The Scrapyard Plug Strikes Hard

As they say,"The proof is in the pudding" and brother this fly is swimming in it.  A few weeks ago on a whim I cut up a dozen or so small sections from a wooden dowel I had laying around the garage and proceeded to whip what I thought would be a top water poppers.  What they turned out to be was a sub surface torpedo that hits bass where they live.

So as a service to my fellow fly fishing and fly tying anglers I have decided to post a quick 'how to' on making this fly.  It is also an excuse for me to share my discovery of old technology that continues to work.  No high density foam or state of the art high tech materials here; just feathers, a hook, and wood. 
   First off I know what you are thinking, "That isn't a new fly.  I have a dozen poppers like that in my box already."  And that's just what I thought until I fished it and discovered that this fly is no popper.  I had made it to be a bluegill popper but boss , this bug don't pop.  It swims and it triggers bass to bite.

    The reason why it does this is due to the density of the wood dowel.  Compared to other popper that use plastic, bass wood, or balsa, the dowel is made from high density wood for strength and as such is a much heavier wood.  When you add the hook, the glue, the paint, and heavy wraps of thread then you get this subsurface plug.
   At first I was disheartened by this discovery since I was originality going for a popper.  I proceeded to coat the first few flies with a floatant but that soon wore off and as soon as that popper became a torpedo the bass where on it like a fat man in a donut factory.  I have been out to various ponds since that day and the dowel fly has been a top producer on every outing.
    My last trip yielded me a nice 3 lb bass that took the fly like a cheetah running down a juking, jumping north African gazelle.  After a sporting fight that tested the limits a bass can jump once hooked, I landed the him and resolved to give this fly a name.  What I came up with as a no brainier and a tribute to the junk I got in the corners of my garage just waiting to be used.
    To tie your own Scrapyard Plug use your own imagination - or try and follow these instructions.  It isn't a hard fly to make but then again the best flies never are.

1  - Take a standard wooden dowel from any hardware store cut it down to usable sizes for your hook.   I used a #10-#8 popper hook and a 1/4 in wooden dowel. You want the dowel to be no longer than from the eye of the hook to even with the point of the hook  If the dowel is shorter then that will work even better.
2  -  Using a hand saw or a band saw, cut a slip in your dowel just deep enough to place the hook shank.  This is the most difficult part since the dowel is so small.  I used a pliers to hold the dowel and then took them to the band saw.  A piece of advise is not try to use your fingers to hold the dowel.  You will discover that the saw is sharp and will bite like a barracuda.  Trust me.... it hurts so use pliers.
3  -  Next take the wooden dowel and secure it to the hook shank using super glue.  Do not try and use head cement.  Supper glue is much stronger and will hold the wood to the metal longer than anything else.  I didn't use any wraps of thread before securing the dowel and have had NO problems with loose dowels on the hook.  

4  -  After the glue has dried - an hour just to be safe - I shaped the back of the dowel in a downward slope.  I used a power tool for this but you can use a carving knife or sander.  Another word of warning... Just be careful because again, the fly is small and your fingers will be close to the workings.  A wooden dowel is a hard wood and is difficult to work in small sections.
5  -  Once the shaping is complete then its on to decoration.  You do this just as you would any popper.  I took mine out back and spray painted them green, red, and light blue but its up to you.  In my opinion you can never go wrong with red.  Bass just seem to love it.  After the paint dries then add the feathers.  I also added rubber legs but have since cut all of them off.  Being a subsurface fly the legs twisted the fly in the water and honestly I got more strikes without them.  I know stick to a standard 2-3 trailing tail feathers and a few wrapped around the back 1/3rd of the hook.  Keep it simple....stupid.

    PLEASE let me know if this fly gets added to your bass box and if it works for you then send me the pick.  I would love to know if you find as much success with it as I have.
    I know that there is nothing 'new' in the fly fishing world when it comes to fly creation so I consider this a re-discovered recipe.  I discovered this more than likely the same way it might have been discovered back in the day - completely by accident.  It works and that's all I care about.   Enjoy!

Remember When....

My first hook-up with a Yellowstone Cutthroat

  Remember when you where a kid and the summers where spent traveling the back roads of America with the family.  Remember when the only map you had was a road atlas you picked up in a rest stop and no one had ever heard of gps.  Remember when you pulled into Yellowstone for the first time.  Remember when your dad finally found the 'perfect camp site' next to the lake and while the folks set up the tent and the old Coleman stove you and your siblings rushed to the water and couldn't wait to cast to those monster cutthroat.

