New Year, New Gear & New Goals - Bring On The 2016 Season!!



  Happy new year to you all! May 2016 bring you tight lines and memorable fish tales to talk about for years to come. My goal for 2016 is to scratch another Alberta trout species off the catch and released list, so bring on Mr. Bull Trout. Last years mission was Grayling and from my previous posts you've may have read came with great success. So I am setting the adventure bar high with moderate expectations of what may or may not end up on the end of my line this season.  Looking forward to posting my adventures so stay tuned and enjoy!

  The quest for a Bull Trout on the fly begins now! With that comes the joy of tying flies! Big, articulated, multi hook, fuzzy hunks of "meat" these river monsters wouldn't dare to let drift pass. So with that fly description and when your current fly tying station is the family dinner table, your wife is not always a fan of your "epic" fly designs.  Even though you may think you've done your best post session clean up, there are always one or to bits you miss and they get flagged by her for your re-evaluation. Not the most ideal location for tying flies but if you've got no where else to go, you make do with what you got.

  Now that I have a child who's under the age of one, my fly tying station (Kitchen Table) was deemed unfit as a staging area and workstation for fly tying. As a result my kit had been relegated to the landing of my basement stairs for the past eight or so months. Not that this is a problem as I've really had no time of late to spend on the bench. Plus there might be some dangers in leaving said kit in the open for the new edition to get his mitts on. Little push back was given on my behalf when I was told it was to be "put away" in not so many words, ha ha!

 However now that the rivers are closed and it's winter in Alberta, there is no better way to get through the dark nights then sitting in front of the vice and not the TV. Being a family man now, I need to come up with clever ways of finding the perfect work / family / recreational time balance. In order to keep all parties happy, fly tying now comes out after the boy goes to bed, dogs been walked and my wife has nestled in with a tea and her knitting. Only then can I sneak away and have real "MAN TIME," ha ha. I kid, I really do have it quite well and wouldn't have it any other way with this crew of mine.

  My wife and I share several similar interests in relation to the outdoors and hobbies. For example, she likes to ski and I snowboard, she likes to knit and I like to tie flies. Just mine are a bit cooler, ha ha! I think my wife could tell that not having tied flies for a few months was getting to me even though I hadn't noticed it was. So for this past Christmas my loving, thoughtful, beautiful wife surprised me with a desk and side cabinet for all my fly tying mess. This photo, below, is the desk set up so you get the idea.

  I now have to start filling up my fly box for early season action and work my way up to the big Bull Trout flies I so delicately described above. A fly fisher has to have his / her tying priorities set based on what open water is fish able first and the accessibility to said open water. At the end of the 2015 season my waders decided to die and before I can reach open water this season I had to pick up a new set.
 
  After a few trials with other brands, I decided to go with Orvis's "Silver Sonic Convertible Waders." The waders are a welded seam and can be easily "converted" to waist highs in a matter of seconds. Ideal for those smoking hot summer days on the river. Check out the Orvis web page if you're interested in learning more. I am not paid by or sponsored by Orvis so I am not going to go into more details. But if someone from Orvis is reading this and would like to pass along some free gear, feel free to drop me a line and I would be honoured to review and field test them in a future post :) !

  I will end this post with a question for the reader, what are your fly fishing goals for the new year?  


New Tying Desk

New Gear - Orvis Sliver Sonic Convertible Waders 
Bull Trout Potential

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