Few experiences can compare to wading and sight fishing a saltwater flat for bones and perms. The water is crystal clear requiring your senses to be at their highest operating capacity as you await that one shot at glory. Sometimes, it can be virtually impossible to see an approaching bone, especially on a cloudy or windy day. The permit are […]
Tidal Carp Revisited
The Godfather
The old man parked his minivan streamside and approached the bridge to inspect a pool he may have fished over a 1,000 times. Although Ryan and I were zeroed in on one particular fish, he had several questions for us. “It’s been pretty slow out here huh? said the old man. I replied, “It’s been alright,” even though the fishing […]
Tidal Carp
Fly fishing for carp has opened up a lot of fishing opportunities in a region I am otherwise quite limited in without owning a boat. After several years of plying my craft in local rivers, creeks, lakes, and ponds I began looking elsewhere to satisfy my urge for freshwater ghosts. I found it in an unlikely place I had written […]
Chesapeake Bay Stripers
Spring brings the world’s largest striped bass into the Chesapeake Bay as they follow a smorgasbord of bait and other anadromous species on their annual migration on the East Coast. Although not too far away, I never got around to targeting stripers on fly or gear, but for only a few hours this year I was able to get out […]
Carp Tales
As I approached the bank of the pond for the first time this Spring, I immediately saw an image I had not seen in quite some time. A long dark shadow prowled a few feet off shore obscured by turbid water and freshly disturbed detritus. I hunkered down and tied on some fresh 4x and paired it with a size […]
Damsel in Distress SBS
A few years ago, Adam Hope created the Carp Damsel, which is a hybridized version of a damsel and dragon nymph designed to target carp. The fly excelled across a wide range of conditions but made its name fishing mid-column to prowling carp and to bank feeders where the fly was delicately dapped in front of the fish. The […]
Winter Steel
Four buddies and I traveled north to Pulaski for some true winter steelheading in typical Great Lakes conditions. The temperature was low and over the course of two days, it rarely stopped snowing. Each morning we awoke to 6-8 inches of snow that added onto the few inches received throughout the day. The temperature and wind resulted in frozen […]
The “One”
In 2008, I made my first fly fishing trip to the Great Lakes tributaries to target steelhead. I began with 7 hour trips to Erie and later branched out to the equally far Western Ontario tributaries near Oak Orchard. When I finally fished the larger water of the Salmon River, I knew that it offered a lot and […]
Backup Plans
It is late August and there are sporadic reports of good numbers of salmon running through the lower end of the Douglastown Salmon Run. Naturally, my mind wondered to two handers and swinging flies for fresh kings, cohos, browns, and steelhead. The reports elicited enough of a response that I decided to break my one rule for salmon fishing: […]
Nile Perch
The word for perch in Swahili is sangara. Each day, we went out in the hopes of catching a sangara kubwa sana, but the very big perch eluded us. Instead we caught a bunch of babies, relatively speaking. Sangara kidogo.