Capt Bob LeMay

In the backcountry we use a variety of patterns in basic white as well as firetiger colors. Most are on hooks that range from a #2 to a 2/0 , occasionally a 3/0. Here's one bug on a 3/0 called the Razor cut mullet.. in basic white. almost all of our flies and bugs sport a wire weedguard as well for working heavy mangrove jungle shorelines... This sample is a bit less than four inches overall.

That Dahlberg variation is just outstanding... I'd have my anglers using something similar (fire tiger colors) in both the fresh and salty portion of the Everglades fairly often.

Thought it appropriate since the saltwater scene is so different from the freshwater world.

I'm pretty much iimmune to the various pitches that come my way... My wife, on the other hand...

We did three days this week with anglers and I'll have a report later on today... Here's a pic or two of the ones we caught and released on the fly... a nice fat Oscar on a yellow/white clouser style fly in freshwater followed by a Peacock bass on the same fly the next day down at Flamingo with a nice backcountry redfish on a larger clouser style bug a close-up of the pink and white clouser style fly that drew a lot of strikes that day "Just nothing like the 'glades" "Be a hero... take a kid fishing"

Winter isn't a slow time at all for folks in my area (south Florida) since lots and lots of visitors come our way. Bad weather, though, cancels more trips than I'd like (including last night and tonight's scheduled night bookings...). That leaves me with time to fill lure orders (bucktail jigs currently - both small and large orders...) and make a rod or two for the skiff. At last count I've done three new spinning rods to replace ones my anglers have broken as well as replaced the on-board battery charger on my skiff... Use a boat in hard commercial service and you break things - it goes with the territory. I'll try to take time later today to post up a fishing report or two since we did get out three days earlier this week... "Just nothing like the 'glades..."

That reel photo brings me to the one big Pflueger I still have - brand new in the box, that I bought as a spare tarpon reel more than forty years ago - and never had the occasion to use.. One of these days some collector will have it , I'm sure...

No secret at all - in fact I'm using feathers - that most experienced tyers would reject out of hand... This particular fly is one of a series from the late eighties, done up in five different colors - Drew Chicone featured a red and grizzly one in his recent book BELIZE FLIES that just came out last year and I did a step by step for him that shows the exact tying sequence for anyone interested. I thought that he did a great job of explaining in detail the eleven patterns for Belize... At any rate, the collar is done with three wide, webby saddle hackles - that are tied in by the butt ends as a unit - then palmered forward. What looks like maribou or hen saddles is actually the fluff at the butt end of the saddles that is left in place and not stripped away to add bulk and movement when in use.... You have to look at the stem on each saddle and only use that part of the butt end that has a thin enough diameter to be able to wrap around a hook without cracking, splitting, or breaking away. The saddles (and the neck hackles that make up the tail) are the cheapest dyed or natural strung chicken feathers that come from China.... Wide, webby, and not worth much to most freshwater tyers - they're the sort of goods you might use for a feather duster (back when they were still in use...). I still have a great supply since I always bought them - by the pound... Here's a pic or two of the various colors and materials that the Big Eye tarpon flies came in. I'm still drawing royalties on them with Umpqua... Here are the Green & Grizz, the Sands (white, yellow and grizzly) , and the Orange Grizz all are mounted on my improvised drying sticks... The head finish on the original bugs was FlexCoat, a rodbuilder's finish. After application the flies needed to rotate for two hours until the finish set up properly... Since I've been buildign rods myself for many years using FlexCoat was a simple step in the production process... Here's the Sand Devil, variation #4 in the series - it's been the most popular of all - and still in demand in some quarters... This entire bug is done up with red chinchilla feathers, neck hackles for the tail and saddles for the collar... Note that the fluff on the base of each saddle is a different color than the rest of the feather, making an interesting feature in the finished pattern... The one remaining variation, the brown and grizzly has brown collar and grizzly tail (not shown). I'd say that johnnyquahog came closest in his guess since the saddles I use for this pattern are very close to being schlappen... By the way the grizzly looking tail feathers (and the grizzly mentioned in collars for some of these patterns) - aren't grizzly at all - they're called chinchilla in the trade (or a times simply called variant...) that's a very good grizzly substitute in some cases.... - including the dyed orange collar mentioned in the original query...

It’s 3:30 in the morning here and I’m booked to fish today so I’ll post the info tonight if possible… Thanks for your interest

I've only lost one rod in my nearly 30 years as a guide... Here's the (actually true...) story.. The backcountry of the Everglades where I take most of my anglers has numerous rivers that drain the brackish interior out to the coast and saltwaters... These rivers are wild mangrove jungle scenes and usually eight to twelve feet deep with strong currents when the tide is strong. With dark waters we can, at times fish right on top of bottom fish that will hammer a live or dead bait if presented properly. My angler that day was a big fellow (college football tackle size ...) and he got taken to the cleaners with the first two baits so I set him up a third time, and he dropped down into the same spot and was immediately hit by something a lot bigger than the first two bites.. in fact it was so big and so quick that it actually snatched my angler out of my skiff before I could reach him... When he went overboard he held onto my poling tower and i was able to pull him back aboard - but he'd let go of the rod -so that was that... We joked later on that next time he fished with me he'd have to wear a tether - but to this day I'm very careful where i allow my anglers to stand on my skiff.... and the following week I had to make another heavy rod... If there'd been a camera recording that incident the video would have gone viral i'm sure - there are fish (and other things) in the dark waters of the 'glades that once or twice were definitely bigger than my 17' skiff. No, not a place for a casual swim at all....