My Dad and Me on a hike

  I Remember and if you had the upbringing that I had you can even now recall the smells and sounds of the great outdoors.  You can remember that sizzle of a fresh caught trout on that green Coleman stove.  You can remember mom priming that old gas lantern and the glow it provided as the family settled down at the camp table to play a game of go-fish.  The sites, sound, and smells of those trips stay with a person for eternity and that old green Coleman stove is seasoned with those memories that made my childhood special.

The proud angler and his catch

  When I saw that the OutdoorBloggerNetwork had partnered with Coleman I was thrilled.  “Sponsored by Coleman and hosted by the Outdoor Blogger Network, this is my submission for the Coleman Camping Heritage Essay Contest.”   It turned out they where asking for stories and memories about how Coleman products had been involved in my life.  I can tell you that with the upbringing I had the memories just came flooding back.

  When I was a kid taking two weeks - or even a month - out of the summer and disappearing into the backwoods of the western US was a family tradition.  Truth be told I can remember with absolute clarity sitting on top of that bright red Coleman Cooler watching dad priming that Green stove and cooking a true back-country meal of fresh fish and baked beans.  I am not sure how old the Coleman equipment was when I was a kid but I know it was rugged and guaranteed to last.  In fact I am sure my dad still has that same stove today.  And, if I'm not mistaken, that same cooler might still be occupying a small corner of his garage waiting for the next trip into the great outdoors.

Fishing with my bro in Northern California

  Truth is that I was a lucky kid to have the experiences I had when I was young.  My brother, Sister, and I couldn't wait for the summer camping trips.  I can remember packing the car the night before a big trip and not being able to sleep.  I can remember that my folks must have been itching to get going as well because there was seldom a time when we ever left the house on a trip after 4am.  We always were a good two hours into the trip before the sun even got up.
The places we went were the mountains of Northern California, Yosemite, Oregon, Utah, The Blackhills of the Dakotas, Wyoming, and one of my favorites -  Yellowstone NP.  Regardless of the destination, nearly every place we went, fish and water were close by.  Besides the Coleman camping equipment, the fishing poles and swim suits were always a must have on any trip.

    Now that I am grown up, married, and have two kids I have vowed to give my kids the same benefits I had when I was young.  We go camping when ever we can and I am proud that my kids love the outdoors as much as I do.  Even my loving wife, who had never camped before we had met occasionally turns to me and says, "We need to go camping!".   Inevitably, within the hour we have the calendar out and are planing our next adventure.

Camping in SC

    A month ago, while on a camping trip to the beach, my family and I found ourselves wishing we had that bright red Coleman metal cooler with that handy latch on the top.  While washing dishes a few feet away from our cheaply made plastic cooler -without the handy lock - my wife was a few seconds late to catch one brave raccoon snatching our morning sausage from inside the cooler.  After the initial shock of the event had worn off we mentioned how nice it would have been to have had that cooler from my childhood.
    Nowadays my family and I aren't cruising the back country roads of the Rocky Mountains looking for camp grounds on rest stop road maps but we are covering a good deal of prime beach camping as well as Smoky Mountain sites.  When my kids grow up I hope they remember those trip with as much fondness as I do.

Proving The Wood Dowel Fly Works

After one of the worst business trips I have ever been on with late and broken aircraft messing with my schedule, I returned home by mid afternoon to find that the family was still at school.  Instead of unpacking, grabbing a cold one, and start to work on the lawn, I reached for my box of newly created flies, my 6 weight rod, and I headed out to catch some bass.

     In my last post I mentioned that I had made a handful of bass bugs out of a spare wooden dowel I had laying around the garage.  During my entire four day trip I had thought about these little bugs and could not wait to get them in the water and see how they performed.  Some might say that obsessing over a few bass bugs for any amount of time is unhealthy but you need to remember that any guy that spends hours upon hours casting to illusive fish without the slightest hint of a bite might be already unhinged.  So obsessing over the homemade bugs is normal in a sort of sick way.
    Anyway, as soon as I got home I dashed out to test these little guys until the family returned from school.  As you can see, the bugs killed them.  The very first cast with the green bug you see below hooked into a good looking bass and the pictures tell the rest of the story.

Giving all the bugs equal play was important so I changed them up often and used a variety of techniques to retrieve them.  I found that the bugs seemed to excite the bass the most when retrieved with long under water pulls followed by erratic short quick jerks.

