Thursday, September 29, 2011

An Autumn Week on the Miramichi

Finally - after missing the best July on the river in years and a quick trip up in August that was mostly sightseeing and casting practice - our September trip to the Miramichi was here.  We arrived on 9/18 to beautiful weather and plenty of water in the river.


We're fishing out of Bullock's Lodge, formerly known as Tuckaway Cabins, in Boiestown, New Brunswick.  Booting up the first morning, Bridget, Linda and myself:


Fly selection was a no-brainer for me the first morning out.  Back in July, I  sent a batch of my new fly, the Celtic Beauty up to Renate Bullock, guide extraordinaire and a principal in Bullock's Lodge.  As I've noted before, its first morning out of the fly box, 3 anglers hooked 14 fish with it.  Now its my turn!



The lovely and talented Celtic Beauty:


I cast my way down through Home Pool, and when I got to the end of the pool, at a spot variously called Dreyer's Point (by Bill D.) or Tanner's Point (by yours truly), I got a massive grab and, as they say, it was "game on!"  Dan Bullock came quickly with the net...this was a good fish.




This was a very big fish.  He wasn't a leaper, but when he boiled on the surface, it was easy to see he was a force to be reckoned with.  Finally, taping at 37 inches, if you check your salmometer, you'll find that he's a twenty pounder!


During my rest from the big fight, Bridget hooked up with a feisty grilse:



Dan Bullock doing the guiding/netting chores:


Success!  First fish of the week for Bridget:




Linda Warren, the FAR better half of fly tyer and good friend Bob Warren, hooked up Monday morning, too, with a nice male grilse.  She was fishing Bob's Golden Pheasant Spey fly:


It was a beautiful morning on the Miramichi with good friends swinging through the pool together:


Tuesday morning and I'm still fishing my Celtic Beauty at, if memory serves (and it usually doesn't), Elbow Pool.   It was another gorgeous day, still plenty of water in the river, water temp 50 degrees first thing in the morning.   Suddenly, a great pull and we're off and running with another big fish. 



My, uh, fish-playing technique has been variously described as either odd, unusual, or ridiculous:



However, it does get the job done.  A fine 12 pound hen:


Not to be outdone, Bob got into a nice fish, too:





But wait, it's my turn again!  Nice male grilse:



At this point, the days start to run together for me.  I've never been any good at keeping a daily journal, so photos tell the story, regardless of the exact day and time. 

I believe it was Wednesday, though, the Bridget landed another grilse, with a big assist from Bob:







I believe it was also Wednesday that Linda trumped us all with this 22 pounder with great friend and guide Vin Swayze at the net:




Bob's Golden Pheasant Spey does it again!



Bob Warren's Golden Pheasant Spey, waiting to get back in the game:



Thursday, good friends Wally Murray, Renate, Bridget and I:




head down to Camp Pool:


My very good friend, excellent fly tyer and wonderful guide, Renate Bullock:



Walt Scheffler and a couple of his friends were in camp fishing as well.  And occasionally, Walt actually gets out of his riverside easy chair and lands a fish! (on a Celtic Beauty, of course)







Bridget hooked and landed a couple nice brook trout:



Fly-wise, I ended up landing a 20 and a 10 pounder, plus a grilse, on the Celtic Beauty.  I hooked and landed a 12 pound hen on the Golden Pheasant Spey.  I also fished, and had a hook-up and several grabs, on a McCormack's Shrimp.  Don't forget you can click on these pics and enlarge them, click again and they'll fill your screen:


We hooked several more fish than I've shown, and had a great week on one of the treasures of this planet.



Many of the photos in this post are courtesy Renate Bullock and I thank her dearly for supplying them.

A fellow name of Brendan from County Waterford, Ireland, recently sent me this thought:

The great thing about about salmon fishing is its a great leveller, young or old, prince or pauper, the salmon doesn't care and when you are in the water you get totally immersed everything else just fades into the background until you get that jolt...
then there is the fishing hut and meeting guys that are passionate about their sport; enthusiasm rubs off and you end up spending half of your allotted fishing time chatting. You are right - life with salmon fishing is good.

Cheers.


Thursday, September 8, 2011

Gordon Griffiths Floss...just call me the Flossman!

I'm happy to announce that I've cornered the market for Gordon Griffiths SuperGlo Floss in the known universe.  Or North America, anyway, and its for sale, you betcha.

SuperGlo floss is absolutely electric stuff.  There are 5 colors:  Flourescent Orange, Green, Yellow (really more of a chartreuse), pink and red. Click on the pic to supersize, click again to REALLY supersize:



This floss is a 2-strand floss that is easily divided for smaller flies or smoother bodies.  It makes an absolute knockout butt on flies like the Black Bear Green Butt or Bob Warren's Cutty Sark.





I'm selling these in packs of five for $12.50, first class mail included, to the U.S.  We'll have to figure out shipping to other countries on a case by case basis.  You can mix and match colors; take one of each or all five in one color.  That's up to you.  We'll just sell these via paypal; email me at Gary.Tanner117@gmail.com to get my paypal account number.  Thanks!

Friday, September 2, 2011

The Park Shrimp

The Park Shrimp was designed by Ross MacDonald, as near as I can tell around 2009.  I'm getting ready for a trip to the Miramichi the week of September 18-25, and this shrimp feels like it just might work.


The pattern, which I found on both http://www.salmon-ireland.com/ and http://www.salmonfishingforum.com/:

Hook:           Salmon hook, single or double, du jour
Tag:             Oval gold tinsel to suit hook size
Tail:             Bottom layer:  Orange Arctic Runner about hook length with two strands orange flash
                     Middle layer:  Yellow Arctic Runner twice as long as bottom and top layers with a few       
                         strands of  gold flash (I used Yellow Polar Bear)                                      
                     Top layer:  Orange Arctic Runner equal to bottom layer
Rear Body:   Gold Lite Brite
Front Body: Black Seal fur (I used black uni-stretch)
Rib:              Oval gold tinsel to suit hook size, across both rear and front bodies.  Original recipe appears 
                         to call for pearl tinsel.
Wing:            Black fox (I used goat) with gold flash over
Hackle:         Yellow wound on first; tie on Jungle Cock eyes, wind on Silver Badger dyed orange.
Head:             Red

Notes:            I've never used Arctic Runner before; pricey stuff, that!  It has some of the same transluscence as Polar Bear, really lovely stuff.  Also never used Lite Brite dubbing before.  It doesn't look like its going to cooperate at all, but in fact twists onto the thread very easily and nicely.

I'm looking forward to swinging this shrimp and reporting back after the trip!