Mega Worm in Place of Pink Power Worm?

[Seth]

It's obvious that the mega worm is great for sight fishing, but has anybody tried it deep beneath a float just like you would a power worm or trout magnet?

[sms_alum]

Tried it a few years ago practicing for one of Phil’s tournaments. Caught a few but did not give it much time. I tied some up using that shammy leather stuff as well. They hold color from a sharpe pretty well if you want to experiment with different colors.  

[Bill Babler]

Have recently tried both a Mop and a Mega below the restricted zone as trout are hitting Egg patterns pretty well clear down to Lilleys. 

Egg is out preforming either with the power worm still way better than anything at this point

[Bill Babler]

Fished a pink Mop from Fall Creek thru Lilleys on the East side gravel for about an hour yesterday.  Mop was tied on a 80th. oz. jig head with a black dubbed collar.  Fished it on a spinning rod like you would a power worm and it was insane.  about 7' below the indicator.

I'm kind of going to go back to what Phil explained about the flow.  I just think the fish are more available and we are able to currently make a way better presentation to them.  I will say they are very actively midging from the landing up and if you can see these active fish, matching the hatch really means nothing.  They are eating and don't seem to care what you present to them.  The midging activity just helps you find actively feeding fish in numbers.  How you catch them has not been an issue once you find them on the feed.

I had a great day just fishing yesterday. and caught them on everything from a 1/2 oz. Fat Free Shad to a size 22 midge   I was swinging it under a crackleback and they ate the Back about 1/2 the time.  I  caught 28 in that many casts at one point   Man it was fun.

[Seth]

Well I tried the white mega worm beneath a float just like you would fish the power worm this weekend during the Elfrink and it worked pretty darn well! It produced quite a few fish including one of better weigh in fish. I did miss a lot of fish though. I'm guessing they were just grabbing the tail without getting the hook in their mouth.

[Bill Babler]

 

I think a lot of those strikes that you may be missing might be the bottom.  Trout don't usually feed by nibbling at the tail of a bait.  Usually they flair their gills and take in water with the fly or insect, taking in the water and item thru their mouth and expelling the water thru the gills.  They can however take a fly in and spit it out in a very rapid succession.  In-out-in-out.

Saw a video at BP in the fly shop a few years ago of a big rainbow both sucking in a midge and spitting it out 3 times in a mater of just seconds.  It was a cool video of both underwater and on top, as the strike indicator really did not move much at all even when the fish had the midge in its mouth.  The fish took the midge and spit it back out from a distance of about 2 inches and would expel it the same distance.  He would just suck water in and the midge would go right back into its mouth from distance.

[Bill Babler]

Variations on the mop/mega worm this past week have become just super deadly throughout the entire upper lake system from the dam thru Branson.  With the current amount of fish we have 50 plus bites a day on this fly would not be uncommon.

Kind of funny as the power worm was kicking its tail.  I think I just gave it a better chance and the results really increased for me and mine on this.

[Flysmallie]

9 minutes ago, Bill Babler said:

Trout don't usually feed by nibbling at the tail of a bait.

They may not feed that way but they do it. Having spent a fair amount of time sight fishing at trout parks it can actually be quite frustrating watching them tug on the tail of a small streamer without ever fully taking it. Could be that they aren't feeding but still are curious enough about it to peck at it or whatever. 

[Seth]

35 minutes ago, Flysmallie said:

They may not feed that way but they do it. Having spent a fair amount of time sight fishing at trout parks it can actually be quite frustrating watching them tug on the tail of a small streamer without ever fully taking it. Could be that they aren't feeding but still are curious enough about it to peck at it or whatever. 

Park trout are terrible for doing this, especially when fishing a wacky rigged trout worm. They will grab the worm and swim around with it and never actually get the hook in their mouth. All you can do is pull it out and let them some back and grab it again. Sometimes they will grab it a half dozen times before finally getting the hook in their mouth. Same with a full bodied marabou or even a trout magnet. When they are being that finicky, I usually have to drop down to a micro or thread jig to hook them.

[Bill Babler]

You guys have got me there, I have never seen anything but a total inhale.  I don't however fish the trout parks.  Watching the fish feed in Taney and at the Hatchery, they totally inhale what they are after.

On a live bait rig I have however had them eat the tail off a crawler if it was jerked to soon so you have a total point.