Okay, this is sort of a stupid tip, but if fly tiers can make a miniscule change to a common fly pattern and then name it after themselves, well, then I can be proud of my new fly tying bodkin. Being a fly fisherman, how my gear looks is just as important to my self-esteem as whether or not I have any idea how to use it. With that in mind, and a bit of a buzz as well, I was struck with the idea for this attractive bodkin. For years, I’ve used an old wine cork with a sewing needle stuck in one end as my bodkin. No more! Now I use an old Wild Turkey cork instead! I recently finished off a bottle of Wild Turkey Rare Breed, and, just before tossing the bottle in the recycling bin, I noticed the stopper. The cork was fixed into a wide, attractive wooden cap. I immediately pulled out the stopper, tossed the bottle and rushed upstairs to the tying desk. I found my pack of sewing needles and inserted the non-business end into the cork with a pair of needle-nose pliers, and here you can see the results. The benefits are few other than that the wood matches my new tying desk, the bodkin will now stand more steadily on its top, and I can now mock Insane’s inferior bodkin (if indeed he even has one. Since making my new bodkin, I’ve noticed a few other spirit bottles with suitable stoppers for bodkin-making. One I have in mind is Captain Morgan Private Stock. So go out, buy yourself a bottle of something inspiring, and build yourself a better bodkin. If nothing else, I’m giving you an excuse to buy new liquor. You can express your appreciation preferably by sending a generous monetary donation or, if you must, by leaving a simple word of thanks in the comments section.

Fly tying bodkin made from the cap to a bottle of Wild Turkey Rare Breed.

Take care,
Nathan

We’ve had so much rain lately that all those small local streams I’ve been itching to explore are currently big, muddy torrents. So, I’ve spent a lot of time tying flies. My problem, other than not being a very good tyer, is that I’m not a very patient or disciplined one. I have trouble making myself sit down to tie several dozen of the same pattern. Predictably, this results in me never having well-stocked fly boxes. “Real” fly fishermen would be ashamed of my trout boxes. I never go with all the bases covered, as they say. Most times it doesn’t hurt me because the truth is, trout will almost always hit a parachute Adams or St. Vrain caddis or hare’s ear in one size or another. But then there are the times, like on the Gibbon River last summer, when the fish lock in on something specific, and I almost never have it. Being a real sucker for a new pattern, especially one that’s easy to tie, I waste far too much of my tying time with experimentation.

Texas Bullfrog tied with a makeshift foam cylinder.

Anyway, I’ve sort of wandered off topic here, but I’ll get around to it. The other night, I was working on some foam poppers for bass fishing. I began to get distracted, as often happens when I’ve been tying for an hour or so. The Alabama River Fishing Forum beckoned from the computer room. There are several excellent tiers on the forum, and I’ve got some great ideas from them. While browsing a few of the threads and trying to avoid getting back in front of the vise, I came across a topic on bass bugs. One of the patterns caught my eye. It’s called a Texas Bullfrog, and it looked very easy to tie. On top of that, it just had that fishy appearance. I began to suspect that I couldn’t catch a bass without it. So, I set out to tie one, quickly and heartbreakingly discovering that I had none of the requisite foam cylinders.

Luckily, I’m a cheap son of a gun, and I came up with a way to make my own without having to order any. This won’t work well for all patterns that use foam cylinders because it doesn’t make a perfect cylinder, but it works great for the Texas Bullfrog. I had recently purchased a pack of the adhesive-backed craft foam sheets from the local retail store. I cut a strip off the chartreuse sheet, removed the adhesive, and rolled it tightly into a cylinder. When I neared the end, I dabbed on a couple drops of superglue and finished rolling it up. The superglue is stronger than the foam adhesive, so it ensures the cylinder won’t come unrolled. You’ll have to hold the roll tight for about 15 seconds for the superglue to set up. It goes without saying that you don’t want to get the glue on your fingers. Then you can tie your Texas Bullfrog just like on FAOL. I added a thin strip of foam as an underbody on mine to give it a slight bit more flotation toward the rear of the hook. Maybe you’ll find a use for this tip some day. As an added bonus, these foam cylinders are a fraction of the cost of pre-made foam cylinders. Also, this method allows you to easily make the cylinder any size you want.

Take care,
Nathan

One more note: If you look closely at tredixie’s pattern on the ARF, it appears that his bullfrog might be built with rolled up foam as well. I didn’t notice that until I checked the link tonight. No doubt there are lots of folks out there who’ve thought of doing the same thing. – Nathan

My cheap line winder holding my Thebault DT silk line.

