The Crank Bait Fly

  I returned to my local carp ponds on Wednesday afternoon hoping to pop the cherry on my new 3wt but Mother Nature's early spring fickleness and Charlie Brown's kite tree both conspired to thwart my ability to perform said act. Blustery winds and abundant shoreline shrubbery frustrated my attempts to reach my quarrie on the far side of the pond and after a dozen rescue missions into the prickly thicket, I'd had enough.

  Luckily I'd brought a box of worms and a brand new 5' UL Shimano Lightning Rod with a Pflueger President 6720 reel spooled with 5Lb. tracer braid, more than enough to tackle anything in those waters. All I needed to do was get them to cooperate. Tackle Shop showed up by the time I'd worn out my third location without a single carp bite. I did manage a half dozen bluegills though.

  TS set up at my first location, tossing a heavily weighted worm 50' out into the deeper water and reeled in a golden 18" carp less than five minutes later! Followed by another slightly larger and a handful of small bullhead catfish. If he hadn't rubbed it in so much there'd be a picture of him peacocking with his catch. Seriously though...my mistake was focusing too intently on the weedy margins using a slip float when obviously the weather had the larger fish feeding in the depths. So after adjusting my depth and casting to deeper water...all I could catch were gills.

   Honestly...catching anything from open water in March is a bonus and both of us were well satisfied with our results but by mid afternoon we were fairly chilled from the constant wind.

   You may remember me showing off this deer hair "crank bait"a few months ago. I finally got a chance to try it out and the results were better than I expected. First off...no I didn't catch anything with it, but I will! With a 2" body it was a bit much to cast with a 3wt rod, but on a long, moderately quick strip it rocketed to the bottom with a tight wobble that would have made Lauri Rapala proud. I played around with different retrieves and discovered by holding the rod under my right arm I could pull with both hands, maintain a fairly constant speed and attain greater diving depth. On a slack line it wobbled back to the surface. There's no doubt this style of bug is going to be deadly fishing predators in stillwaters.

  The first thing I did when returning home was to tie a couple scaled down versions for my new rod. Tied on a #4 baitholder hook these flies have a body lenght of 1". I can't wait to use them ...legally. Bass opener is still 3 months away.