It also seemed like the bass really liked the red but every color caught fish.  One interesting discovery was how they behaved in the water.  I had expected that these little bugs would readily float on the top but what I found was that after only a few short casts, they began to sink.  This I found was an added blessing because that is where the majority of strikes occurred.   I also found that if the fly sunk to low then there was less of a likelihood of a strike.  It worked best when just under the surface, occasionally popping up after a retrieve.

I also found that since the bugs became submariners on the retrieve, they also tended to twist in the water.  I need in the future to try and solve this problem.  I am not sure how to do this so I am open to suggestions.
  After some of the bass fishing seemed to die off I headed to an area of shallow water known for big bluegill.  The smaller gills stayed away but a good number of the larger ones where more than happy to take these flies.

  Overall it was a very successful few hours and as you can see, the homemade bass bugs work.  It was extremely satisfying to see the work and the wait pay off.  It made my bad business trip fade into a distant memory.  If you would like to see how to make the Dowel Bug Bass Killer check out my last post titled Improvising Poppers.  I will try in the future to perfect this bug by reducing the line twist while keeping the semi-subsurface action this fly has.  Who knows, I might actually even post a true instructional step by step on how to create this simple bug.

Improvising Poppers

The other day I spent the morning making bass and bream poppers form simple wood dowels.  That's right, I went old school for this one.  Instead of going to the fly shop and purchasing a bag of pre-made poppers, I went out to the garage, found me a spare wood dowel from the corner where I keep extra wood, and cut them into small, popper sized sections.

I then too them over to my band saw and sliced notches in them for the hook placement.  After that I took out my Dremel and did a bit more shaping before I took them over to the vice and attached the # 8 hooks.  After that it was back out to get spray painted them back in to get all the feathers and legs attached.  I was half expecting to test them out this weekend but once again work gets in the way.  Hopefully next week I will be able to test them out.

    I know a lot of you are thinking why would I go through all the work of making my own poppers bodies instead of just going down and buying pre-made bodies - or for that matter just buying the whole pre-made popper, feathers and all?  I have done that before and they worked good but sometimes you need to create something just to prove to yourself that you can.  So the answer is a simple one for me.  I enjoy the process.  I like to feel that this fish that I catch is  not just being caught on a store made mass produced lure.  Like most fly tying anglers, I like to feel that this fish is being caught by a fly that took time to create.  It is being fooled into thinking that this fly I created is actually an edible morsel.  In the creation of this fly, I am ever more a part of the fishing process and I feel that much more satisfied in every fish I catch.  Its not just about catching the fish, it about how you caught that fish and it goes beyond the thrill of the tug.  It goes beyond just how big a bass you haul in and into how well your creation performed.  (OF course a big bass on the line doesn't hurt the  'process' of creating flies)
    On the flip side, if my 100% home made poppers completely fail to catch fish then it is that much more of a realization that the fish just might be smarter than me.  That sort of knowledge hurts.

Painting The Sunfish

   The other day I had a full day off work and had planed a grand day of trout fishing up in the mountains of North Carolina.  It had been a long time since I had the time free and the weather to make the trip but sometimes things don't work out the way you plan.  When I got home from a business trip the day before my scheduled trout adventure I was greeted by a little girl with a temperature and a stomach bug. Suddenly a trip to chase trout in the mountains didn't seem that important and staying home with my little girl became the priority.

   The good news was that my little girl got to spend some quality time with her old man.  Luckily when we awoke in the morning her high temp had broke but due to the school regs we had to keep her home anyway.  So what do two kids do with a day to burn at home?  First off we had a little breakfast and then settles back on the sofa to watch a little movie.  Next on the agenda - Break out the paints.
   It had been quite a while since I painted a fish so I cracked the watercolors and artists pad of premium paper to paint up a quality version of the bream I have been catching a whole lot of lately - the Pumpkinseed Sunfish.

   My girl on the other hand would not be satisfied with crayons so I shared the colors and she got to work painting a few butterflies and then began to sketch birds and crabs on a spare pieces of paper.  As the morning passed into mid afternoon the two of us worked across the table from each other to the sounds John Hiatt and John Prine.
   As I finished up the final touches on my work I thought back on the trout trip I was suppose to have taken and the little girl that had needed me.  It didn't take half a second to realize that I wouldn't have traded that morning with my girl for an entire week of chasing trout.  Those are the memories we carry long into our lives.

