effective for so many species of fish!  They are kind of like the fly fishing version of the Mister Twister curly tail grub.

feel free to ask any questions, have fun!

English 201: My Positive Influence

I wrote this paper for my English 201-225 course, it was graded C.

Nate Fordham

Prof. Dee

English 201

February 15, 2009

My Positive Influence

My dad has been a positive influence in nearly every aspect of my life.  My mom and dad were divorced when I was seven years old.  Custody of my younger brother and I went to my mom.  As a result, I only saw my dad about eight hours a week, and every other weekend.  A lot of time during these weekend visits was spent fishing, where my dad gave me a love of nature, held me responsible for my actions, and taught me to make the most out of less than ideal situations.

By teaching me how to fish at a young age, my dad taught me to appreciate the outdoors.  My earliest fishing memories are from around age five.  I remember catching two rainbow trout in the Muskegon River.  At that age, my dad baited the hook, cast the line into the river, and waited by the rod while I threw stones and looked for frogs.  When there was a bite, my dad would set the hook and tell me I was catching a fish.  I would run over to my dad and reel it in.  It was not long after this that my dad taught me to cast with an open face reel, and how to bait the hook.  By the time I was ten, I knew how to tie the hook on with a clinch knot, add weight, and a bobber.  Doing these things with my dad pulled me away from the television set and into the wild.

By watching my dad’s stream-side manners, I learned a great deal of responsibility.  There is a place on the White River that we used to fish.  The riverfront was private property in this location, owned by a business.  My dad would go to the business and ask permission to fish there.  The owner of the property was happy to let people use the property to fish.  He would ask that we signed a liability waver, and did not leave trash.  My dad would always get upset when he and I would get to a fishing spot to find trash from another angler.  It seemed like we would always carry out beer cans and worm containers when we left, in order to leave the area nicer than it was when we got there.  My dad taught me not only to be responsible for myself, but to step up when others are irresponsible.

Sometimes in order to achieve good results one must step outside his or her comfort zone.  I learned from my dad that for some reason, unknown to him, the fish really bite in the rain.  They also really like to bite early in the morning.  My dad took me perch fishing one time on Muskegon Lake.  He woke me up at five o’clock on a Saturday morning, so we could be on the water by six o’clock.  This was a brutally cold morning in May where we both caught close to our limit of thirty perch. It is because of my dad’s early morning fishing trips in just above freezing conditions that I had no hesitation braving the elements two years back.  I chose to go fishing on a cold autumn day in the rain, while recovering from a hernia operation.  The weather was miserable, my feet were soaked before I got to the river, the wind was fierce, and I was all alone.  That cold September day in 2006, I caught the biggest fish of my life, a thirty-eight inch chinook salmon.

Today, I understand the value of rural areas.  I am not afraid to take the road less traveled just to see what is there.  I am a responsible individual who knows the importance of doing more than my share.  I regularly put myself into unpleasant situations in order to achieve favorable results.  My dad continues to this day to be a great influence in my life.

A New Hope

Eventually, there will be a time when you're out fishing and you just aren't catching anything!  It's really not that big of a deal, you know?  The worst day fishing is better than the best day at work, am I right?  Nonetheless, getting skunked is a bummer.  It's gonna happen from time to time, but you have a secret weapon, you have (or at least you should have) a rarely used Mepps spinner!  I like to keep at least two at all times, a shiny one, like silver or brass, and a brightly colored one, like Firetiger (orange/yellow/green).  The Aglia comes in sizes 0-5, and is the best known Mepps spinner, but there are other lesser known models that are super effective (like Charizard using Inferno on Paras) for some particular species.  The only setback to Mepps spinners is the price.  They usually run about $5.00 for a number five, and they get cheaper as they get smaller,  and assortments of five will cost over $20.00.  There's a reason they're this expensive, they work!  And really, that's a fairly average price for most lures.  Sometimes you'll find some off the wall color on sale, like my pink one pictured below.  Don't question the color, just buy it!

A collection of Mepps lures.

My current Mepps Aglia stash.

