danhunt

I suddenly feel like I'm in a Windows 7 commercial. I can even picture myself stumbling around a river somewhere muttering "My name is Dan and the Amundson Midge rod was my idea..."

Another variation of my "dream rod" would be a less stealthy configuration with a honey brown blank (kind of like a medium flamed bamboo), nickle silver hardware and guides, a high grade reverse half wells grip and a tiger maple spacer.

The next rod I'm in the market for is a moderate action small stream stick. I have a 8'6" 4wt moderate/fast action rod that I'm using right now, and it works, but I'd like something along the lines of a Winston Boron IIt, Winston WT, Thomas & Thomas Whisper-Lite or even a bamboo. The only thing holding me back is the price point of those rods. If I could find a smooth, moderate action with quick damping in the $200-$300 range I'd be a happy camper. Maybe I'm not looking in the right places, but I don't think there is a maker out there that produces a line of rods with specs like these. Maybe the niche is too specialized, I don't know. To take it one step further, my dream rod would be an 8' 4wt, the blank would have a matte grey/black finish, titanium or pewter colored hardware and guides, a reverse half wells grip made of burl cork and an uplocking reel seat with a stabilized amboyna burl wood spacer. ***edited to fix my 3rd grade grammer and spelling***

I have one of the Mustang inflatable vests, but without the automatic inflating option. It could just be an urban myth, but when I was looking for one I read that the self-inflaters could malfunction and inflate in a heavy rainstorm. I have no complaints with mine, but do check the CO2 cartridge periodically as they can work loose. I found that out one day when I opened it up to dry out after a storm and the cartridge rolled out on to the floor.

Sorry, I don't have a camera with a decent macro to do closeups, but you've got the idea. I trim the foam in to sort of an elongated triangle before I tie it in to get a little more of that teardrop shape. Sharpies are fine, but if you have a Michaels craft store, or an art store, nearby you can try the pantone felts too. An idea I got from someone on another board was to use UV knot sense on the foam to help make the fly a little tougher (the fishes teeth slash that shell back foam) and it does seem to help. It adds some time to the tie, though, and dealing with sticky gooey crap is why I went looking for something other than the JUB in the first place.

Yep, that is the pattern that got me started. A friend and I were fishing Pinnacle Lake up by Hathume Lake in the fall about six years ago, and mid-morning we started seeing fish rise for no particular reason, and then around lunch time the lake started to boil. He had a couple of Jennings Ultimate Boatman patterns that he had picked up in Kamloops that summer, and I had some more traditional boatmen I had tied myself. Long story short, he out fished me about 5 to 1 with the JUB, and it is fair to say it was mostly the pattern because after he lost his last JUB our catch rates evened out to where they were about on par with one another. The pattern is a good one, but I don't really like making the JUB, mostly because I don't have the skills to easily work with epoxy. I found that with the techniques I used the JUB was taking me about 15-20mins each, which was far too long in my mind. That, combined with the fact that I couldn't find a way to incorporate the little bit of flash I wanted on a boatman pattern in to the JUB, is what lead me to try to accomplish the same basic characteristics with older tying techniques.

I think the acid Jack was referring to is formic acid, which is also found in ants. The same thing happens with a flying ant hatch/fall, the fish tend to hit them hard for a couple of days and then they have to take a break. I've never heard of fish eating until they are full, regurgatating and then feeding some more. I suppose anything is possible, but it doesn't make sense to me that they would have evolved that way as it seems like a really poor survival strategy. Why trade an already full belly to expend more calories just to fill it up again? That being said, I really don't know one way or the other... I use a pattern that has a tan foam shell back, a pearl crystal chenile body and rubber legs tied in perpendicular to the hook shank about midway down the hook. I use a black fine tipped sharpy to make the chevrons on the back, and fabric paint or a red sharpy to do the eyes. I've tried almost every boatman variation I could find and this is the one that has worked the best for me.

