Flies I Like To Fish/August 2011
If I could just choose surface patterns, where all the action is visible, that would be fun fishing. By far the best trout dry fly fishing is hopper fishing. The western anglers are very lucky; many locations have good mid-summer hopper fishing. While trout will sip most dry flies they, at times, crush hoppers. The great thing about fishing hoppers is a perfect drift is not usually necessary and at times moving the bug will cause trout to charge. When a trout noses under the hopper and follows but will not commit try giving the fly several twitches or a foot long pull. Usually the movement will trigger a hard take.
During late summer surface action can pick up for stripers and bluefish. If there is a good spearing hatch two things happen. The spearing reach a decent size and splash on the surface and the bonus is when snapper blues feed on the spearing. Both events create great surface feeding action for gamefish. Try fishing along shorelines on flats and in and around estuaries. Usually early morning is best but some places have good daytime fishing. Those foggy days or days with high overcast can have fishing into late morning. Try several different retrieves using a steady popping action and a stop and go action. If fish are following, swirling below the bug but not taking try several quick, hard pulls or stop the bug and twitch it several times. On a calm morning a slow craw with loud pops seems to work well.
Largemouth bass are fun top water action. Surface bugs like frogs, splashing poppers and even a bushy Snake Fly are effective. Weedless bugs are best because you can fish the edges or pull the fly quickly through patches of weed with few hang ups. Try different retrieves. At times using just a short pull then letting the bug sit for a long time works well. Mix up the retrieve and don’t be afraid to cast several times to one location. Work the edges and pockets of the weeds and along shorelines. Sunken trees and subsurface weed beds are good bets. If you are fishing big bugs use an 8 weight. You don’t need that much rod to land the fish but casting will be easier.
Regards,
Lou Tabory