navigator37

A new addition to the fly pattern database has been submitted by navigator36: Black Beacon

Glad you all liked the pattern...thanks. For the tail, I just use the base fibers of the same saddle feather when I prep it for hackle. Color combinations could be considered with this fly, but for the most part, I like to keep this one drab and buggy looking. Plain and easy.

A new addition to the fly pattern database has been submitted by navigator36: Ostrich Bugger Fly

Up to you I guess. I've thought about trying to sell some of mine but haven't bothered. I walked into a popular fishing store once, and a guy I knew there was running around left and right. I went up to the register to pay for my stuff and he looked at me from behind it with a frustrated look on his face. " Wanna ruin a great hobby?" " Turn it into a buisness!", he said, shaking his head. Must have been having a bad day I guess but I remember that.

Thanks. I'll check out the other flies. It's strange. On fishing for the perch myself there, I was catching loads of them at 6-12 foot depths. I later, many times fished the deepest spot, well over 20 feet deep with a sinking 4 weight line and got absolutely nothing. No perch. Very strange indeed. Maybe pike did get in there. Who knows.

Very nice flies. The rabbit strip for pike will always be a killer.

Well, I just got back from my week of holidays at Duck Mountain. Spent 3 afternoons at Jackfish Lake hitting the perch with my flies. Wow! I've rarely seen so many perch and they were eager to please. About 75 perch later, I called it quits and fished some other lakes. They didn't have black spots but some did have the puss bubbles on their gills. I never tried eating any but enjoyed catching them. They were hitting the floss fury and tinsel streamers like crazy. Fun on a four weight sinking line or a 3 weight floating with an indicator. What a blast.

I haven't used it on anything except simple small streamers. I'll try a leech imitation with it sometime soon. Gotta brainstorm that one. Might work well on buggers too. Take three or four strands of floss, place it on your knee and comb it together and out with a mustache comb or toothbrush. When it's combed out, it's very soft and supple. I'm sure it would work well for the tail on a bugger.

It does have a flowing action depending on how long the wing is. I'm sure that action in black floss would make a great leech imitation but I haven't tried it yet.

Cool looking boatman. Have to try that one. The bead looks like the sheen a boatman gets when it dives back down.

Awesome. Like the flash at the sides.

A new addition to the fly pattern database has been submitted by navigator36: Floss Fury

Pus bubble in their gills? That's something I haven't seen before. Seen enough black spots on pike. I wasn't going to keep any from there, just going there for fun. Then some pike fishing back at Batka Lake. Thanks for the warning Wellman.

No, it's not Two Mile. I fished Two Mile when I was younger and remember there being brookies and loads of perch in it as well. The lake is Jackfish Lake just south of Madge Lake. It's still on the Sask side I believe. The tourism guides still read " visit Jackfish Lake and try for some trout..." It's surprising how many writeups are not updated regarding small trout lakes which for years have been over run with perch. In Sask, There is Zeden, Mitten, Jackfish, and a bunch of other which haven't been stocked with trout for years because of the perch infiltration. I wonder how perch get in there anyways to take over a trout lake. Some of these lakes don't seem to have any inlets or outlets in them. I know the fisheries stocked perch in two trout lakes up north by mistake. It happens I guess.

Yes it is in the Duck. My brother said that people were lined up in the one accessible area there and were catching a lot of them. He looked in some of their buckets on shore and remarked how small the perch were that some kept. He used one of my float tubes and caught nicer ones out farther. One thing that happened got me thinking as well. When he was out there, he talked to a guy with a small boat and depth finder. He noticed the guy had quite a large spoon on and inquired about it. The guy told him that with his depth finder, he encountered a series of deep holes where he got some very big fish readings and thinks there are some large residual trout still there. Hope to get there this season some time. Flo green and black with rubber legs? I'll give that a tie. Leeches too. Thanks you guys.