Having spent a fair bit of time in the Fallen Timber/Burnt Timber areas I can fully understand the frustration, but it all boils down to policing and enforcement. You can have all the laws you want, but without someone to back them up it don’t mean *hit… Speaking specifically for ATVs, OHVs, Quads, or what ever you want to call them, I don’t support an outright ban because these are crown lands we are talking about, and as far as I’m concerned they are there for your enjoyment as much as mine. Giving preferential access to a special interest group, as they already do with grazing leases, really blows when you are on the side that is excluded, and I think it is completely unjust. I confess I’m ignorant of what the current laws are with regards to the licensing and registration of these vehicles, but I see a simple solution – Require them all to be registered, licensed and insured just like vehicle towing them. That way the police can set up a road block and catch some of the irresponsible ones on the way out to the bush. Those that don’t have their registration, license and insurance face impound charges and a hefty fine to get their machines back just like you do with a car. Those monies collected can help pay for any extra policing costs of setting up those road blocks. Now that we are saying they have to be registered every year, you can levy a special surcharge of say $100 per machine (call it a habitat restoration fund) and you pump those funds back in to the Conservation Officers’ coffers to pay for that aspect of the policing. The frame work is all there, all it would require are some amendments to what is already on the books. Oh yeah, and also the support of the general public because I would be willing to bet that off-roaders represent a larger special interest group than pretty much any other outdoor recreation group, and I’m pretty sure they would be dead set against this. But, if they can’t police themselves then they should pay for the privilege as the rest of us do.

Instead of a syringe what about one of those little squeezy bottles for head cement that have the long thin metal tube? I know what you mean about finding syringes, I used them sans needle to measure expoxy for rod building and I finally had to source out a replacement after every pharmacy I went to refused to sell them to me.

I use a multitip and I think the sinking heads work just fine, but I still carry a standard dry line for any surface work.

I can't remember the name of the author right now (I think it might be something like Bill Heavey), but he writes short humor stories and in one he was relating his experiences with asking for access to peoples land. As the story goes he had been shut down by a number of sucessive land owners, and when he related the story to his elderly father the old man volunteered to go with him on his next visit. As they were getting ready the son saw the father putting on a dress shirt and tie and he made a comment to his father "you look like you are going out on a sales call" to which the father replied "aren't we"? I may have the details of the story a bit jumbled up, but the point is when you approach a landowner asking for access to a piece of property you are trying to sell yourself as a mature, decent, responsible person. Unless they already know you, or they have the time to get to know you, they will be faced with making a snap judgement based on your appearence, your attitude and your body language. Keeping in mind they have likely let people on their land before, and it is just as likely they have been burned by some of those, if there is any doubt in their mind why would they take a chance? Its nothing personal, but like so many things in life we all end up paying for the mistakes of those who went before us. On a related note, has anyone ever tried exchanging labor for access? There is never any shortage of work on a farm or a ranch, and if it took a day or two of fencing or pitching bales or what ever, I think that would be a worthwhile trade for a nice stretch of water.

Nothing wrong with Uberfly's suggestions, but you can also consider a higher end TFO like a TiCR or TiCRX, or maybe an Amundson Wind Warrior and have some coin left over for a new line or maybe even a reel...

I have a danvise and all in all I think it is a great vise for the money. Like someone said earlier, the jaws are a little soft and they tend to spread over time, but a friend who has the same vise sent an email to the company asking if he could buy some replacements and they sent him a new set at no cost. I don't know if they still do this, but it was one of the reasons I decided to buy one. My only other issue, and it could just be me, is that I find the shape of the vice a little awkward when working on the rear portion of smaller patterns. Oh, one other thing, if you get one and you happen to get the C clamp model be sure to install the little rubber dots on the inside of the clamp. Without them the vise has a tendancy to slip.

I take my vehicles to Folk Automotive of off Ogden Road on 16a street. They've always treated me right, and the only time I had something go wrong (not even their fault, it was a set of faulty struts) they made it right with no hassel. In fact, we had the clutch go in our car on the way home last winter and a shop in the town where I live quoted $2500 to replace it and we would have to wait two weeks on parts. I called Folk and they were able to get in the same day plus they were about $700 lower. Even with a tow in to town we still came out money ahead.

On Sunday I broke the tip of a rod I had built on a Dancraft blank that I had bought at Fishtales. I went in today and they were able to warranty the blank and they gave me a new tip section from one of the blanks they had in stock. No fuss, no muss, no hassle. Its been said before, but its worth saying again - GREAT SHOP!

