2Nd Report....testing Mic's Midges

[duckydoty]

Yesterday, before the snow started, I committed another 30 minutes to testing one of Mic's midges on Upper Lake Taneycomo. The midge I tested yesterday was probably a size 18 tied with a light tan fur collar. I fished it in the same area as the 1st test (the flats between outlets one and two) and then fished that area with an olive pine squirrel sculpin to set a base line on how the bite was. The wind was blowing out of the East for this test at about 10 to 12 mph (now remember, they say, when the wind blows out of the East, fish bite the least). There was a lot of chop on the water and good surface action happening with fish midging. I was using 7x flouro carbon for this test. Started off right on the bank casting into shallow water. Wind caught the fly line right off the bat on the first cast and put me in the weeds on my back cast. Fly was gone. Tied another one on of the same color and moved out just a little bit to make sure it would not happen again. This fly had a hard time breaking the surface tension of the water and would float on top pretty good even with all the chop. I went with it. Started skating it across the surface through all the midging fish and sure enough picked on up on about the 5th cast. This got the fly wet enough to finally get it under the surface with just a little tug once it hit the water. Swung the fly, stripped the fly, dead drifted the fly through all the midging action and did not get a solid hook up with another fish for the duration of the 30 minute test. Got several hits, or what I like to call short strikes but did not land another fish. After 30 minutes of testing, I put on the olive pine squirrel and started fishing. It was slow. I fished the pine squirrel with any and every retrieve you could think of and landed only 2 fish. Pretty tough fishing conditions for conducting the test. After the test was over I did switch over to fishing a size 16 zebra midge about 30 inches under an indicator and started picking up fish pretty good. I guess, even though there was a lot of surface action, the fish were picking the midges up off the bottom, and I probably should have tried Mics midge as a dropper under these conditions. Leaves me a good excuse to get out and fish it again.

Again, I liked the looks of the fly and the size of the fly. With the lighter tan colored hair as a colar, it kind of reminded me of a mini caddis. It caught a fish and got a few other bites under harsh fishing conditions. I don't know if it was the perfect fly for the day, but that is just fishing.

I would use it again. Would like to try it on a sunny warmer day when you can see the midges coming off the water.

[mic]

I would love to hear how the blue midge works to. Thanks again.

[duckydoty]

You are welcome. Happy to test flies any time. I will try the blue one on my next trip fishing Taney. Should be over the weekend.