Been fly fishing and tying my own flies since 1990. My home waters are the McKenzie River, Willamette river, Umpqua, Deshutes, Metolius, and big and little Fall Creeks in the beautiful state of Oregon.
Fly Fishermen check in!
- Thread starter dducker3
- Start date
Fly fishing in Michigan - have cottage 15 minutes from the "Holy Water" (Ausable River catch & release). Using dry flies and Woolly Buggers mostly.
Checking in from Utah. Been fly fishing and tying for 37 years. Dry flies only. I tie down to size 28. My main rod is Sage spl 1wt. Orvis 3 wt is my second fave.
Been fly fishing since I was about 10 and I'm 43 now. I tie all my own flies and just about 6 years ago I started making my own fly rods. I try to get out to some of PA's fabled waters (Penns Creek, Yellow Breeches) whenever I can but mostly stay local to Pittsburgh.
Yep, love to fly fish. Mostly fresh water, but some salt....I built the saltwater fly rod on the bottom.
like to tie also...
like to tie also...
Fellow flinger of fur and feathers checking in. I have fly fished for over 30 years but really got into it about 6 years ago. Started doing a little guiding on Michigan's Manistee River 2 years ago. I fish for just about anything with fins, but focus mostly on brown trout, brook trout and steelhead.
My tying station does not look nearly as neat as those pictured here. It would take me several hours to organize the piles of stuff.
I also build my own nets.
My tying station does not look nearly as neat as those pictured here. It would take me several hours to organize the piles of stuff.
I also build my own nets.
Yup... I chase brookies and salmon in Maine; browns and bows on the Delaware; Tarpon and permit in Key West
I like to tie too
I like to tie too
Tenkara here. I tied with my grandfather when I was a kid, but haven't in years. Thinking about getting back into it!
Tributaries of lake Michigan mostly. Rainbows and Brookies mostly.
Tributaries of lake Michigan mostly. Rainbows and Brookies mostly.
After a 15 year hiatus, I'm back to tying and getting ready to do some fly fishing. Just ordered a Regal Eng. Inex Vise; I can't find my old vise--the attic gremlins must have made off with it. I've got an Orvis 5wt 7'9" Far and Fine remaining. Sweet rod that never saw water, but it will now. Gave a lot of my older gear to family and friends. Time to begin anew.
The new vise--very excited to get it sometime next week.
View attachment 466289
The new vise--very excited to get it sometime next week.
View attachment 466289
Started fly fishing 6 years ago, then had to stop when I trashed my back. Then the road to my local river collapsed which made it grom a 45 mile drive to well over a hundred. I used to laugh because I would drive 45 miles, boat 15 miles, just to fish 5 miles from my house.
That is not me but that is where I liked to fish.
That is not me but that is where I liked to fish.
I do not know the name o the steam or river in the background but these tasty darlings were caught off flies I tied and BF used, in a little stream I and the locals call "mill river"... Not dissimilar to the inviting pool that the first bend in the background shot contains. 
I love to fly fish and I did a lot of it when I lived in Michigan. Now that I am in central Florida there is no longer any trout stream fly fishing available to me. I do some saltwater fly fishing on the flats in Sarasota Bay. Snook, sea trout, and red fish are the possibilities there. These fish are very plentiful and a blast to catch on a fly rod. I collect vintage glass and bamboo rods and I even use some of them. My favorite for the flats is an old Scientific Anglers System 8 rod w/ a sinking fly line. I tie a variation of the Clouser minnow that I call my "Sparse Minnow." send me a pm for tying details. It works great.
