Back to Basics

On Monday, I was able to get out on the water for one last, little fishing outing.  I was feeling a little lethargic but still wanted to fish.  I stayed close to home (Rocky Hollow Park) and decided to keep my fishing as simple as possible.  It's also late summer fishing (and I got there mid morning) which can make fishing a little slow at times.  I didn't really want to strip streamers and I figured that the fish didn't really want to chase them.  That is exactly why I chose to go with a fly and float.

This is as simple, effective, and adjustable of a fly fishing technique as you can find.  Here's how I set my rig up.  I pull 6 pound fluorocarbon off a spool and attach it to the fly line.  I prefer to use a 3 or 4 weight rod for this method.  I then slide a small strike indicator/float about 16"-24" up the line.  I then put a small jig on the end of the line.  The float can be easily adjusted to get the fly to different depths and hit different parts of the water column.  That's it!  

As you can see, this technique catches fish on Missouri waters and I would bet that it will work on almost any water!  No, it does not produce big fish very often.  However, you might hook into a channel cat, carp, or an occasional big largemouth!  This technique is probably going to catch a bunch of small fish for the better part of the day.  As you can see in the pictures, I caught four different species on Monday.  While I didn't catch any monsters, it sure was fun to catch a bunch of fish on the day before I had to return back to school.