Pike Rod - Bartsch BF 909-2

After long work I managed to finish the first rod for this year. I've been a little bit out of exercise but everything went well. I built the rod for a pike fly fishing session in Ireland ( Lough Derg ). I hope, I'll drill some nice Esox with this rod. Karl Bartsch, one of the most skilled rod builder I ever met helped me with the choice of the components. Many fly fishermen don't like 2 piece rods but I do even it will be a little bit more difficult with the transportation. 

It's a 9 foot  9WT rod built on a Bartsch BF 909-2 blank with an ALPS reel seat, REC guides. Thank you very much Karl for your help ! 

Here is a link to Karl Bartschs Rod Building Shop !

The Grande Bouffe - Part II

Now it's time to present my catchy wet trio, 3 terrestrial wet imitations, included in the chubs summer 'grande bouffe'. I modified this patterns during the years adding new elements or replacing some of the used materials with newer ones. All of them are very productive but my favorite one is the wasp. You'll definitely be successful fishing this patterns also in trout waters. Here you have a general recipe:

Hook:         heavy shrimp hook at least size 8 ( for example Akita )

Thread:      any, just match the colours

Abdomen: antron (yellow / green) and peacock herl

Wing:         krystal flash ( tan ) / deer hair

Hackle:      soft hackle ( brown / black)

1. The Wasp - The abdomen of this fly is made of yellow antron ribbed with black silk. I used tan krystal flash for the wing, tied in a S-loop. One partridge and one brown hen feather for the hackle. It is easy to tie and very effective.

2. The Black Fly - I start the abdomen with 3-4 turns of pink sparkle braid continued by a few turns peacock herl ribbed with silver wire. Same S-loop technique for the wing. The hackle is also made of 2 feathers, one partridge and one black hen.

3. The Grasshopper - The abdomen is made of green antron ribbed with silver wire. You can use some other more contrastive materials for the ribbing. Rubber legs are a great option but you can also use pheasant legs. The wing is made by deer hair but don't take to much. In this case I used only one brown hen hackle. 

Have fun with the tying and hope you'll catch big chub with this patterns.    

The Grande Bouffe - Part I

Having a few days off, I started to think where to go fishing. The idea of catching trout or grayling didn't satisfied me, probably cause I caught almost salmonides the entire year. My thoughts quickly ran to the fish that opened the gates of fly fishing for me, the chub. The rivers had low water levels during the last days and I chose a tributary of the Danube which resembles almost perfectly with the river on which I cast my first flies many years ago.

Since the mercury past 30 ° during the last days and the water temperature was more than pleasant I completely gave up waders.

Food is abundant in the summertime. Wasps, grasshoppers and other insects land unwittingly on the water surface contributing to the grande bouffe. Chub is a customary guest of this culinary orgy.

In this case I use to fish with wet flies. I always have my catchy trio in my box: wet wasp, wet grasshopper and a black fly.

The results were not long waited and fish made their appearance with the first casts. Most of them I caught on the wasp imitation and had between 1 and 3 lbs. Although the drills were rather average, the strikes were like cannon shots, firm and strong.

A snap on the surface caught my attention and I immediately cast in that area. Instantly I felt the strike in my rod. This time I had a bigger fish on the other end of the line. After a few minutes I had the fish in my net. It seems that my wet flies were also appreciated by this last fish of the day, an asp around 4 lbs.

When the sun reached its highest point on the sky, I decided to end this wonderful fly fishing day cause of the heat. I caught nice fish, made some nice pictures and I knew some cold beer was waiting for me at home.

I hope you enjoyed the pictures and there will be more about the flies during the next post.

Fly Fishing X - Zone

Fly fishing is like a Pandora's box. When you think there is nothing else to impress you, unexpected things happen. As a conclusion, fly fishing is like a box full of surprises that is feeding our eye, mind, soul and sometimes our stomach.

I decided to try to catch a carp with the fly. My home water holds nice specimens, but never saw them feeding on the surface. After discussions with fly fishermen on different forums, one of them told me to put some garlic extract on my nymph. I don't have such an extract at home cause I'm not a regular carp fisherman but I have enough garlic in my kitchen, so I cut a clove into pieces and put it in a small box together with a damsel fly I wanted to fish.

I knew the water in cause was always good for a surprise but never thought it will go out like you'll see in the next pictures. After the second cast I began to strip the fishing line with short breaks in between, strip-strip-stop-strip and strike. Suddenly I had fish contact but it was definitely not a carp. The fish was fighting good but not as aggressive as a carp. I thought it could be a bigger perch or maybe a pike, for this last case I was using a piece of 7x7 steel wire rope. No, it was not a pike, it was an eel. Long time ago somebody told me a story about an eel he caught on the fly and sincerely I hardly believed it. I couldn't have a better proof that you can catch almost every fish species with the fly. I sacrificed the fish taking care not to get the blood on my mucous membranes and went home with my prey.

I enjoyed it fried with some potatoes and a cucumber-garlic salad. I'm curious if I'll have another opportunity during this human life to catch another eel with the fly.