Flies

Tied up a few flies today. Remember to tie some mono on a newly tied fly and see how she sits in the water column. I've been filling up the sink lately. 

Monster VT brown

Well just got back from a weekend at the fly fishing festival. Managed to sneak a little fishing in today on the east branch raritan. Shout out to Arne Mckinley for pulling in a beautiful 23 inch brown in a VT river this weekend!  

EP permit

Off to the fly fishing festival in Somerset NJ for next two days(http://flyfilmtour.com/)! Just tied up a crab pattern that works wonders on stripers, blackfish, and yes PERMIT! This warm rain we have been getting is great news for the rivers. Prey for warm weather the next few days and we just might get some red hot fishing. Tight lines

Next comes legs

Trim top and bottom of hook shank followed by perimeter.

Alas your EP permit!

Enrico Puglisi permit: Krystal flash pearl, grizzly marabou chartreuse, ep fibers, ez legs etc...

Vimeo fly fishing channel

Those of you that love to watch quick vids on the fly. Check out http://vimeo.com/user9997855/videos and http://vimeo.com/channels/flyfishing

We've been having some freezing rain the past 5 hours. Have fished the past three days on the East Branch in Brewster,Ny. Managed to move a large brown today. Caught this beautiful rainbow yesterday evening, check out the hue on the pelvic and anal fin. She sipped a micro midge in olive. There were bwo's and midge on the surface with the occasional trout rising. Something I was very surprised to see. Water temps are 37 degrees and with the rain in the next 24 hrs we should get some good fishing once the rivers start to drop in days to come. Especially if the air temp remains above 40 mid day. Good luck out there and tight lines. Flow on the east branch is at 209 cfs and rising. Wait for the drop.

Sight fishing for bones at night!

Fishing for tailing bonefish at night has become the brothers' favorite way to fish. Small sharks cruising at your ankles and silvery tails flashing in the moon light, it doesn't get much better. There is something about fishing in the dark that allows your imagination to run wild. On a low tide and when the moon peaks up above the horizon were off to our secret spot. Under the moon and stars its amazing to see how these fish hydroplane into the shallows.  Catching a fish like this makes the walk back to the skiff in the deeper and more treacherous water a little more bearable. Bars with a silver phantom.

A quick look back at Alaska

With winter well under way I thought I'd put up some eye candy for the AK angler. Hard to think that this beautiful landscape is currently cloaked in never ending darkness. For those of you that have not been to the 49th state please do what you can to get there. You will not regret it. I will not be guiding there this summer however Tony Gugino from Salmon Country Guide will be at the Royal Coachman lodge. A place immersed in fishy water. Look it up!

Temperate rain forest. Beautiful. 

Misty Fjords

Think salmon like pink?

Fellow guide and Captain Greg Eklund of Islamorada like me a long way from home. 

Dungeness crab fishn'

prehistoric 

Tennis ball in the gut. Works wonders. 

Getting the gang into some halibut. 

Grey goose about to be on tap

Base camp below

Rich with a good one! 

Who said the East Coast has small fish?

Salt chrome for my dome

Mild winter = carp still swimmin'

Homeward bound

What a trip. The amount of bonefish caught could only be summed up on a calculator. Observing these fish in their natural environment is something special. Lucky for us we captured a lot of it on film. The camera's highlight witnessed a school of bonefish's last few minutes in the mangroves before the outgoing tide pushed them out of their secure hiding spot and into the danger zone. It was amazing to see a black tip shark and barracuda waiting so patiently for these fish.  On a different note I hooked a 15-20 lb range snook in the mangroves only to loose the beauty seconds after. Snook are rare down there and to feed one was quiet the experience. Between the footage from this past week and the great lakes it is safe to say I have a lot of editing to do. Tight Lines!

Getting a circle hook out of a sharks lip can be tough but rewarding! Didn't quiet get there on this one. 

After an endless day of polling and a cursed go pro camera we finally got a beautiful feed on camera.

Breaking your back on the fly tying press is worth it! 

Hooked on ghosts!

Arms about to fall off from the amount of bones we've been hooking. Sun has not been cooperating however, so we've been fishing skinny water scanning for tails and pushes. The bones are stacked right now! Will put up some cool video footage soon.

Fed a phantom with this fly today!

Home sweet home

What an afternoon! Arrived at 3 in the afternoon and skipped lunch to get out on the flats. We were rewarded with tailing bonefish all afternoon and into the evening. Lost a big fish, however, we still managed to get a few. We also had a shot at a 10 lb fish easy. It's tails were sky high! Looking foward to driving the egret 20 miles east tomorrow in search of tarpoona! Should be interesting to see how the fishing holds up with the full moon creeping in. Either way its good to be back down here. Cheers! 

Fishing Report January 5, 2012 Atlantic Herring push!

      

       Happy New Year! With the season over for most, I thought I'd throw in a quick report/outlook on recent fishing. Up until two days ago the weather has been very mild. Fish are swimming. Reports of good brown and rainbow action on the Saugatuck in the 12-18 '' range have came in. Small midges with a little flash are the ticket in the tailwater (make sure you use a very dry indicator with a couple split shot!) The Farmington River like the Saugatuck is producing, early afternoon is the ticket. I have not made it up to the Naugatuck in three weeks however, flows/conditions look okay, definitely worth prospecting. Winter caddis are being seen in the morning with bwo's and midge in the early afternoon. Fished the Mianus (down river of dam) for 45 min. two days ago with no luck, however did manage to shovel a dead brown trout (13''s) out of the water. Fish was plump and healthy looking, weird to see it dead as a doornail. Be sure to fish the deeper slower moving pools. The Thames, Housatonic and CT river have been producing some wintering striper action in the schoolie size.

       For the hardy angler there is action on the SALTWATER. Cod are being caught out East while the western sound is seeing monster schools of Atlantic Herring that appear to be feeding on tiny 2 1/2 '' sand eels. Wouldn't be surprised if there are some flounder tailing these fish. I'll tie up a nice eel pattern to mimic when I get the chance. Here are a few pictures of the Atlantic Herring going wild in a western sound harbor taking just moments ago!

the boys doing work!

2 days and counting