Two Unit streamers!

This past Tuesday I took a guy who fishes with JRFFA quite frequently,Robert Farnsworth and his friend, Stewart. It rained relentlessly all day. The guys were pretty committed to streamer fishing. The dam had two generators running all day. Our conditions where less than perfect water wise but our cloud cover was awesome. We had some technical difficulties with a broken rod and staying hung up. Finally, the guys got in the groove and waxed some browns. We probably caught 25 fish and 23 of them were brown trout! That's pretty sweet. We only saw one other boat on the river all day. I was amazed at how clear the river stayed with all of the rain. It was a pretty awesome day to be trout fishing on the Little Red River~!

Fall Fly Fishing Challenge is Saturday

If you're not doing anything Saturday and have the itch to fly fish, you might want to enter the fifth annual Fall Fly Fishing Challenge.
Rick Grassett, a Sarasota professional fishing guide, and I founded the event after agreeing that the area has a lot of talented fly anglers and offers good saltwater fishing.
The event has attracted an average of more than 40 anglers each year. Competition is tough, but it should be. Our goal was to pit the best fly anglers in the area against one another.
Two years ago, we added a second division to the event to attract more anglers. In addition to the Open Division (all licensed captains and guides must compete in the this division), we added the Angler Division. Only non-guides are allowed to fish in this division.
In the Open Division, snook, spotted seatrout and redfish are the eligible species. Overall champion will be the angler who has the highest total of inches for a single redfish, trout and snook. Also, prizes will be awarded to the anglers who have the most total inches of redfish, most total inches of snook or most total inches of trout.
This is a catch, photo and release event. Anglers will be allowed to turn in a maximum of 10 photos.
In the Angler Division. eligible species include redfish, spotted seatrout, snook, ladyfish, jack crevalle, flounder, pompano, permit, mangrove snapper and other species. Six places will be awarded.
The tournament is sponsored by the Mangrove Coast Fly Fishers and Coastal Conservation Association Florida.
Captains' meeting is scheduled for 6 a.m. Saturday at the City Island boat ramp in Ken Thompson Park.
For information, call Rick Grassett at (941) 350-9790 or Steve Gibson at (941) 284-3406.

Another Beautiful Fall day

Sunday morning the sunrise was amazing! The clouds were thick and I just knew it would be an awesome day for streamers! I took my friend Frank and Robb who works for Patagonia fishing. We wanted to boat some big pumpkin brown trout, so we got the big sticks and streamer flies ready. We started out getting lots of hits and lots of action. We lost some nice fish and missed some nice fish. We had about a full generator of water running, so the hook set becomes an art in itself when throwing the big rigs. The biggest fish we saw was probably twenty five inches or better! Robb hadn't done much big streamer fishing and was eaten up with it! Around noon our clouds left us and it became almost hot! Unfortunately, it messed us up for streamers. We picked up a few nymphs for the last hour or so and did awesome. It was another Beautiful Little Red River day!

Little Roger's Birthday

Saturday I took two guys who fish with me often. Roger and Roger Jr. The last time I took these guys, the water was muddy and low. We had a pretty tough day. Saturday we had a great window of low water down river for the morning, then in the afternoon we ran up river and fished the falling water. Starting with the first drift these guys pounded them! We caught fish every place we fished. We had a fantastic morning and probably caught 30 fish. Being the die hards these guys are, we crammed down a sandwich in the car on the way to a different ramp, refueled, and set out after them again. I'm not too sure the fishing wasn't even better in the high water that afternoon! Big Rodger caught 5 fish in 5 casts! It was pretty unreal! Little Roger's birthday was coming up Tuesday so the trip was his birthday present and all he wanted was a brown trout! Well, he sure got one on the last drift! It was a beautiful day jammed full of action and beautiful Little Red River Fish!

Rainy day streamers

Thursday it didn't rain in Heber Springs, it poured. I fished with Tom from St. Louis. Tom is a good angler and didn't let the rain scare him. We put in and ran up river with one thing on our mind, brown trout. We fished big streamers all day and turned lots of nice fish. The temperature was nice. It was rainy but at least it wasn't cold. We found refuge under a dock at lunch and ate a dry sandwich, which was nice. As the day went on, the water got more and more stained. We found a bright fly that the fish seemed to love and had action all day. It was a Blast!

Snook and spotted seatrout plentiful

I was after snook, spotted seatrout and redfish. Those are the eligible species for our Fall Fly Fishing Challenge on Saturday.

So, I launched my Native Watercraft Ultimate 14.5 and hit Bishop Harbor at about 7:15 this morning. No need to be on the water before dawn. Our captains' meeting is scheduled at 6:30 on Saturday and we can't leave for our destination until after it's over.