Ever since I’ve been into classic tackle like bamboo rods and silk fly lines, I’ve wanted one of those fancy line winders. I prefer the ones made of nicely worked wood. The idea behind them is to provide a quick and easy method of winding your silk fly line off your reel and onto something that can space the line out for quicker and more effective drying. Moisture is really bad for a silk line. It will turn into a moldy, useless mess before you can say “mucilin” if you store it wet. But I couldn’t afford a fancy line winder, and being the lazy bum I am, I didn’t build one. I found a great alternative at the local retail store, in the Christmas department. It’s one of those plastic rings for storing your Christmas lights in an orderly fashion. There’s a hole in the middle that perfectly fits a Sharpie marker. It makes quick work of getting the line off the reel, and it’s open from both sides, so the line dries very quickly. When I’m ready to reel the line back on, I just stick a wooden dowel through the center hole, rest the dowel on a couple of my rod-turning supports (you could use two slits in a box), and reel the line back on. It’s best if you can figure out a way to tension the line a little. I use rolls of masking tape from my rod-building supplies to act as washers between my supports and the line winder. I bought two of the line winders (only like $2 each). I use the other one in conjunction with the first for when I want to turn a DT line around. You could fancy this whole thing up a little by mounting it to a base and permanent supports and then gluing a couple straps of leather for holding the reel in place. Leather might be too high-class though. Might want to use pleather or nylon backpacking straps.

I usually store my line in an old Cortland box. This is me moving it back to the Cortland spool from my line winder.

These things aren’t just handy for silk lines. They’re great for plastic lines, too. They assist in keeping the line orderly when you’re cleaning it, and they’re great for moving a line from one reel to another. You can use them to turn around a plastic double taper line just like I do with my silk line. Say you have a double taper line, and you want to use the neglected end because you’ve worn out the other. You can strip the line off in the floor, try to be really careful, and hope you don’t end up with a big mess. Or you can use a couple of these cheap line winders to make quick and neat work of it. These could even be useful for baitcasting reels when you want to move a line from a broken reel to a good one or something like that.

Hope you find this useful. If nothing else, I hope it provides a fascinating glimpse into the mind of a cheapskate. Take care,
Nathan

I’ve finally got another tip to share with you. Well, it’s not so much a tip as a refinement to a tip shared by our friend Eduardo at Mendoza Fly Fishing. Back when I highlighted Eduardo’s nifty tutorial, I mentioned I had made one in the past almost identical to his. Eduardo and I discussed how the little fly boxes were very handy for nymphs and smaller bugs, but you just didn’t have space for dries or larger flies. I’ve found a nice solution to that problem.

There are at least two brands that offer tinned cigarillos in sizes that provide more ample space for larger flies. You won’t be able to cram size 2/0 bass poppers in there (at least not without severely altering their shape), but they’ve got 1/2″-3/4″ of clearance. I wanted something small to carry my bluegill flies in, and these boxes are perfect. I tie my bluegill flies in fairly large sizes, one because we have large sunfish around here, and two because I want a shot at a bass when tossing them. The tins will fit neatly in the front pocket of a shirt, and they’re about twice as deep as the typical cigarillo tins. The ones I found are Romeo Y Julieta Reserva Real Minutos Petites and Don Diego No. 5 Elites, but I’m sure there are others. I just roughly cut 2mm craft foam, scratch the bottom of the tins a bit, and superglue two layers of foam in there. Eduardo does a much cleaner job of it in his tutorial. The best thing about these cigar fly boxes is that you get the smokes, too. I especially recommend the Don Diegos for a quick, smooth-bodied smoke, and the Don Diego tin is slightly deeper for holding bigger flies. For you non-fly fishing types out there, these boxes would make pretty cool tins for carrying your crappie jigs.

P.S. – For those of you paying attention, I plan to post another item up for grabs on the TVangler Classifieds Page tomorrow. I’m not naming a time. You’ll just have to keep your eyes open, and count on some luck, sort of like fishing.

Take care,
Nathan

My two cigar tin fly boxes. See, I even color coordinated the foam! These are the perfect size for a small shirt-pocket fly box.

I love going on backcountry fishing trips, particularly in the Great Smoky Mountains of Tennessee and North Carolina. One thing I learned very quickly was that the lighter the load, the more I enjoyed the hiking. My first true backpacking trip was to the Cataloochee Valley. There were four of us. I imagine the average pack weight was over 50 lbs. One guy’s pack probably weighed near 100 lbs. It was so heavy that some of the buckles broke and had to be rigged back redneck fashion. After that, I began systematically cutting down on pack weight. Here are a few of the things I’ve done.