cottontop
cottontop
Thought I would pass on my recent experience fishing the Bighorn River, MT. Six of us fished the Bighorn River last week and caught very nice-sized brown and rainbow trout, ranging from 16" to over 20". We hail from Virginia, NYC, and Rhode Island. Though some of us tied a few patterns before we left home, a couple of us took our tying equipment and materials with us. I tied at night or very early in the morning based on what I saw while on the water or scuttlebutt from guides. Gratified that four of my patterns caught fish, an adult black caddis in #18 and #20, pink soft hackle Ray Charles in #18 and #20, a dark green wet fly with starling hackle in #18 and #20, and a weird red wire-wrapped chironomid. some tied with white soft hackle in #16-#18. I added 11/0 Czech glass beads to a couple of these patterns, red and green, and they became even more effective. We thought we would be in hopper season, but it never really materialized. Yes, we saw hoppers in the grass, but very, very few on the water. One day a couple of us hired a guide to fish a 13-mile segment. The guide tied on a Moorish Hopper and a Ray Charles sowbug or scud dropper. Trout ignored the hopper and took the sowbug or scud every time. So the hopper was merely an indicator. One remarkable fly the guide used as a lead fly was a red wire-wrapped Kahle hook, probably a Mustad 37160, in #6 as a lead fly for most of the day. He still tied a scud or sowbug as the trailing fly. I actually caught some really nice browns on his worm pattern. Guides on the Bighorn seem to prefer using a one-inch diameter balloon as an indicator. I came to prefer it over yarn or any one of the many commercial indicators. When we arrived, the water had a 2,600 cfs, but rose from dam releases to a tad over 3,000 cfs, which became a little hazardous for wading in many spots. The wonderful thing about the Bighorn is that there are well over 8,000 fish per mile and most of them over 15". The fish didn't seem to be as large as I remember from my first trip in 2010 and the hatches seemed to be fewer. Yes, there were diminishing black caddis hatches and increasing trico hatches. I sure wish the hoppers had been in the water. Drifting a boat along the grassy banks and casting a hopper/dropper would have been more fun than the law should allow.
Oh, for gearheads, I took a new Sage 9'9" 5-wt. nymphing rod and used Rio Gold line. It was just as effective for dry fly fishing. I only gave it up when the guide talked me into using his rod, a vintage TFO IM6 rod, probably because he already had it rigged with his worm and dropper. But it cast well and handled large trout.
Oh, for gearheads, I took a new Sage 9'9" 5-wt. nymphing rod and used Rio Gold line. It was just as effective for dry fly fishing. I only gave it up when the guide talked me into using his rod, a vintage TFO IM6 rod, probably because he already had it rigged with his worm and dropper. But it cast well and handled large trout.Beautiful nets. The lamination shows a very strong net as well. Is that birdseye maple you used? Brodin hasn't a thing on you!
Nice fishI've been fly fishing for trout since 1981 here in the UK. Count me in!
Started 2 years ago, try to get away 1-2 weekends a year, hard in this stage of life with multiple young kids. Rainbows and Browns in the southern rockies of NM, also head to San Juan waters and private rivers in southern Colorado. 1 hour drive for the Southern bodies, 4 hours to get to CO. Would love to buy land some day with river front access for family get aways.
Have a simple 5wt reddington, buy my flies local guide shops to support small business, and LOVE walking up a river taking it all in just as much as the thrill of setting a hook when I get a strike.
Have a simple 5wt reddington, buy my flies local guide shops to support small business, and LOVE walking up a river taking it all in just as much as the thrill of setting a hook when I get a strike.
Checking in - been Fly Fishing since I was 8 or 9. I live in SE Michigan so all of our Blue Ribbon trout streams aren't very far for me. Unfortunately I haven't made it up north for any trout action this summer. Mainly I hunt big bluegills with poppers and spiders. Nothing beats some fresh fried bluegill. I tried getting into fly tying a few years ago but never had the patience to sit down and master it - something to keep on the back burner I suppose
Checking in from Louisiana! I have been fly fishing for a little over 6 years for trout in Missouri on vacations and whatever else I can catch in the lakes and ponds in my area. Give me a rod and a box of olive Wooly Buggars and I'll be one happy man.
I try to fly fish Here in Montana, but the problem is the rivers are all bad, muddy, too low and no fish, yep Montana fishing is really really bad. Oh and the land is on the ugly side as well, no trees, no hills no wild life. so no fish and nothing to see here. And if it wasn't for work, and pending shoulder surgery, I would be out there right now. floating the Missouri or wading North Fork, Blackfoot or Clark Fork.
