Buzzing in darkness

3:30 AM is either late in the into the night, or early in the morning. It all depends on how you look at it.

Clocks wrong. The hammer will fix it!

For me 3:30 AM is early in the morning, and for the past 2 weeks, I have been fishing for about 30 minutes before I go into the gym for my morning workout.

There's just something really peaceful about fishing when you have nothing but the moon and stars providing you light. The lake I fish is always calm and almost glass like each morning. The other day I was joined by 2 hooting owls, who talked me into fishing for an extra 10 minutes.

Watch out for those skunks...and not the fishing kind.

For these quick outings I primarily use either a spinnerbait, or a buzzbait. I always start off with the buzzbait, because, there's just something extra cool about casting that lure into the darkness and being able to hear it chug along. The best is when you hear the bass blow up on it, and even better is when you hear a blow up and you can no longer hear the chugging of the lure. FISH ON!! 

Beware of the shadows.

Ninja fishing!

I'm going to try tossing a big popper with my fly rod next!

One of those days...

Have you ever had one of those days, where it seems nothing wants to go your way?

The Subaru all loaded up for it's first of many trips.

Well, I had one of those on a recent trip to the Northwoods of Wisconsin.

The target species - Musky with a side of smallmouth bass.

I enticed 2 follows from the same musky in the first 20 minutes with a fly I tied, but couldn't get the shiny green beauty to commit. As the day went on, I had another musky follow, and then I was able to get one to commit, but me being over excited about the take, I lost focus and didn't strip set the hook, and went with a hook set I would normally do for bass. I realized the second I lifted my rod. The fight lasted about 3 seconds after that, and then my line went slack. D'oh!

Orange Crush - 8/0 single with an articulated shank.

I was able to hook up with multiple smallies, but just couldn't bring them to hand. I had a 4 +lber smash one of my flies, and then swim behind me, back around, between my legs, back around me, back out, and back through my legs before coming unbuttoned. All of the others came unhooked when they went airborne. After 9 hours of wading we went back to the car to grab some lunch, and I switched to my baitcaster and an inline spinner. New set up - Same story. Hooked up with multiple smallies, but they just didn't want to stay on. It became quite comical.

I know what you're thinking...you use barbless hooks - Correct - But on the flies that I recently tied for this trip, I completely forgot to smash the barbs on them.

Oh, well...there's always next time!

At least my buddy The Fat Gordo was able to hook up with a bunch of those beautiful Northwoods smallies, and I was able to take some pictures of them. 

Flexin'

I love my GoPro camera!

All in all it was a great trip, and it definitely won't be my last. Unfortunately, I will be sending in my rod to Redington for repair. 2 of the pieces came apart while casting and the male ferrule on one of the pieces snapped at the tip. Thank goodness for their warranty.

End of an 10.5 hour wade. - Exhausted.

Step by Step - CARF Crappie

Here's a step by step of how to tie a small but big crappie pattern I've been tying up lately for bass, pike, and possibly musky.

Step One - Self explanatory.

Step Two - Tie in nice size hunk of white craft fur to use as a tail.

Step Three - Silver crystal flash.

Step Four - Black holographic Flashabou.

Step Five - 2 natural grizzly hackle feathers. One on each side.

Step Six - Reverse tie in some black buck tail.

Step Seven - Add more silver crystal flash.

Step Eight - Reverse tie in another small hunk of black buck tail

Step Nine - Tie in some white craft fur. Make 2 wraps and work it around the hook shank with your fingers before making more secure wraps. (I ran out of black thread....Oops!)

Step Ten - Dumbbell eyes towards the front.

Step Eleven - Palmer some silver polar chenille up to the back of the dumbbell eyes.

Step Twelve - Tie in some black Senyo laser dub to make the head.

Step Thirteen - Whip finish.

Step Fourteen - Beer yourself or go fishing....or both at the same damn time!

Material list

1. 5/0 aberdeen hook
2. White craft fur
3. Crystal Flash - Silver
4. Flashabou - Black
5. Natural grizzly hackle feathers
6. Black buck tail
7. Hareline Polar Chenille - Silver
8. 6.3mm dumbbell eyes
9. Hareline Senyo laser dub - Black