Nice Lake Michigan brown trout, note
the lateral line in the glare.
(Click to enlarge)

In order to know what makes Mepps spinners so effective, you need to know a little about fish anatomy.  Fish have an additional sense to the five senses we have, actually, it's more of a hybrid sense combined of several senses from how I understand it.  The receptive organ for this "sixth sense" is the  lateral line, it can be seen easily on most fish once you realize it's there.  It runs from just behind the gills to the base of the tail.  This organ helps the fish with spatial awareness when traveling in schools or when tracking prey.  It detects electrical impulses caused by muscle movement of other fish, and it detects vibrations caused by water being displaced, almost as if a fish could "feel" outside of its own body, and "feel" sound.  The Mepps spinner blade spins rapidly as the lure is retrieved, causing a lot of vibration and displacement in the water.  So you got the vibration stimulating the lateral line, and then the blade will flash very brightly, triggering a visual reaction, And I'm sure there is all kinds of noise coming from the blade as well.  The triggering of these senses almost seems to initiate a striking instinct.  Even fish that aren't feeding may chase down and attack a spinner.  Some people say that the blade doesn't have to be spinning to initiate a strike, and I'm sure that's true-- but it's like using a fully loaded Desert Eagle to melee someone to death, why wouldn't you just shoot them? Here's a brief story about a time I witnessed a pike chasing my lure.

One time, I was retrieving a spinner off the breakwater in Lake Michigan in Milwaukee, and as it became shallow enough to see, I spotted a pike giving chase!  The lure was almost reeled all the way in, so I slowed my retrieval to allow the pike to catch up.  As it slowed, the blade stopped spinning, the lure started to sink, and the pike stopped dead in the water, six inches from the lure.  I decided to really rip it hard, get that blade cranking as hard as it could, The pike lunged like a lightning bolt and grabbed the lure like it couldn't control itself, the spinning of the blade drove the pike into a frenzy!

 In  a trout stream, choose a small Aglia, a 2 or smaller.  In slower currents, cast upstream and reel back fast enough to spin the blade, you will feel the blade start spinning.  Reel it over submerged boulders and other cover.  You can cast across the current ahead of a pool and let it drift through, the current will make the blade spin as it swings through the pool.  You can use these same techniques in smallmouth streams, but you might want to use a bigger size.  I usually use a size 3 for smallmouth.

An assortment of Aglias

In inland lakes, choose a size 4 or 5 for largemouth bass and pike.  Mepps makes a huge spinner (sizes 6-7) for musky, called the Musky Killer.  It looks like a squirrel hanging from a remote controlled helicopter!  I just stick to the standard sizes.  If you're fishing for panfish, a size three or smaller should do the trick.  My step-grandpa was an avid fisherman, and he loved the Mepps Comet Mino for Pentwater Lake smallmouth bass.

A Musky Killer, measuring
5.5 inches long!

Mepps Comet Mino.
(R.I.P. Grandpa Joe)

In Lake Michigan, and the channels, a size 5 might work for salmon when nothing else will. My dad loves to tell a story of a time he was fishing for salmon off the south pier of the Muskegon Lake Channel during the early 80's.  During the salmon run, guys will fish shoulder to shoulder on the pier.  My dad found a spot on the rocks and saw that everyone was casting spoons with no success.  He tied on a number 5 Aglia and limited out in like a half hour!  He said guys were offering him hand fulls of cash for his Mepps as he walked back with a cooler full of big salmon; to this day, I don't think he goes out without at least one.  I'll even cast a size 5 along the channel rocks, big rock bass will strike a number five.  There was this one partly cloudy day that I was fishing the rocks and just killing the rock bass with a brass number 5.  The sun disappeared behind the clouds, and they just stopped biting.  So what I did then was tie on a size 5 Firetiger and killed 'em again, until the sun came out.  That's why I keep a shiny one and a brightly colored one.  The shiny ones seem better in the sun, the bright colors work under clouds.  So all that day I kept switching colors, depending on the conditions.  I kept eight rock bass between six and nine inches that day and threw at least that many smaller ones back.

So, next time you're out fishing and just not catching anything, open up your tackle box, reach for your brand new unopened size 1 Aglia and say "help me number one, you're our only hope," and start fishing in an epic way!

The Straight Talk on Curly Tail Grubs

My collection.

The first lure that every angler needs is the Mister Twister Curly Tail Grub.  Mister Twisters are very natural appearing soft plastic and the slightest movement in the water will cause lifelike motion in the tail.  You can get a package of 20 Mister Twisters for around $3.00, there are also variety packs with several colors.  You’ll need to buy jig heads as well but those are also super cheap.

