Flysmallie

Was supposed to spend three days on Crane Creek. Decided to cancel that trip do to the weather. But I still have a new rod that hasn’t seen a fish yet. Well it hadn’t at the time. Made the call at 7:30 to hit Bennett. Started off with a cougar. Lots of chasers, and nippers. Even had one nice fish blowup in it like he was a largemouth but he missed. Switched up to a tact jig with a midge underneath it. Game on! Caught 7 fairly quick, all on the midge. Then I busted it off. The wind picked up and I decided to call it a day. By the time I got back to my truck my glove was frozen to the reel seat.

Keep seeing this on social media today. Hopefully maybe I guess.

Amazing trip @Ham. Thanks for sharing this with us.

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/picturethis-plant-identifier/id1252497129 Here is the app I use. It’s kind of annoying because it tries to trick you into subscribing every time you open it. But if you hit cancel enough times it goes away. Then you just take or upload a pic of the plant and presto! I probably should pay for it since I’ve been using it for years.

I’m not that smart but I have a good Plant ID app.

Snow was a surprise this morning. It looked like a blizzard for about 10 minutes. Dog wanted to go out and when I opened the door and noticed it snowing she just turned around and went back to her bed.

Can’t wait to see it.

Yep. It’s on almost every rod I own.

Rio Gold baby! To be honest I don’t know how much it was. I’ll have to find my receipt. Probably should burn that one before it turns up in the wife’s hands.

Preface: I have been planning on doing some simple gear reviews. I've made a decision to get a lot more dedicated to fly fishing this year, and I have spent a crap ton of time and money getting regeared. I'm not saying that I'm smarter than anyone on any of this. But I have tried out a lot of different things and visited a lot of different places putting hands on what's available (which is a lot harder than it should be). Even if I do make it to a town with a decent fly shop they are either closing by the time I get there or they don't have any of what I want. It's not their fault. There are so many options, in every category, that no shop could ever carry everything. So I've contacted a lot of shops to see what they had available and all that. It's been a journey that is just about complete. My wife would appreciate that. 😁 So that brings me to Lilley's Riverside Fly Shop, and in particular, Shop Manager Darin. Before Christmas I was shopping for rods. I made a decision on a new 6wt. A Redington EDC. So I went on a search to find the right reel for it. Now, if you know how I am, you will understand that this reel had to look a certain way. I wanted a certain color. I wanted it to look a certain way in pictures. I even told Darin, "I know this sounds stupid". But it's how I am. I'm not carrying all that heavy camera gear to not do it the way I want. Anyway I ran across an Redington Rise reel in Amber that I felt would look great on this rod, but they were discountinued. While looking for something else I ran across a fly shop out west that still had a couple. So I did a google search to see if anyone else had one. Lilley's Riverside came up in the search. I emailed the store and they told me that they had one and they put me in touch with Darin. What a great guy he is to deal with. He held the reel for me and we discussed getting me a couple of rods. We struck out on one, it was a long shot and not his fault. But he did order me an EDC and I picked them up today. More to come on the rod and reel once I get a chance to fish them. But Darin is the man. We have spoken on the phone and I have pestered him with emails, and every single time he is as nice as could be. I was short on time and did not get to spend a lot of time in the shop, but immediately spotted some hackle that I had been to two other fly shops to buy with no success. Give this shop some business and you won't be disappointed. In the beginning I had asked Darin if he could get me a Sage rod along with the EDC. Sage shot us down, they aren't an authorized Sage dealer. I haven't decided what I'm going to do for the second rod. I guess most people would just go grab the Sage someplace else. I think I will just find something that Darin can get me.

Yep. Saw a guy get busted over the limit with short fish. All smallmouth. He said they told him the fine was $125. This was probably 15 years ago. The dude was more bummed out that they kept his stringer. I’m sure he’s still out there keeping short fish.

Probably shared this one before but just ran across it again. This is my dad in probably 1971.

I can’t wait for AI to start adding this BS to search results.