This morning was awesome. A heavy fog blanketed Bishop Harbor as I paddled to the northeast side. I had a mullet imitation tied on my 8-weight and a Super Hair Clouser on the 6. My plan was to cast for redfish and snook, then hit the trout.

I found a good snook early. The fish hit about 30 feet out from a mangrove island in about 18 inches of water. I knew it was a formidable fish. First thing it did was run for the mangroves, pulling me and the kayak with it.

I back-paddled to get the fish away from the trees and had the snook under control in just a few minutes. Turned out to be a large snook than I first thought. I estimated it at 30 inches as I was getting ready to release it. I later caught a smaller snook on the same fly.

Before I got out of Bishop Harbor, I found plenty of small seatrout around grass patches. I caught and released 15 or so, then headed out into Tampa Bay where I hoped to find a few redfish on sand bars.

Redfish were scarce. I caught several more trout and saw a few snook. But the reds eluded me.

Seems to always be that way in this tournament. I won the Trout Division one year and won the Snook Division twice. One year I did managed a slam (snook, trout and redfish), but the red was tiny. It's the only redfish I've taken in this event.

Maybe tomorrow I'll find a few hungry reds?

25/10/09 - Lands End - Speci Lake

Weight – 44lb 8oz (26lb – silvers)
Catch – 31 Perch, 8 Roach, 6 Chub, 4 Carp, 3 Bream, 1 F1, 1 Tench
Weather – Mostly sunny & windy – mild
Water Temp– 12.5c > 13.0c
Match – Open – 6th overall, 1st silvers

I had a decision to make this weekend, fish Saturday or Sunday. Saturdays weather forecast was for wind & rain, which I didn’t fancy much, whilst Sundays weather was much drier, but still windy. A quick call to Mike confirmed he had a match on Sunday, so I booked myself in.

At the draw there was a discussion whether to put all 15 of us on Match Lake or split it and put 4 on 1 bank of speci (25-32). Personally, wanted to include speci simply because I hadn’t fished it this year and needed some practice for the forthcoming winter league match in 2 weeks.

I found myself on peg 25, a sheltered corner on Speci Lake and when I arrived there was what I thought a big swirl at 16m – happy days. Then I noticed a pleasure angler on 39. The big swirl was in fact a method ball landing in my swim – oh great! I suggested he keep to his side of the lake, which to be fair to him he did, although he had to make a few visits to the margins in peg 40 when ever he over cast.

With peg 26 not in I had plenty of space and too many options. I could just about reach the island with 17m, I had plenty of open water and the margin down my left hand side. My opening gambit was to try 14.5m in open water straight in front and towards the island. After 20mins and no sign of carp, it was time to try down the LH edge on double caster. For the next hour I caught consistently, mostly 8oz perch plus a few small roach, whilst all the time flicking 4mms towards the island and 16m in open water.

The island swim did produce 1 carp, which came off as I was shipping back. I also had a few liners, so tried shallowing up with 3 maggots on the hook, but I still couldn’t get a proper bite and too be honest I’m not build well enough to fish 17m waiting for bites.

By the ½ way stage I had 12lb or so of silvers and needed to make a decision. Stick with silvers for the rest of the match or go chasing carp. Mike West on peg 29 already had a few and I was certain a few people would be catching on Match Lake, so I felt I was out of the running for a frame payout, so decided to stick with the silvers. With this in mind I felt a 2nd silvers swim would be required to rest my LH margin line and fed some micro pellet, a pinch of 4mms and a bit of corn at 11.5m for the skimmers.

As the session progressed bites from the margin swim weren’t as frequent, however the quality of the fish had increased, with bigger perch up 1¼lb, chub and few bonuses in the shape of a decent F1, tench as well as 3 carp.

My 11.5m line produced 3 skimmers & a carp on soft pellet, but I had to wait a while for a proper bite. I also had a couple of chub from under the bush immediately to my right.

Come the end of the match I thought I was in with a good shout of winning the silvers, but not knowing how Match Lake fished I would have to wait to find out. 26lb was slightly more than I expected and I would have been disappointed not to have picked up some coin.

In total I fed 1½pt of caster, mostly via a tosspot, mixed with some atomic cloud and had a really nice days fishing. In the end the I won the silvers quite convincingly, with Nicky Collier taking 17lb from peg 6, however he did win the match with 87lb.

A special mention for Nick Merry, who doesn’t know the venue that well, but has decided to fish the Winter League. His 1st match was on peg 31 on speci, a flyer, which he didn’t make the most of. Today he drew peg 32, had 73lb for 3rd overall, including a munter of 17lb 13oz. At least "Mr Angry" didn’t come out.