Chris recently fished out on the coast and came across a large school of Black Rockfish boiling on the surface. He grabbed the floating line and tied on a large popper. Here’s 8.5 minutes of popper fishing.
Black Rockfish On Poppers- Neah Bay Fly Fishing from Chris Bellows on Vimeo.
Here is a picture of the fly afterwards.
At The Bench is our in store fly tying series. These demonstrations will focus not only on specific patterns and fisheries but also techniques and how to use some of the new fly tying materials. Watching someone else tie will help you improve the patterns you already tie and give you ideas for new patterns.
These tying demonstrations start at 10:00 am and run until 1:00 pm.
Sunday, May 26th – John Gort will spend the morning tying chironomid patterns. John has been a customer since we first opened our doors and is a fabulous tyer. He loves lake fishing and his chironomids are little works of art.
Saturday, June 15th – Special guest Sean Dahlquist will be joining us for a day of steelhead fly tying. Sean is an extremely gifted tier and everyone should show up for this one. He will be demonstrating classic and low water styles as well as spey flies. This one will probably go past 1:00pm! His flies are works of art and his demos are always filled with tips and tricks that make all of us better tiers.
Friday, June 21st – Chris Bellows will be sitting down to tie his favorite saltwater patterns. Chris guided fly anglers for six years at Neah Bay and will be focusing on subsurface salmon and bottomfish patterns. Chris loves the Clear Cure Goo products and will be showing why he’s given up epoxy and silicone in favor of these UV cure products. He will discuss fly fishing for rockfish, lingcod, and salmon with the flies he ties.
Thursday, July 11th – Chris Bellows will be back at the bench. With the 2013 salmon season already in progress the focus will be on tying popper patterns for salmon. He will be tying top water patterns for salmon, but most of the patterns can be downsized for sea-run cutthroat along the beaches. While the focus is on tying, he’ll also be answering questions on surface fishing techniques.
Saturday, July 27th – Sean Dahlquist will be back for another round of steelhead flies. This one will be strictly focused on Spey and Dee style flies. These gorgeous flies can be very effective on the river but they also look great on the wall. Sean will be showing us how to mount these flies in a frame or shadow box.
Saturday, August 10th – Jeffrey Delia will be sitting down and showing us his effective sea-run cutthroat and salmon patterns. Jeffrey has lived on Dabob Bay for years and has used his proximity to the saltwater as a laboratory for creating saltwater flies that trout and salmon cannot resist. He will tie the Conehead Squid and a few other patterns that consistently fool Hood Canal cutthroat and coho salmon.
We have finalized our Spey Casting Class schedule for this summer. This is a great option for any level of caster to improve your spey casting. A day on the water with our instructors will help fix what’s ailing your casting stroke.
Click Here for an online review of Curt’s instruction
Upcoming Spey Classes
Saturday May 25th
Saturday June 22nd
Saturday July 20th
Sunday August 18th
Click Here to learn more and enroll online.
This question comes from Bennett Colvin in Colorado.
“I have been wanting to try to fly fish deep using streamers for lake trout, salmon, trout, and arctic char. I was wondering if you could describe the set up that you guys use to get into the salmon out of the boats in the ocean? Items like rod size, line… if you use a shooting line and what size heads etc., how deep can one reasonably fish, flies etc would be awesome. Being here in Colorado this technique is not used much but I think it could be very effective.”
The timing for this question couldn’t be better. While Bennett plans on fishing lakes in Colorado our saltwater season on the coast is just about to start. Dredging can help one reach fish often thought out of reach to fly fishermen no matter where you live.
Most of our dredging uses rods in the 8-10 weight range. If you have to fish a lighter rod, RIO’s Deep 7 Lake Line can get you 20-30′ deep with rods in the 6 weight range. A 6 weight rigged with this line is the perfect setup for offshore pink salmon when you need to get deep (and this summer we are expecting over 6 million pinks to swim by Port Angeles).
For serious dredging, a shooting head system is the way to go. Let’s start with running lines. For maximum depth, a mono running line is your best bet but it is harder to handle and can have more tangling issues than the second option, which are intermediate running lines like RIO’s Coldwater Intermediate Running Line. The .030 sized intermediate line is the best all around running line for balancing sink rate and line handling.
For the sinking heads we are lucky to be blessed with some great options. The 30′ Coil Packs of RIO’s T-14 and T-17 are what we typically use. For an 8 wt. rod, we will cut the 30′ of T-14 back to approximately 25′.
25′ of T-14 can reach the 40-50′ range and T-17 can reach the 60-75′ range. Under ideal conditions you can get deeper but those depths can be reached without too much effort by casting up-drift letting the line come tight after the boat drifts over it. The picture below shows a rock snagged from the bottom at the Winter Hole off Port Angeles in 70′ of water using 30′ of T-17.
Weighted flies work best for this. Not only do they sink fast and give the flies an up and down action during the retreive but they reduce tangling with the sinking line on the way down. If the fly is too buoyant the sinking line will sink much faster than the line and the fly will tangle with the line as it gets vertical in the water. Clouser Minnows and Shock and Awe’s are great flies for fishing deep water.
Hope that helps. Good luck and send us some pictures of the big lake trout you hook.
Our latest 2013 Question comes from John in New Hampshire.
“I am coming out to the Olympic Peninsula this August. I will be backpacking and want to know about fly fishing in Olympic National Park.”
The winter steelhead on the Olympic Peninsula get the most attention but the summer months offer great fishing. John didn’t mention what species he wants to target so we’re gonna give him a breakdown of the numerous summer fisheries in Olympic National Park.
The Elwha River was our go-to trout fishery prior to dam removal. It offered good fishing for native rainbows and was close to Port Angeles. The Elwha will be closed for at least another four years during the restoration. Losing our local trout fishery was tough but has forced us to explore some of the other options throughout the Park. The upper reaches of most rivers hold resident trout from the North Fork Skokomish River above Lake Cushman to the Sol Duc River above and below the falls.
The high lakes in the Olympic Mountains are well worth the sweat and sore muscles required to get to them. The short growing seasons mean the fish tend to be aggressive towards flies. They also give backpackers the option to keep a few brook trout to enjoy for lunch and/or dinner. These lakes can be found throughout the high country, but some popular areas include the Seven Lakes Basin and the lakes accessed from the Obstruction Point Road.
Lake Crescent is a beautiful lake that also holds some of the largest trout in the Park. There is both road access (Hwy. 101) and day hiking access (Spruce Railroad Trail) to the shorelines for Beardslee rainbow trout as well as cutthroat trout. A boat is helpful but not necessary. Baitfish patterns work well for the larger trout. Lake Crescent is centrally located and a great spot to wet a line when heading to and from the coastal rivers.
The coastal rivers offer summer steelhead and sea-run cutthroat fishing. There are trails along all of the larger rivers on the coast. The numbers of steelhead may not be as high as other areas of the Northwest but the solitude makes up for it. There is nothing quite like camping on a great piece of steelhead water and having it to yourself.
Then there is the fly fishing along the Pacific Ocean. The coastal strip from Shi-Shi Beach all the way to Rialto Beach is a backcountry hiking paradise. There are surf perch along the sandy beaches and cutthroat in the river mouths. The wilderness coast offers lots of unexplored water that not many people fly fish.
We hope this overview of the fly fishing opportunities within Olympic National Park isn’t overwhelming. The Park has diverse habitats and the fly fishing reflects that diversity.
John, good luck and enjoy your summer backpacking trip.
Here’s a great video of steelhead fishing on Vancouver Island in the early 1900’s. It is hard to imagine how many fish there were back then.