As a saltwater type - my leaders are all hand tied (and since I'm from the stone age - a bit old fashioned). For anyone hitting the salt for the first time - here's the first step - a permanent butt section connected to the end of the fly with a nail knot ( two nail knots in a row if connecting to a full Intermediate fly line - one won't work...). I prefer monofilament for this portion of any saltwater fly leader (and Ande Premium is always my first choice if available). Each butt section ends in a surgeon's loop big enough to pass any popping bug through and here's the routine... 7wt... 3.5 feet of 30lb mono 8wt ...4 feet of 40lb 9wt... 4.5 feet of 40lb 10wt.. 5 feet of 50lb 11wt.. 5.5 feet of 50lb 12wt... 6 feet of 60lb I'll forego the final "quick change portion of my leader setups for now... but here's a teaser.. I tie up pairs of leaders, joined by a common bite tippet, then loaded loop to loop on spools by size... When needed you pull off a leader pair, clip the bite tippet in half and have a ready made class tippet with shock (or bite tippet) ready to secure to your butt section and ready for whatever fly...

Always a possibility that the thief - is in-house as well… As you can guess, I’ll never be allowed on any jury…

Most likely it was chopped up and sold for scrap (and the scrap value of the metal was probably a good bit of money...). Down here in paradise, years ago during the crack cocaine troubles, thieves were even taking aluminum lamp poles along busy urban freeways to sell for scrap. One guy I knew back then reported that he caught a crack cocaine zombie actually trying to remove one of the aluminum storm shutters off of his house - while he was at home... Glad I'm years out of police work - the desperation of addicts will be hard for anyone to come face to face with in that line of work (understatement...).

I smoked from age 16 to age 23..before quitting cold turkey. To this day I can't tell you how I was able to do it but I was single back then. Best thing I ever did looking back on it. For me - that was 52 years ago now... Anyone struggling with that habit has my sympathy. By the way, when I was in the service a carton of smokes was around $1.75... You'd think the tobacco industry was trying to get all of us hooked.

On the issue of tying threads - currently I'm struggling with supply issues... My wholesaler reports that shipments from Danville have been a bit uneven... Twice now I've ordered a particular color and been told that my wholesaler doesn't have it since Danville hasn't produced it and they have no idea if and when it will be included in their ordinary course of business. Guess I'll be using Uni instead - still in that large 210 denier size and praying it will come close to the actual color I've been using forever...

Outstanding display... Where I am most days in the interior of the Everglades - the reds rarely tail at all - we usually spot them cruising, mudding, or feeding along very shallow shorelines with no grass at all... All our tailers are down in Florida Bay just south of the areas we fish most days...

Poopdeck... thanks for your info about in-line singles.... Very interesting -and something to consider since my anglers toss lures as well as flies at tarpon... My normal routine with plugs for big tarpon is to change out the rear hook for one - two sizes larger (and in the 4x strong category..). We do get solid hook-ups with the larger treble hooks -but, unless the plug is of small size (relatively...) big tarpon are still able to toss the lure entirely too often. Hook a big tarpon on the fly and it has a hard time tossing the hook on it's jumps - instead they break my anglers off if they're not quick to "bow to the king...".

Snook do behave a bit like largemouth bass in that they will attack anything that comes near (and we use many of the same tactics, lures and flies for them) - when they're hungry... After that things change since they're very quick once hooked and will streak towards the nearest cover and stitch you up before you even realize you're on one... The harvest of them is strictly controlled since they're also great table fare... In my area, along the coast if you hook one - sharks are always a problem since they like to eat them as well..

That bit about homo sapiens is true wherever you go in this world, unfortunately, in my experience. Of course as a retired cop my point of view is a bit skewed but I came to the belief years ago that - it's who we are as a species... All possibilities, angel to demon are contained within each of us from my experience.. Any time we get compared to monkeys - the monkeys ought to feel insulted...

If I lived up north I wouldn't be much of a fisherman at all - until it warmed up a bit... Instead I'd take up poker playing, pool shooting, visiting other fellow's wives - nothing dangerous at all... All of that, of course, was many years ago. Nowadays - it's just a memory...