I have a Kelty external frame backpack. It came with a metal piece sewn inside the main pocket. I think its purpose was to hold the pack open. I found this a useless feature. It took up space and added weight. I cut it out, saving an ounce or two. The pack also came with a huge Kelty label sewn on the outside. I removed that thing as well. Every little bit helps. Take a look at your pack. What’s really necessary? Remove anything that you can’t see a good purpose for. You might want to make a trip first before removing things just to see if you find a use for them. But if you don’t, don’t be afraid to take them off.

On that first trip I took a few canned food items along with some bagged tuna. For future trips, I reduced the number of canned items and items with high water content. I really like Rich Osthoff’s book Fly Fishing the Rocky Mountain Backcountry. He is a proponent of not taking cooking gear and mainly eating out of cans. I highly recommend his book and approach, BUT if you plan to cook on occasion, you need to cut way down on canned items. Buy yourself a good titanium cookware set (much lighter than aluminum) and use lots of freeze-dried meals. These meals from such companies as Mountain House and Backpacker’s Pantry are very good, easy to make, and extremely light. I also recommend a Sierra Zip Stove for your cooking as opposed to gas stoves. First off I really like its simplicity, and second I really think it’ll save you weight over a longer trip. The food and stove are readily available from REI Camping & Hiking

Take yourself a plastic fork and spoon for your silverware and reuse them. Just clean them well after every meal. You can take two of each in case you break one.

Take a small selection of flies. There is little need to carry the full arsenal for the backcountry. Most backcountry trout are not picky. You can reduce a ton of weight by carrying just one good box with some Adams and other basic dries, a few hare’s ears and pheasant tail nymphs, and some basic wet flies and streamers. There is no need to carry a vest either. Just take a shirt with a couple of good pockets. (more…)

This is the beginning of my series of tips. I guess I’ll keep doing it until I’m out of tips, which may not take too long. I’ll cover pretty much anything remotely related to fishing and the outdoors, so you can expect a few out-of-the-ordinary topics…like this first one.

One of my loves is backpacking and fly fishing in the Smoky Mountain backcountry. If you’re going on an extended trip, you’ve got to come up with a good selection of lightweight meals for yourself. All those freeze-dried meals, cans of tuna, and ramen noodles can get old. You need to treat yourself to something a little different at least one night.

I scratched up an idea for a taco salad on a long backpacking trip on the North Carolina side of the park one year. What you do is collect a few extra packs of your favorite Taco Bell taco sauce next time you go in for a mexican pizza or burrito supreme. How many packs you need depends on how much sauce you like. I take around 10. Go to the grocery store and buy heavy duty aluminum foil, a bag of tortilla chips and a bag of that pre-cooked ground beef. You can usually find the beef around the tuna, canned chicken and whatnot. I was a little skeptical of this stuff at first, but trust me here. Tear off a big piece of the aluminum foil, maybe 2 feet long. Fill a sandwich bag or quart freezer bag with crushed tortilla chips and pack all that stuff along for your trip.You don’t want to ground the chips into powder, just crush them enough to make packing them efficient.

After two or three days of bland meals, when you’re itching for something a little heartier, pull out your taco sauce, aluminum foil, tortilla chips and ground beef. Build a camp fire. Put the ground beef in the middle of the aluminum foil and fold it into a closed pocket. Find a rock to set the pocket on. You want the rock to be of just a size to hold the pocket of beef, not too big. After you have a good bed of coals, either let the fire die down to just the coals or scoop some of the hot coals out. You want to surround the rock holding the pocket with coals, but don’t let the coals touch the aluminum foil. Be careful because sometimes rocks will explode when heated if there’s water trapped inside. Using one of the rocks in the established fire ring has proven safe for me. There’s sort of an art here, but you basically want the beef to cook inside the pocket. It’s already cooked, but you want to warm it up well and evenly without burning it. You can use a handkerchief (you should always take a handkerchief on backpacking trips) to open the pocket on occasion to see how it’s doing. If you still have the fire going, you can scoop more coals on as needed. You can turn it if you notice one side cooking more quickly. Take your time and don’t burn it. You can count on this taking around 15 minutes. Once the beef is nicely heated, take it off the rock being careful not to burn yourself. Open the pocket into sort of a plate shape. Pour the crushed tortilla shells on top and dump on as much sauce as you want. I like lots of sauce. Then eat up. You’ll be surprised at how good this is on a backpacking trip. If you want to and temperatures permit, you can take other things to spruce it up like tomatoes, cheese, lettuce, whatever. But it’s good just like I described. Give it a shot on your next camping or backcountry fly fishing trip. Take care,

hawgdaddy