My brother recently got back from a fishing trip up north on the Sask/Manitoba border. He gave me a heads up on a lake where they used to stock trout but perch got into it and wiped out the trout population. I pulled up to this lake a while ago but never fished it as I was trying out some other lakes at the time. When he told me what he encountered there, I could have kicked myself for not trying for the perch there on a fly. He said the lake is teaming with yellow perch now with smaller ones inshore and the larger perch out a little deeper. Swarms of them, he said. This got my blood running and got me tying up a few perch fly boxes for the trip. I got a new 5 weight floating setup and a 4 weight sinking I've used before. I'll use a strike indicator with the bead head flies. It's gonna be a blast.

In Saskatchewan, barbless is stressed but is still an option. Manitoba requires barbless hooks so when I go there I mash the barbs on the ones that I am using. I have found that mashing the barbs down can weaken and even break some nice flies though. Now, especially on smaller flies, I mash the barbs slightly and then lightly and quickly file down the rest of the barb. I'm not sure about B.C. but you should have no problem with simply mashing down the barbs.

I usually do treat my flies with floatant as I am not the greatest dry fly man out there. I assumed the foam cells retain the floatant better when dressing the fly. Haven't had a problem with it sinking much.

1. When you are fishing a tiny pond catching trout and someone drags a boat in slamming oars or even starting a small motor up, scaring the crap out of the fish. Saw a guy enter a small creek once in a float tube. Funny as hell. 2. When you are catching fish from a lake shore and someone thinks that the fish are all where you are. He then proceeds to fish along side of you with a large jig or spoon. 3. A beautiful, calm afternoon on the lake in my float tube. The trout are there...and then....water skiers.....back and forth past you...arghhh!!! 4. In the float tube in the middle of a lake and having to go to the bathroom. Always make sure you're drained. 5. Wondering as I fish, if my vehicle and other gear inside are still safe and secure. It's always great to fish an area where I can still see my truck from the water. 6. Out north, fishing streams. Always watching my back for bears. 7. Awkward float tube launches at certain lakes. Soft, muddy shorelines, sharp sticks and stumps, etc. 8. Wind knots in my leader sometimes.

I didn't put the hopper in the data base. I guess I could have. The hoppers I have seen where I fish often have that bright yellow under body so I couldn't just wrap the body with furry foam alone. I often try to come up with more simple but effective flies with less material but the hopper patterns seem to produce well with a more accurate under body color. On the furry Foam Hopper, the yellow under body is tied on first at the rear of the hook. I tie a tapered end of the yellow craft foam slice sideways with about two wraps. Then I move/pull the yellow foam under the body of the hook and secure it with more wraps. Ahead of the craft foam base I tie in a length of H&H Glimmer Thread for the rib. It's as strong as wire and lightweight which is good to wrap the furry foam and craft foam together. Then the furry foam strip is tied on at the rear. It's awkward, but then you wrap the furry foam and craft foam strips forward with the ribbing. The thread is used to tie it off near the front. That's how the abdomen is made. I would recommend kevlar for the hopper pattern or another very strong thread.

Thanks you guys. The furry foam cut for the pattern is roughly less than a quarter of an inch wide. Furry foam sheets, as far as I know come in one thickness, so the slice I cut for the caddis appears as a long square strip. In all truth, you don't have to get real specific with how wide you cut it because it stretches so well. Stretching it slightly, as you wrap it around the hook, narrows it's width if you like. Rodd Gunn... You mentioned a hopper imitation with this material. Here's one standard I tie incorporating furry foam for the top and yellow craft foam for the bottom. I still don't tie rear legs on my hoppers but the pattern seems to work fine.

A new addition to the fly pattern database has been submitted by navigator36: Furry Foam Caddis

The hook by the way is a #20 Daiichi 1110 wide gape dry fly hook with a straight eye. Tie chironimids and lots of other stuff on them. They go down to size 26.

A new addition to the fly pattern database has been submitted by navigator36: Micro Mite

A new addition to the fly pattern database has been submitted by navigator36: The Brillar Chironimid Pupae