FLY FISHING FOR BLUEGILLS

FLY FISHING FOR BLUEGILLS

   Trout fishermen already know what a blast it is to catch fish on a fly rod, but there is no reason you can't go after other freshwater fish.  In May through early June (maybe later this year), Sunnies and Bluegills will be spawning in shallow water. It will never be easier to catch the big ones all year.
   If you've never fly fished before you will need to do a few simple things. Obviously you will need a fly rod. Rods are sold by fly line weight, two being the lightest and going all the way past twelve. Anything between two and six is a good choice, use your own judgement. They also come in various lengths, nine feet is average. You don't need to spend a lot of money on a reel, even though they can go for big bucks. It just isn't worth it, you're not going after trophy Steelhead.
   Using waders and wading through the water is a popular way to fly fish, but you can do it from a boat or a dock, or even from shore if you have enough room behind you.

BAIT

   What you put on the end of your line is the most important thing. The only thing that's ever worked for me is the Green Spider. I give my uncle Sonny credit for inventing it because I've never seen them anywhere else.

   Sonny was a true Minnesota renaissance man. In the 50's he raced stock cars and had a country western band. He was also a painter. In the 60's he got a job working for the TV station in Mankato. He got to meet a lot of interesting people passing through there at the time, from Eleanor Roosevelt to Jane Fonda to Walter Mondale. He taught me the fine art of drinking brandy. pickling northern pike, and freeing the hostages at the Embassy Bar in Saint Peter. A few months before he died, he also showed me how to make spiders and where to purchase the materials.

   To understand why the spider works so well re-
member that the males have built nests in shallow
water waiting for the females to come in. If you
find them in clear water it will look like an under-
water moonscape. The spider is made out of a sponge material that absorbs water and makes it
slowly drop down below the surface. If they are not feeding heavily they will still eat it if you drop it down on the nest. Bluegills like to keep things clean. Of course if they are feeding you'll know it!
   You can also make the spider look like it's swimming. Just keep pulling the line toward you.
This is effective when you are looking for where
the fish are.
   Of course the Spider doesn't just work on  Blue-
gills. Early season Crappies go just as crazy. And Large and Smallmouth Bass are more than happy to indulge.

Boat Renovation- Raising The Hesperus

I had just sold my Lund Pro V and was already regretting it. I was given an offer I couldn't refuse, but now I didn't have a boat. It was time to find another one. The plan was to find an old boat to fix up like new. I scoured the classifieds for a week.

A boat showed up one day that looked interesting. "18 foot Alumicraft KingFisher".  I never heard of the KingFisher model before, but it sounded interesting. I called the guy up and asked him about it. He explained that he spotted it out in the country, parked in a field. He was an older guy, and he said "you probably don't remember this, but back in the 60's the KingFisher was the boat that everyone envied and wanted".  This kind of got my attention even though it was older than I wanted.

 He then told me that that he negotiated a price a price with the owner with the idea of making it a project with his son. The boat he said, had been all over, even Lake Superior. So he bought the boat. He didn't tell me what he pais for it. 

His son wasn't so sure. Dad, "You're 75 years old and you're fighting prostate cancer and I'm working 12 hours a day trying to run a business." He didn't think it was a good idea.

So I went out to look at it. It was at his son's business in Chanhassen.  I liked the size, otherwise I was not impressed. It had dents, peeling decals, and a rotting floor. His son had broken the front end of the tongue of the trailer moving it around with a lawn tractor. It was welded back together. There also was a patched hole in the hull.

He was much more motivated to sell than his father. It was taking up space in his parking lot and wasn't exactly bringing in business. His dad wanted $1500 for it. No way. The son started trying to sell it to me. "Well what will you pay for it?"

I looked at it for a long time. It was May and it wouldn't be ready to fish with until the following year. But if  I could pay cash for it, I could fix it up over time without going into debt. "$1000" I said. I was still thinking about 18 feet.

   "Oh no!  He would never do that. He thinks the trailer is worth $500." I said nothing.

   "How about $1400?"

   "No."