Pumpkinseed Sunfish
8.5" X  13"
Watercolor On Paper
FOR SALE

The Stealth Bomber Bass Killer

In my last post I mentioned the Stealth Bomber Fly but soon realized that I had failed to add any pics of this fly in the mouth of a bass or any instruction on how to tie this little wonder bug.  So with the purpose of getting a few bass pics with the fly in the mouth, I took an hour off and hit the local pond.  They are not the biggest fish I have seen hooked with this fly but with the hour I had to fish in the heat of the afternoon, they ain't a bad catch.

From what I can gather, the Stealth Bomber fly pattern was created by Kent over at FlyFishGA.com who I come to find out was a native of my area of SC.  Gotta love the local boys.  On his website you will get one of the best in-depth descriptions of not only how to tie up this bad boy but also how to cut the pattern for the foam as well as how to fish it.  This site came in especially handy for me since the first few hook sets I tried while fishing this fly very nearly ended up with the hook being neatly set in my right eye.  I soon learned that a strip set is best despite the automatic reaction most of us have to raise the rod tip.

Anyway, click over and check it out, especially the PDF on how to tie this fly.  Great fly Kent and thanks again to Kev for getting me hooked on this fly.

Tying Flies And Catching Bass

Despite the pressures of work and household duties I did manage to get a few hours at the vise the other evening and discovered something about myself.  I believe that I am the slowest fly tier there is.  In just less than two hours I only managed to tie up a pitiful six flies.  That's right, SIX.  Granted that there were a few other distractions present and I was not fully concentrating on the task at hand but still, It was a disgraceful showing.

So what was so complicated that it took me so much time to make six flies?  Truth is the flies were not that complicated, I am just that slow.  First up was the bass and bream killer known as the Stealth Bomber.  I picked up a few materials to create this little effective bug at the Fly Fishing Show in NC this year and later got some instruction from Kevin.  I tied a few up in white to augment my box and then a few more in black.  I have to admit that I had to consult the instructions a few times during the first tie job - my memory for specifics of each fly is a bit hazy and I tend more often than not to just wing it.

Of course even when I have the directions and material lists in front of me I also tend to substitute my own material at hand for the recommended materials.  In fact that is how I do most everything.  I guess that deep down I just think I'm smarter than the expert.  More often than not I come to find out that the expert is called an expert for a reason but when it comes to my own flies that I am going to fish, I don't really care.  They are mine so the Bombers you see are not the recommended way to tie them up but for me they still work just as well.

Next up was a foam popper, the inspiration of which came from an old bass book from the 70's.  Of coarse they used a different foam back then and the eyes where painted on but what they lacked I filled in.  This little guy is actually not so much a popper as it is a skimmer.  When played on the water, it dives just a few inches under the surface and then pops back into the film.  Tied in on a #10 or #12 hopper hook, this little guy is a true and tested bream killer.  I do however recommend (as you will read about later) that it is tied in something other than white.  For some reason the bass and Bream around me shy away from white unless it is streaking through the water.

So how did these flies do on the water?  This morning I hit the pond to test them out and the black Stealth Bombers worked great and got a lot of attention.  I was excited to even get a few tailing fins as eager bass tracked it in on a faster - frog swimming - retrieves.  The white Bombers were snubbed and I found myself wondering why I even bother with them.

The small poppers got a little action with the bream and once again I found that white is a very unpopular color choice.  Green and especially black seem to work the best.
As the hours passed I fell back on the good old Woolly Buggers and rabbit strip streamers and hooked into a few bass.
Overall it was a morning well spent even if it took me so long to tie those flies up.  One things for sure, I would never make it as an expert tier.  How those guys whip out dozens upon dozens of flies in as many minutes as it takes me to set up my vise I'll never know.

Panfish Are Just Fun!

   I had a few hours between dropping the kidos off at school and having to leave for work so I tossed my 4 W in the back of the car and headed out to do a little panfish angling on the fly.  Small poppers, spiders, and inchworms were the weapons of choice and as the sun began to heat up the pond, the fish responded in kind.

 I think panfishing is so fun because they always take stuff off the top.  rarely if ever are you going to test your line strength on these fish (though I have landed a few that could have easily filled a standard sized skillet) but you are never going to be disappointed with their takes of stuff off the top.

   I once read an old article on 'fly fishing in the south' from a magazine dated around 1910 (I enjoy reading how the old timers did it back then mainly because they knew how to tell a good fish story) and although it primarily focused on the 'Black Bass' it did have a little to say on the good times of tossing flies to all-to-eager sunfish, bluegills, and bream.  It went on to say that if an angler was so inclined, he could easily line a stringer with 30-40 of these fish in less than an hour and feed the family well that night.
   Back then they would have scoffed at the idea of catch and release primarily because food was never something you threw away.  In fact I imagine if you would have asked about their catch and release views they would have looked at you for a long minute and say something to the effect that 'occationaly one got off the hook but with a good set you can easily bring them in.'