In my neighborhood - we have fish that will eat whatever fish you've hooked.... just nothing like the 'glades... Here's a true story... in a place called the Little Shark River one day my anglers caught and released a small great hammerhead (about six feet long, and skinny, maybe 50-60 lbs... at full growth a great hammer may be as much as twenty feet long...). It was in good order and swam off - no problem. When that small guy was about 200 feet away from my skiff - it got blown up with an enormous explosion... and whatever monster had him in it's jaws swam by us with that little hammerhead sticking straight up in the air about three feet... My anglers got really excited and asked what was that... I replied a really, really big shark... When they asked what kind my only reply was large and hungry.... very hungry. No, the areas we fish in are not suitable for swimming since the waters are dark and you just don't see a big animal headed your way until it shows itself (which only happens now and then...).

Finally, this past weekend I was booked out of Flamingo in Everglades National Park , the interior - mostly Whitewater Bay, is starting to show its winter population of reds, snook and other species... On Saturday I had Mark Howard and his wife Dot aboard for a short trip out of Flamingo (they were staying at the new lodge there...). We found lots of trout at first - mostly in the interior near the Gulf coast - but all were on the small side. We were using the lightest spinning gear and small lures almost exclusively... Mark is a retired fishing guide from Anna Maria Island and I was looking for a bit more action so we moved back inside and found both redfish and snook in the same shallow shorelines... The reds were all slot sized and working in twos and threes along very shallow shorelines (good sight fishing... ). The snook were laying just about 20 to 30 feet off of those same shallow shorelines (and we never saw them until the strike..). Here's a pic or two from Saturday... Mark is a really big guy - this red was around 23", carefully released.. A nearly slot sized snook - one of three that day... Almost all of our fish that day were taken on 1/8oz leadheads - with plastic tails using only 10lb braid on light spinning rods - great fun! Inside waters on Saturday were unusually warm for January - back at the ramp that afternoon we showed 77 degree water.... The next day was a definite change of pace. I committed to meeting my anglers at an interior chickee (they were part of a group in two bigger boats and wanted to fish with me instead... ). I knew that I'd have to get an early start just to meet them but never guessed I'd log 31 miles to get there that morning (the Harney River chickee was our meeting point). Fortunately we didn't have to run back there at the end of the day and met up with their group at the Joe River chickee instead... Still and all - it was a more than 90 mile round trip that day for my old skiff... Our first few hours that day were a struggle - just to find fish - and we struck out in Tarpon Bay, and a few additional spots near Oyster Bay before I decided we needed a change.. At a nearby river mouth we finally found fish and began to score well on a variety of species laying off the shoreline at the very beginning of the incoming tide - then found the reds and snook we were looking for nearby. We caught and released seven snook (all under 24") at that spot without moving - all on small leadheads (just like the day before) as well as small reds and one very nice 18" trout, all carefully released - then ran back inside when the action slowed. Once back in Whitewater the same pattern as the day before produced well for us. Here's a pic of our best snook that day... Jeff Sink with a nearly slot sized snook on very light gear... What started out as a very slow day - just got better and better.... Just nothing like the 'glades... This time of year we count on cold front after cold front coming through, every 7 to 10 days - our next one is headed to show up this coming weekend (along with the usual high winds and sudden temperature drops). In coming weeks, as soon as the weather moderates and we have low seventy degree water temps in the interior for a week or so - the giant tarpon will flood up into Whitewater Bay and nearby areas.... If the waters stay cold (air temps supposed to drop to 50 degrees this Saturday night...) they'll stay away... Note: Every bit of the action this past weekend would have been perfect for an 8wt rod with a simple weight forward floating line... "Be a hero... take a kid fishing" Tight lines Bob LeMay (954) 435-5666

Have to toot my horn a second time... this past weekend the waters in the interior of the Everglades out of Flamingo... were as high as 77 degrees. If the weather stays mild in a week or two we'll begin seeing the big tarpon... Whitewater Bay is the first place the big girls show up down here - well before they show up down in the Keys each year... Just nothing like the 'glades. In winter the interior waters in places like Whitewater Bay are just warmer than any shallow waters elsewhere and that warmth is a magnet for big tarpon every winter... Will post a report with photos under "non-fly fishing" since I didn't have any fly anglers this weekend...

Over the years, on more than one occasion... Here's what I've recommended to my anglers when they have an outstanding catch they want to memorialize... I hand them the fly to clean up and preserve as well as my best photo of the event - then encourage them to do a shadow box display - with both the photo, and any info they want to record - as well as the fly (with leader if desired...) mounted under (or over) the photo. Done properly it makes a GREAT display... When I started working on boats, more than fifty years ago... I was working as a mate on boats sailing out of Miami Beach (Haulover and Castaways docks) and green as grass (understatement). This was years before I took up guiding out of a small skiff and in that time we killed every fish we could and sent as many of them as possible to the taxidermist for mounting that "trophy". I'm very glad that world is long gone and nowadays most anglers prefer catch and release if they're not keeping a few fish for the table...

A very old thread... had the fun of re-reading what I wrote back in 2012 - and wouldn't change a word... Hope someone somewhere can find a use for that part of the calftail... I call them kiptails since my earliest mentors (one of them a fishing partner of Joe Brooks...) always called them that... The good news for all of us is that as long as there's still a demand for veal.. we'll never run out of calf tails.