   "It's got a VHF antenna, that's worth a hundred bucks."

   I shook my head.

 He tried hard to point out the boat's virtues, but he could sense that he was going to lose me. Finally he said, " I tell you what, write a check for $1300 and I'll write you one for $200. That way my dad will feel better and I'll have this boat out of my hair."

   Fuck.

   I couldn't argue with that. "Okay, you got a deal."

Now The Fun Part

   The first thing I did when I got home was google Hesperus. It was on each side of the boat and across the front of the steering console. All I could find at first was the Longfellow poem "Wreck of the Hesperus". Huh.

That explains the hole. I found some other obscure stuff from Greek mythology but obviously Hesperus referred to the poem. This boat had a story and was full of ghosts. I felt better about the whole situation.

   First things first. Clean out the shit, there was plenty of that. Almost everything inside was useless. The seats were bad, the floor was rotted, and as I found out later, the steering cable was obsolete. Fortunately the steering system was a Teleflex Big-T, first built in 1963 (the boat was a '64). The Big-T is still in use today.

   I burned a lot of stuff in my fire pit. The floor would have to wait until I found some marine plywood to pattern it after. As you can see by the picture above right, it had a lot of styrofoam insulation under the floor. Even that was rotton. As everyone said when they saw my upcoming project-"You've got your work cut out for you".
   Once I got out all of the styrofoam, I checked the hole repare, there was still light shining through. This wasn't hard to fix with bondo. After it dried I sanded it down and painted it silver. You have to look real hard to find it and it's never been a problem leak wise.

I had all of the old decals taken off, then had it repainted white. Had some striping done too.

There was no drinking involved, the beer can was
used strictly for perspective. 

   
At this point I found someone who sold marine plywood.  I used the the old floor as a pattern. Using 3/4 inch plywood for the floor was probably over doing it, adding more weight than necessary. Going even farther, I primed and painted the wood before gluing down the carpet. The boat manufacturers don't even do that.

   A word of warning, if you start a project from scratch like I did, it will take on a life of its own. A lot of time went into designing the steering column/dashboard. In fact I spent more time trying to figure out how to fit everything together than doing the actual work. But eventually everything came together and I could finally say" IT'S ALIVE!"

   I won't go into great detail about the live wells I built except to say that they both were found on ebay, along with a lot of other stuff. The valves and cables,  to make the live wells function properly,  were bought through Flow-Rite. Using their equipment will make your system as good as anything new.

Fishing Lures- The Original Bomber

DUST OFF THOSE OLD LURES, THEY STILL WORK! 

   I'm talking about those old Bombers that look like they're swimming backwards and aren't made anymore. This was the lure used by D.L. Hayes on Dale Hollow Lake to catch his world record smallmouth bass in 1955.

These lures were originally made out of wood and later replaced by plastic bodies that rattled. Although both work great I seem to catch more fish with the older wooden ones. They came in 5 sizes with the 600 series being the largest.

Trolling is where this bait really shines! It will consistently dive to 13 feet, but since it floats it won't go down until it starts moving. This makes
trolling easier than using a spoon or other sinking lures.

The company was started in a garage in Texas in 1946. The lure was designed to catch bass in the south. It travels well though, it makes a great trolling lure in Minnesota and other northern states.

Smaller Bombers work well on crappies and walleyes, larger ones on bass and northern pike. In fact, if you use the larger ones you will need a wire leader because on a good day they will drive the pike insane and their teeth will slice through normal line. It's not unusual to catch ten pike to one bass. The leader does not hurt the action of the lure.

This one has caught hundreds of
fish. It was originally chrome colored.
The pikes' teeth have taken off most
of the paint.

Another abused lure.

Original Bombers can easily be found on Ebay. Wood ones in good shape are collectable. If they are beat up in any way, use them
for fishing. A lot of times you may have to replace the hooks. This is
done by unscrewing the eyes that hold the treble hooks on. Sometimes the screw eyes lose their hold in the wood lures. This can be fixed by filling the hole with gorilla glue before screwing them back in.If you're looking for another way to catch fish, sometimes it's better to go old school.