Snowy Day Fishin'

Went fishing after the blizzard here with Bob Schoeller, the biggest fish junkie I have ever known. The water was up, but with a little persistence, and the right flies, he was able to get it done. His technique involves poly leaders and tube flies, or fishing shrimp patterns upstream and back. It is deadly, even in high and off color water. I put together a little video footage while we were out. Hope you like it.

Fly Fishing Bristol Bay

Above: A decent Artic Char

Fly Fishing Bristol Bay
August-September 2008

Above: Artic grayling

Above: Fish on!! Silver at the Togiak

Above: Mike Schoeller with an Alaskan Rainbow on the 'Pak

This year, I had the pleasure to fish Bristol Bay with Bob and Mike Schoeller. It was absolutely amazing. The sheer numbers of fish were unbelievable. I have never encountered anything like it in anywhere I have fished. I wanted to share some of the photos from this trip. Picking out which ones was hard, as anyone can take great pictures in Alaska. In particular, I would like to thank everyone at Mission Lodge for making our trip something truly special.

Above: A fresh Silver Salmon

Above: Look at all the eggs in this Chars mouth!!

Above: Evening Ride Coming In
Above: One of the locals...

Above: Bob Schoeller with a pig Rainbow

An average Dolly Varden

The operation was a fly out, meaning that we would take float planes out every morning for our days fishing. It took a little getting used to, but after day two, I came to look forward to the morning fly out. Our days usual started out eating breakfast around 6:00, getting ready, and then flying out every morning around 7:00-7:30. We fished a wide variety of water, from small streams to big water like the Togiak.

Me with a colored up Silver

Above: Our Daily Transportation

We fished a lot of beads and indicators for the rainbows and char, and swung monster streamers for the silvers. We used mostly 8 weight rods with floating lines, although next trip I am going to bring my switch rod! I caught plenty of fish, drank too much beer, ate too much and generally had a wonderful time! Over the course of the week we caught silvers, artic char, dolly varden, artic grayling & pig rainbows. It was like fishing heaven! I am going to start saving my pennies for the next trip out.

Below: the sockeye on the move!!

Bass, Brook Trout and Browns

We have been working all over this month! After a bit of a break because of the arrival of my new boy, Lucas, I decided it was time to harass some fish again. Last week we went to the Penn State area to fish Big Fishing Creek and Spring Creek. Big Fishing is a personal favorite of mine, and it lived up to my memories of it! During our trip down their, we had temps in the 90's and bright skies. Not the best trout fishing weather, but we made the best of it. We would spend the day messing around, and then, around 8:30 at night, get ready for the dry fly action. It would come fast, and give very little time until we couldn't see well enough to fish, but it was completely worth it! We ended up with a mixed bag of brooks and browns, with the best one topping out around 15 inches (brown, not brook... that would be a monster if it was a brookie!!!). Next up, it was time to go after some smallmouth. We have had a tough season with high winds, cold temps going right into a heat wave and storms. Last night looked to be perfect, so me and my buddy Paul met at the boat after work and decided to give it a shot. We checked several spots, but all our action came in one 400 yard stretch. The fish were all hanging near drop offs. I suspect this is because of the rapid water temp change. When we got over fish, we could get them to eat, and within two hours of fishing we had several nice fish come to hand. It is a great time to hit the bay right now, and if the warm trend continues, we probably only have a couple more weeks of good shallow water smallmouth fishing. Flies that worked were bunny strip flies, DNA clouser minnow and standard clousers. Good luck, happy fishing and tight lines!
-Steve B

Ice, flies and bass?

Pups on the loose on the shores of Lake Erie

So far this has been a pretty crazy winter. We have seen the creeks ice up, melt, be open for a couple of days only to freeze right back up. Right now we have a winter storm warning, and when all is said and done this weekend, we will probably have well over a foot on the ground. This week we also had a pretty good ice storm. Those of you from out of town probably saw stuff about it on the news. It really does look cool when the ice is covering everything. In the meantime I am anxiously awaiting the real springs arrival. I don't know how long winter is going to last, but the ten day forecast doesn't really show an end in sight. It is surprising to some, but the thing that really gets me going this time of year is thinking about fishing smallmouth. Damn I love those fish. Either wading the flats, or hitting them from the boat, they are the most fun you can have in the summer. Pound for pound, those red eyed devils fight harder than any fish that swims! With the clear water of Presque Isle Bay you can sight fish for them. They are mean, aggressive fish, eagerly attacking any fly that dare intrude upon their domain.
The standard fly to get them is a clouser minnow, but it is certainly not the only choice. Me, I love rabbit flies. Rabbit strip tail, palmer rabbit fur around the hook, give it a hackle collar, lead eyes and bingo! You now have a 60 second bass fly that is sure to get the job done! On a side note, the fly cannot be too heavy for early season. Before the weeds come in, if you can get your fly to the bottom quicker than you can twist off the cap of a bottle of Labbats, then you have weight just about right. Damn, time to stop typing and go tie up some flies....after all, May isn't that far away...

My homeboy Paul sticking early season in spring '07

Another site to check out

Got another site for you to waste some time on: http://www.itinerantangler.com My buddy Paul turned me on to this site, and it is a pretty cool one. Around here it is catch up time. Tying flies, patching waders and getting ready for real spring! It is supposed to be 18 degrees on Sunday and Monday, but I think that it might be winters last really bitter days
Thinking of tying, and Paul, look at his fly box! He ties all those. A lot prettier than my ugly guide box. Some day when he isn't looking I am going to steal it.