Since you have to rig Mister Twisters yourself, they are highly customizable.  You can get heads painted in colors that stand out from the color of the lure, or heads that have eyes painted on them.  I usually get very small unpainted jig heads.  Mister Twisters come in many colors, with the most effective being chartreuse flake, pumpkin pepper, purple, and black, but they are all good.

purple, pumpkin pepper,
and chartreuse flake.  I
ran all out of black.

When rigging, make sure the hook
goes the opposite way of
the tail.

Rigged like this, the tail is more
likely to get hung up 
on the hook.

The most amazing thing about Mister Twisters is that they catch just about anything!  Here is a list of fish I have caught on them.

• Bluegill
• Sunfish
• Crappie
• perch
• rock bass
• bullhead
• creek chub
• smallmouth bass
• largemouth bass
• northern pike
• walleye
• sucker
• carp

When fishing in a bass stream or river, I like to use the smallest jig head I can cast.  Cast them up and across the current to the head of a deeper pocket, or just alongside cover likely to hold fish.  The lighter head makes the lure sink very slowly and naturally in the moving water.  I retrieve the line just fast enough to keep it tight while my lure bounces across the bottom, and if the line goes tight, set the hook!  In the Milwaukee, I’ve caught many smallmouth, some nice rock bass, one 24” carp, and even walleye using this method.  One day earlier this summer, my dad and I caught about 40 fish in the Milwaukee River in just a few morning hours.  My dad borrowed my spinning rod and used Mister Twisters, I used my fly rod and Woolly Buggers.  It was seriously like video game fishing!

Smallmouth on a hand tied Woolly Bugger while
fishing with dad.

One of dad's smallmouths on a
Mister Twister

Nice one!

Nice sized rock bass on the fly.

Beautiful fish.

Rock bass on a Mister Twister.

Chartreuse flake FTW!

When I lived in Michigan, I would fish the rocky walls of the Muskegon Lake Channel using Mister Twisters under a float with good success.  In this situation, a bigger jig head can be used.  The float would go about 4’ above the lure, then cast almost parallel to the rock wall.  The ebb and flow of the water between Lake Michigan and Muskegon Lake will keep your float and lure moving along the rocks while the waves give it vertical motion.  The lure will present itself to spaces between the rocks and dark hollows where panfish, largemouth bass and rock bass love to hide.  If your float disappears under the water, set the hook!  This technique also works along the rocks in Veteran’s Park in Milwaukee, or out on the rocky section of the breakwater, and even right in front of the Milwaukee Art Museum!  Don’t be afraid to climb out on the rocks, find one that looks fairly level and sturdy and make it your home.

A dreary summer day under the Art Museum

The wings of the museum close and open at noon.

This big perch took a black Mister Twister

The rocks along Veteran's Park with
the breakwater in the background.
So much cover for fish.

When I'm in Michigan, My dad, my brothers and I would go out in my dad’s fishing boat and fish in inland lakes.  Most of the time we’d go to Twin Lake on weekday evenings.  Twin Lake is close to home and not too big, so it doesn’t get a lot of fishing pressure during the week.  On the water, you simply cast your line out, then let the breeze push the boat.  You can give your lure some twitches by lifting the tip of your rod occasionally, but a lot of times, that isn’t even necessary.  Largemouth bass or northern pike won’t hesitate to suck up a purple Mister Twister just crawling by at a snail’s pace.  When Kyle, my youngest brother was just a little toddler, we wanted him to feel like he was fishing.  What we did was gave him a yard sale kid’s rod with a brown Mister Twister on a huge orange jig head (we called them “pumpkin heads”) and let his line drop about 8’ below the surface, just to make him feel like he was fishing.  The waves kept his lure moving up and down, and wouldn’t you know it, he caught the biggest bass of the day “pretending to fish.”  It must have been 17” long!  Poor little boy, it scared the crap out of him!  I still remember him crying out “Put that whale back!”  

Magician Lake.  Kyle's all grown up now.  My dad and my other
brother Shane in the background.

If you don’t have access to a boat, fishing from shore is still a lot of fun.  Cast toward docks, lily pads, downed trees, anything that gives fish cover.  You can also just cast out and steady retrieve your line back in, big bluegill will give chase!

Because of their affordable price and effectiveness for so many species, if you are only going to fish with one artificial lure, Mister Twisters are the one.  But i’m betting, once you get into fishing with artificials, you’ll be hooked!