   Part of that is true today; a good hook-set will easily lead to more fish but most fly anglers today are strong advocates of catch and release instead of the classic 'stringer of fish.'  The reason I suspect is that cleaning these fish is tedious at best, food is easily retrieved at a local grocery store instead of the pond, and most of us believe in the sustainability of our local waters.  Of course all that is a bit high minded to some and it doesn't stop some corn fishers from raping my favorite pond of big bass and bream by the bucket full, but I digress.
   Don't get me wrong, I would never pull a bugger out of a big bass's mouth in favor of hooking a bluegill and I would always choose a trout water over a bream pond if the two were side by side but for a few hours to kill and no time to head to the mountains, fishing for these little (and sometimes skillet sized) panfish is non stop action at its finest.  All fly fisherman can agree that any fish that consistently takes dry flies off the top is a worthy and fun species to catch.

Been A Long Time - This Is A Big Post!!

It has been far to long since my last post.  Actually it has been far to long since I have done a painting, thought about trout, or for that matter, done anything on the web besides checking Email.  The reasons are many including family emergencies, a whole lot of traveling, an art show I did that took a large chunk of time, and probably most of all a complete relapse into laziness.  So to jump-start my interest in the web I knew that I had to do a decent painting to get back into the game.  I have had some decent luck with bird lately and my experience with fish... well you know how that has gone.  So I finally decided to combine the two with the only bird worthy to pluck large rainbows from mountain lakes - The American Bald Eagle.

As always, I started off with a detailed sketch and worked in color as I go.  I have been asked how I get the ideas for paintings and in this day and age it is quite easy.  The web is a great source for color photos and reference material to work from.  It is however quite difficult to find the right composition I want so I end up finding a number of photos and drawing inspiration from them all.

I call this work:

"Fishing Master"
Watercolor on Paper
11in. x 14in.
For Sale


I also thought that I would give you a quick photo montage of my activities of the past weeks.  It is the least I could do for my absence from the blogging community.
First thing was a trip to the beach with the family and a few friends.  We got rained on one night really hard but the kids and I loved it.  The raccoon that stole my sausage from a cooler five feet from where my wife was washing the camping dishes also loved it....  We had grits for breakfast the next morning.

I tried for about ten minutes to surf fish but my heart wasn't in it and I soon found myself looking for shells with the kids and hassling a few horseshoe crabs that we came across at low tide.  When I go home I did however manage to hook a few sunfish.

Next was a few days of hunting for turkey.  What you see is exactly what I saw the entire time I was hunting.  Lots of trees and no turkeys.

I squeezed in a few hours of fishing for sunfish here and there..... again.1

I also did an art show in the town of Pendleton SC and managed to get my name a picture in the Greenville Paper.  It wasn't a huge success but I did manage to sell a few paintings and come out ahead.  Since it fell on Masters weekend as well as Easter, the show was not as well attended as I would have hoped for.
One thing I did get was an nomination for best in show.  I of course didn't win anything but it was just nice to be noticed for my first show.

I also received a whole lot of feedback from other artists at the show who were surprised that this was my first showing.  They had great things to say about my collection of art and seemed to really appreciate it.  Overall the experience was an encouragement for me and my art and I hope to find time to try another showing sometime in the not to near future.

I also got some time to do some bass fishing on a fly rod.  No biggies but It was still fun to wet a fly.

And last but not least is my book.  Okay, its not really my book but my name is in the credits and my art is scattered throughout.  I am also unable to read a lick of it because it is entirely in Spanish (I wish now I would have payed more attention in school) but I am still excited to have my work finally in print.

The book is on carp -barbel- fishing around Spain and it comes fro a fellow blogger from across the pond.  You can check out his blog at Barbos con Mosca for your own copy of the book.  His publisher was kind enough to send me a few copies for myself and a few close friends but if you want one then you will have to look to him.  If you have time, at least stop by his site and check how they do it over the pond.  He has some great pics and great advise if you have a translate option  on your computer.
I did do a whole lot more in my blogging absence but most of it was mundane or personal and would bore you to death so I'll end on a high note.  I think was the longest I have gone in three years without posting or checking blogs.  It was good to have the down time but now it feels good to be back at it.  I hope you survived reading this post and if you didn't then your not reading this anyway