Paul workin' on Elk.

Another good movie site!!

Here is yet another way for you to get through your workday by daydreaming about fishing!
http://www.burlproductions.com/

Some great clips, movies and the like. There are some really cool saltwater fly fishing clips in here. It is giving me tarpon fever again. That is not good, since the last case of it just cleared up. A word of warning to my friends and fishing buddies... It is wicked contagious! Soon you will be day dreaming of 12 weights and tibor reels. All I can do is express my heartfelt apologies.

Enjoy, and may you accomplish little at work today!

Steve B

New website to check out (at least new to me)

Was taking a break from working on fall orders today, and my Orvis rep told me about this website to check out, so I did a little lookin'. If you guys are bored and looking for something to check out, give this a shot: www.fishwithra.com Some great videos!
Enjoy and tight lines!
Steve

07' Guide Season

Since it is frozen up now, I figured I would tell everyone about some more of the guide trips from the fall 2007 steelhead season. In the beginning of December, I took out Mark, who has fished with me in the past. We fished Elk Creek together last year, and it was ridiculous! We nailed a nice 13+ pounder in November of 2006, and he now loves Erie steelhead!

Typically, December is my favorite month to fish. Consistently there are more fish around in the stretches I prefer to fish, and many years, my biggest fish of the season come in the worst weather, in December. This year was hit and miss. There were plenty of fish, but we didn't see as many hogs as usual (at least not in the upper stretches where I fish). They came later for me this season, in January. The trip with Mark was a bit of everything! The first day was high water, and going to the small creeks on the east side saved the day. With high winds, heavy sleet, snow and rain mixing, and within sight of the lake, Mark swung streamers and clean the clocks of several nice sized fish! The other creeks were ripping in the morning, but cleared some during the day.


The next day we hit the bigger waters, and worked for several nice fish. The water was still that high, but green/chalk in color, so as long as you got the weight down, you got into fish. We were tossing egg patterns that day, and bright colors were the order of the day! We finished up down low again, and called it a day. As is typical in Erie, conditions were on there way to low and clear by Friday, so were fishing small nymphs and tandem rigs. The temps were getting a bit colder every day, which contributes to the creeks dropping faster. As the feeder creeks get lower because of runoff and the ground freezing, they contribute to less water going into the creeks. Also, the seeps that you see coming between the shale freeze up. This is why you get so much ice on the shale cliffs. This contributes heavily to water flow, and when it is cut off, you will see dramatic flow changes.

The last day we fished together was tough! The temp in the morning was a balmy 18 degrees, one of the coldest days in December! We had some tackle issues to deal with and more. This is a great time for one of my half a**ed theories for you. When it gets cold, you loose stretch in both your fly line and tippet and are more prone to breaking off, and you also get less effective hook sets because the transfer of power from the rod to the hook in disrupted by ice in the guides, on the tippet, etc..ie, you loose a lot more fish when there is ice around! Mark worked hard for it, and in the end we pulled a few more fish out. By the time we finished at around 1:00 or so, the temps had risen to a remarkable high of 24 degrees... It was a great 4 days, and I look forward to having Mark come back soon.

Rob and Steve

On January 17th I had a guide trip with Rob and Steve. It was cold but productive! We were sticking fish like crazy! The best of the day topped 12 pounds. Flies that produced were a bit larger than I typically fish (my most common fly size choice is 14). The best producer of the day was a size 12 bead head prince nymph. As is usually the case, we were fishing tandems for the most of the day. More fish took the top fly than I usually see. The setup we were using was egg high, nymph low. The water offered great visibility, with just a touch of color. By the end of the day, the water had cleared up just a bit more. All in all, another great day to be on the water!

The last trip before the winter blast!

I had the good luck to fish with a great couple of guys for what may be my last steelhead guide trip for a while (too cold now!!). Jerry and Dave are a couple of locals, who were more trout nuts than steelhead junkies. I think that we might have changed that! We fished together on the 18th of January, and what a day! They had tons of hook ups ( I can't ever guess how many fish we hooked up), and a great number landed. These guys had the touch. On a more painful note, the weather was a bit harsh. It was 25 degrees when we came off the water. The net was flash freezing to my fleece gloves, and the gloves themselves were frozen like ice cubes! It is easy to ignore these things when you are catching fish though! It is a good thing the season is winding down. My gear needs to dry out, another pair of waders is finished, my flies are almost gone, and I am ready to catch up with things around the shop, at home, on the computer etc. I am going to keep posting about trip I had this year, putting up some pictures and showing everyone what our area is all about. Happy fishing and tight lines!

Erie Steelhead in December

This is a video of a day out fishing and goofing off with my buddies Paul and Zack. We were fishing on Pennsylvania's Elk Creek for steelhead the week before Christmas. The water was on the clear side, but the fish were cooperative!

About us

We started this blog to give you a little more information on fishing in the Erie area for steelhead and smallmouth bass. We will update this blog with local info, fly patterns, techniques, pictures and more. We will also give fishing reports for the local steelhead and smallmouth fishing. Questions or comments can be directed to Leua@velocity.net