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By Don Jordan
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5/11/07 Bits of feathers and fur fuzz waft about my fly tying desk. Tiny bits of rubber, snipped from the "legs" of a floating rubber spider, litter the floor, and bits of my cat's fur floats in a stream of sunlight beaming in above the tying vice. Toze, my cat, loves bluegill season, but not because she goes fly fishing with me. She gets considerable extra brushing when it's fly tying time. Her tail produces a fine dark sable color that I love for my bluegill nymph bodies.  Unfortunately
it is impossible to find a cat with chartreuse foam rubber fur or I'd
have one. Chartreuse or bright green foam is far and away my favorite
body material for floating spiders, and floating spiders are deadly bluegill
flies. I've landed tarpon, snook, muskies and northern pike, every kind of trout and salmon, largemouth and smallmouth bass and even crappie and carp on fly tackle, but no strike is more exciting to me than seeing a big bluegill rise for one of my green spiders. Dry flies are especially deadly when they're on the nest, mainly because it is possible to drop a fly on top of them without spooking the whole bed. Keep this in mind when you approach a set of beds. All fish become more wary in shallow water, and for a bluegill nesting in Yellowwood Lake, for example, that means from a few inches to a few feet of water at most. Any surprise flash or movement can send them flying to deep water -- your fly rod, your silhouette, the boat or even the dip of a canoe paddle will do it. That's why you have to learn to drop a fly onto nesting bluegill as if your bug just floated down from heaven. You can't slap it down. You don't want to make repeated casts over their heads. "Dapping" will spook them. Be very gentle. Fly casting to "bedding" bluegill therefore puts a premium on both accuracy and distance. You need to back off at least 30 feet in clear water, and still be able to roll a fly up under overhanging limbs and leaves. It isn't easy. Bluegill fishing is a great way to learn fishing with a fly rod. It's how I learned. Taught myself, casting off the dock for bluegill at Big Lake Chetek, Wis., when I was nine or 10, and look where it got me. (rimshot) Bluegill fishing excitement actually begins long before a big bull male bluegill smacks the surface and sucks down a floating spider. I have had December dreams of enormous bluegill beds, stretched out before me as far as I could see: thousands of adjoining circular depressions with dark, bomb-shaped bluegill bodies in silhouette, nest-guarding 'gills in each plate-sized nest. Dreaming about bluegill. Thinking about bluegill. Tying flies for bluegill. Casting those flies for bluegill. Catching bluegill. Eating bluegill fillets. Call me the Forest Gump of Bluegill. GRIFFY LAKE VERSUS To those readers who have sent mails or approached me at breakfast or lunch downtown, here is the scoop on "Lake Griffy" versus "Griffy Lake." The official Herald-Times style, I am told, is that "Lake Griffy" is always "Griffy Lake" when it appears in the newspaper. Yes, I know we all call it Lake Griffy, but please stop harassing me when it shows up as "Griffy Lake" in this column. I can refer to it as Lake Griffy until my fingers wear down on the keyboard, but it is always going to come out as "Griffy Lake" in this newspaper. On the other hand, "Lake Monroe" is not "Monroe Lake" and "Lake Lemon" is always "Lake Lemon" in the Herald-Times. Got that? -30- |
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©Copyright 2007. Donald Lee Jordan
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