Skip Matthews

Fatman, those are some really good looking jigs.

Good luck convincing a game warden that you are fly fishing with a spinning rod in a fly fishing only area. Try casting a spinning rig or casting rig like you cast a fly rod, and while I’m thinking about it there is also skill in casting a bait casting rod and reel. Bait casting doesn’t that sort of mean I’m throwing the bait and not the line? Are we not supposed to be promoting good sportsmanship while on the water and off, so why would we as fly fishermen put down or belittle any other method of fishing? Yes, I know I made some lures I called a fly, but I was wrong. I have since scaled them down in size and mounted them on a thin wire hook so they are very light in weight and wind resistance.

Openers by saying this is lure making I agree with you. I have started out making them large enough to learn the process. Once I'm comfortable with working with cork, and I have all of the bugs worked out of the process I will scale the size down. I do believe to qualify as flies the cork should be mounted on a single hook, or attached to an articulating shaft with a single hook attached to the articulating shaft, and the cork should be scaled down, which I am working on. I agree with mikechell the Gorilla Glue foams and leaves holds that trap air when I apply epoxy. Once the epoxy is applied the air bubbles pop up through the epoxy, which leaves holes that have to be filled in once the epoxy hardens. The cork has to be sealed once it is formed to the shape you want, because cork is porous to start with. By using super glue gel the air bubbles should not be a factor, which has to be a stronger hold. Thank you

I have started tying bass and panfish poppers and shallow diving flies. I am using used wine corks for the body and articulating shafts and split rings to attach a treble hook to the shaft or long shank hooks for a single hook point. When I first started, I was using ZAP GOO, but it's too flexible. So I have been trying Original Gorilla Glue. The Gorilla Glue holds up to rasping and sanding the cork once it is attached to the hook where ZAP GOO would not. Now I know Gorilla Glue will expand as it dries, but I sometimes use that to my advantage, such as filling holds in the cork bodies. My question is has anybody tried Gorilla Glue for attaching popper bodies to hooks? Here a two of my flies they were tied so I could fish for bass with them.

I am posting a fly for the first time. So here goes this is a bass fly actually it is a bass plug for an 8wt fly rod. The body is made out of a used wine bottle cork. The shaft is a 2 1/8” articulated shank. The front hook eye is a wire weed guard I tied to the shaft. The lip is a Wapsi Genuine Fly Lipp I purchased from J. Stockard tied on to the front of the shaft. 00 Split rings are used to connect the hooks to the fly. I am using split rings so I can convert the fly to a single one barbed hook if I’m fishing in an area where a single hook is required. I formed the body using a half round #2 rasp and sandpaper. I have retired for the fourth time, and my wife and I are planning on moving back into our lake house on Lake Bistineau. It is located a few miles south of Minden, LA. I will mainly be fishing for bass and pan fish so I have been making warm water flies such as shallow diving and popping bass flies. Any comments are welcome.

Try this website it will get you started. http://flyanglersonline.com/ Every reply from above are correct because you can catch fish on different patterns on the same body of water at different times a day. Just don't give up.