In BC triploids have been stocked for a while now and my experience, which is purely subjective, is that triploids will grow large, but they don't seem to fight as well as normal diploid fish. That could be due to environmental conditions rather than the physiology of the fish, but I have to say I haven't missed them too much while I've been catching wild Bow freight trains the last two years... Below are some quotes taken from various websites that tell a little more about triploids. As you can see from the last one, its important to play them quickly and leave them alone entirely if the water gets too warm... How do fish farmers produce triploids? To make fish triploid the newly fertilised eggs are physically shocked. In practice this means the eggs are placed in a special pressure vessel and subjected to a very high pressure. The timing after fertilisation and the actual pressure are critical to the process. If the farmer times this wrong then mistakes can be made. The balance is a fine one. Too little and it does not cause triploidy whilst too much pressure kills the eggs. It is difficult to judge the success until the fish can be sampled and examined under the microscope, or mature as adults. The triploid eggs go on to hatch and grow normally into adult fish. However it must be remembered that the process is a biological one and as such triploidisation is rarely 100% effective. Some fish of each batch seem to escape the process and mature as normal fish. We expect our suppliers to provide fry that are normally much better than 90% triploid. That is we generally expect that one fish in ten from a batch of triploids will develop eggs in maturity. It is therefore important that the farmer grades the fish to remove any hen fish before these fish are stocked into critical waters. This is a point often overlooked and a batch of triploids may still contain a small number of fertile fish. The Physiology of Triploid Fish: A Model for Applied Research in Aquaculture. Tillmann J. Benfey, Department of Biology, University of New Brunswick, Fredericton, New Brunswick, E3B 6E1 Triploid fish are sterile as a result of having three sets of chromosomes in their somatic cell nuclei rather than the normal (diploid) two sets. Although there are compelling reasons for using sterile fish in aquaculture, triploidy has not been embraced by the salmonid aquaculture industry because of real and perceived differences in their culture characteristics that can best be summarized as a reduced tolerance to chronic stress. Triploid salmonids also exhibit increased rates of jaw, gill and opercular deformities, as well as the presence of dividing and fragmented red blood cells. These effects of triploidy likely result from fundamental physiological differences between diploids and triploids that arise from increased nuclear and cellular volume in the latter. Exercise Physiology Triploids and diploids appear to have equivalent aerobic capacities (Stillwell and Benfey, 1997), but triploids have lower oxygen consumption rates when swimming aerobically in a respirometer (Stillwell and Benfey, 1996) and during recovery from exhaustive exercise (Hyndman et al., 2002a). The question arises as to whether the decrease in red blood cell surface area to volume ratio affects cellular oxygen consumption rates in triploids, but this does not appear to be the case: oxygen consumption rates of triploid blood are not significantly different from diploid rates (1.87 ± 0.51 vs. 1.67 ± 0.28 nmol/ml/min/g Hb, respectively; Currie and Benfey, unpubl.). The overall responses to exhaustive exercise at 9°C are similar in triploids and diploids, although triploids recover more quickly from acidosis, muscle ATP depletion and muscle lactate accumulation (Hyndman et al., 2002a). At 19°C, on the other hand, triploids exhibit high (90%) mortality within 4 hours of exhaustive exercise (compared to no mortality in diploids) and demonstrate reduced anaerobic capacity as reflected by an absence of phosphocreatine depletion and slower muscle ATP recovery and lactate elimination (Hyndman et al., 2002b). These results help explain the previously demonstrated reduced tolerance of triploid rainbow trout (O. mykiss) to elevated temperatures (Ojolick et al., 1995).

I have the 9' 6wt and it is a sweet casting rod, but like the post above mine broke on the 2nd trip out with it. First rod I've broken in about 12 years.

I'll volunteer to tie a dozen flies to help get you back up and running. What do you need? Anyone interested in lending a hand?

Sadly, the "Meat Hole" on the Vedder is worse than that. I was fishing the river about three years ago and we drove up to watch the circus before we left. One of the funniest things I saw was a gentleman fishing with a rod that was about 5' long with a little close faced push button spinning reel on it. He had managed to hook what looked to be about a 25lb chinook, and he had that little rod doubled over trying to move that fish. The chinook was sitting about 10' directly in front of the fisherman not showing any signs of concern and not moving one inch. I wish I could have stayed to see that rig explode when the fish had enough fooling around and decided to make a run...

I was fishing in the Fernie area yesterday and I lost my blue SA nymph box when one of the zippers on my vest broke. If anyone has found a box like this please let me know and I'll identify the contents as well as where I lost it. I'm offering a $100 for its return. Thanks!

It was pretty slow this weekend at Cataract. The water was nice and clear but still high and cold, and all of the fish I moved were on a #16 evil weavil. Upstream of the bridge that you cross on the way in to the camp is a meadow that has some good water. The falls are probably too much of a hike for the little guy.