I have been following these posts for awhile now and have been into FAOL for even longer. This is my first question/ post for you guys. I’m looking forward to becomming a good contributing member.
Cold water is great and I’m going this weekend but i get to spend more time in warm water , farm ponds 1 to 20 acres around Charlotte,NC. I’ve fished for 30 yrs. but for the last two years i’ve gone back to the long rod from UL’s and 2" curleytail grub jigs (the most productive lure of all time for me: trout to flounder).
This question relates to Gills and LMB with WB’s,nymphs, and leach patterns:
Once you find the holding areas in the lake what lure movement/presentation do you find most productive. Such as: sink to bottom raise in 6 inch strips with 2-5 sec delays.
I hope this is not to juvenile a question ,but i find that presentation is probably the most important factor (even beyond lure choice) once the fish are found.
Thank for your replies…
Hey ZZ,
Nymphs and scuds work pretty well on
warmwaters. I generally cast them out and
let them settle in the water column, then
slowly raise my rod tip and let them
settle again. If buster blue gill is home,
he’ll usually jump on it pretty quick. I
fish them close to structure, usually on
the shady side. Very productive for me.
Warm regards, Jim
ZZ,
I fish mostly ponds & small lakes & I prefer topwater & slow sinking, lightly weighted, flies for these waters. If you would toss a live worm into the water, it doesn’t “plunge” headfirst to the bottom…it “settles”, as Jim Hatch says. With a leech pattern, I do a slow strip with short rod twiches as it settles. With nymphs, I strip & let settle, but I’m gonna try lifting the rod as Hatch does with scuds.
Oh…WELCOME!!
Mike
Welcome aboard ZZ.
In the spring I fish mostly unweighted flies - nymphs, wooly worms, etc. with a 2-3" pull-pull-pause with sometimes a 6" or so sloooow pull thrown in.
After the fish move back down in the water column I fish a lot of scuds and nymphs under a strike indicator - almost like fishing with bait. Fish against the weed wall, next to “wood” and so forth. Almost near “something”. That could also be a pontoon boat [a big ‘un] moored on a dock. Just move the fly slowly every once in a while. I fish this from 2-3’ down to the depth of my leader - usually 9-10’. If I’m not using the nymphs I’ll be slow stripping a weighted olive wolly bugger [size 10 or 12, 3X long] probably. This is a super panfish/small bass fly. When the sun goes off the water it’s popper or floating foam spider time. There’s just something about bluegills on topwater! Hope this will get your started.
Tite lines!
Donald
ZZ,
Welcome here. Not a juvenile question at all but a good question. My answer is “it depends”. Since you’ve been spin fishing for 30 years, you know what I mean. Some days (cold water for example in early Spring) they want it sloooooow. Some days (post spawn after the fish have healed up when the water’s warm for example) they want it fast. some days twitch and pause. Other days stick the rod under your arm and retrieve with both hands, one after the other for a steady retrieve. Just put your 30 years of knowledge to work and apply it to flyfishing.
Like you, I came to flyfishing after a long career of bait and spincasting and I’ve found that the biggest challenges to WW flyfishing are 1.fishing deep and 2.fishing brush which I still say that both of these problems can be more effectively resolved with something other than a flyrod but nothing is more fun than a flyrod. Good luck. You’re going to have a blast.
Once you find the holding areas in the lake what lure movement/presentation do you find most productive. Such as: sink to bottom raise in 6 inch strips with 2-5 sec delays.
SLOW 
. Assumption: subsurface flies are implied. I let it sink to the bottom and then strip it in very slow, stop (2-5 seconds sounds about right) and start, like short finger over finger strips (with very little or no current). I guess about one or two inch short strips and mixed up in sequence might describe it better. It largely depends on how much current is present. For a faster current, I usually but not always use a faster retrieve. Sometimes I let the current do the work for me but add extra fly movement using the fly line. I never use the fly rod tip to impart fly motion (unlike a spinning rod where I do use the rod tip) because it puts me in a bad position for a good hook set (I impart fly motion only with the fly line). I feel bites through the fly line, not the rod tip anyway. I use the rod tip to set the hook, not the fly line, because I tend to miss fewer fish by hook setting on the rod tip.
Robert B. McCorquodale
Sebring, FL
“Flip a fly”
[This message has been edited by dixieangler (edited 20 April 2005).]