A simple way to identify and catch the big one in river! by Ebenezer Heng

A simple way to identify and catch the big one in river! by Ebenezer Heng

River dry fly fishing considered as the purest form of fly
fishing inspired generations of writers, artists, poets and
even philosophers to wax lyrical about its pleasures.

The gist to river dry fly fishing lies in the rise. Here,
the angler waits patiently for a rise to begin before
he or she starts to fish. And the art comes in persuading a
particular trout to take your artifical pattern among a host
of natural flies.

Rise forms vary widely from hour-to hour and river-to river.
From the way a trout breaks the surface (a rise), an
experienced angler can tell how and what the
trout feeds.

The classic rise is when a series of concentric rings fan
out on the surface as the trout confidently engulfs the fly
as it drifts past.

Trouts do not rise vertically in the water, instead they
drift back on the current to intercept the fly. The trout will then return to its station in the
stream, usually inbetween weed beds on a shallow gravel run,
under a bridge, overhanging tree or in a hatch pool, to
wait for the next free meal.

Other rises includes:

Nebbing rise occurs when the trout pushes its nose right out
of the water as heavy hatches of flies hover over its head.

Splashy rise is a violent splashing which usually
happens in the evening when the trout are after mayfly or
caddis.

Sipping rise happens when insects are trapped in the surface
film and usually leaves a bubble behind.

Sub-surface rise causes all the problems as the rtout seems
to be rising to take a surface fly, bt it is really taking
an emerging nymph. As it does so, it disturbs the water
making it looks like a proper rise.

Head and tail rise are usually seen in smooth stretches of
water to nymphs trapped below the surface film where the
whole fish appears.

The challenge comes in first identifying the fly that the
trout is taking, whether they are taking duns or spinners,
or if they are nymping sub-surface.

After selecting the correct fly, the next challenge comes in
persuading the trout to take it.

The observant dry-fly angler learns by experience to
recognize the different types of rise that commonly make.
This will help him to select the correct fly and present it
in a manner that the feeding fish will accept.

Once a correct imitation fly to match those that the trout
are taking is selected, get a position downstream and cast
at but not over the rising fish.

Highlighted are the common rises, to net that 'big one',
all you need is to match the correct fly to what the trout
is looking for and cast your rod!

Wishing you loads of catch!
About the Author
Are you looking forward to that one big catch? Ebenezer Heng
has co-created the ultimate, informative and useful fly
fishing directories for anyone seeking to know more about
flyfishing. Read about the equipment, places and other
trivias to net a prize catch!
Check out=> http://www.flyfishinglovers.com

A Guide to Non-Typical Catfish Fishing Techniques Part II by Jeff Williams

A Guide to Non-Typical Catfish Fishing Techniques Part II by Jeff Williams

Method 1

Equipment

I fish baits at all depths, not just the bottom, in wide-open water. I always set up and fish deep lake structures. Besides an understanding of the contours on the bottom of the lake, being mobile and being able to read your fish locator are the keys. The tools I use are 8-foot heavy action rods, circle hooks, cut and live shad, balloons and the all-important fish locator. I use 30-pound line, large capacity reels, 8-foot heavy action rods, 2 oz. Egg sinkers, barrel swivels and #7/0 circle hooks.

Basically a Carolina Rig, I have a hook with an 18-inch leader tied to your barrel swivel, which is connected to your main line, which is where your egg sinker is attached. My boat is equipped with steel rod holders, a hand-controlled trolling motor, two fish locators, a big dip net and marker buoys. My equipment is not the most expensive but it is practical. The main thing to remember is to keep whatever equipment you use in good condition. Many know all too well about the disasters that can be caused by old line and improperly maintained fishing equipment and big Blues will test everything from your knots to your rod holders. If there is a weak link, they will expose it.

Find the Big Fish

You need to know how to tell the difference between larger fish and bait fish while using your fish locator.

There are two main structures that I catch Blue Cats on: ledges and humps. Blue Cats are creatures of edges and they seem to congregate on the brake lines of ledges and humps. The one-two punch comes when you find these structures with both bait fish and big fish mixed together on your locator. There are very few spots that I will stop and fish where I dont see either big fish or bait fish on my locator. The ledges that I primarily fish are old river channels edges. The fish can be scattered up and down the edge but the best fishing occurs when they are on the top.

Catching Them

Typically, when I set up to fish these ledges, I run my boat over them and throw out my marker buoy where I see the fish. A little trick to using your marker buoys is to throw your marker upwind of where you are going to fish. If you drop the marker right on top of the fish, you will be bumping it and will eventually move it while the wind is pushing you around. If you throw it upwind of the fish, you can run your trolling motor right up to it without the wind pushing you over it.

Next I bait my rods, staggering them at the depth I see the fish. If the fish are up high, above 10 feet, I use a balloon and live shad on two rods. The other four rods will have half live and half cut shad, which I will suspend over the fish, continuously moving around the marker until the first strike occurs. In the warmer months the bite will usually occur on live shad. The colder the water, the better that cut bait seems to work.

Keep moving the depth of your baits up and down according to what your locator is telling you. An easy way to determine the depth of your bait is to measure the distance between the first guide and your rods reel. My rods are two feet from reel to the first guide so when I pull out twenty sections of line between my reel and the first guide, my bait will be approximately 40 feet deep. Stagger the depth of your bait so that you know how deep each is. When you get your first strike, move your other rods to that depth. If no strikes occur within 30 minutes move to another structure. I have set on the same ledge for many hours and caught fish, but I will usually have to move after catching 5 to 10 active fish. If you do not have a trolling motor you can use anchors, but it requires many sessions of heaving up heavy anchors and can soon kill the fun of ledge fishing. When water is at its coldest, the anchor method will work better due to the inactivity of the fish below.

In other words, the warmer the water the faster the fish will spook out from under your boat. The colder the water the less chance the fish will want to move away due to their comfort zone in the water column.

Make sure to read Part 3 of this article to learn about Capt. Jeff's second non-typical technique!

You have permission to publish this article free of charge as long as you are not selling it and that you include the author bylines immediately visible with the article and, if published in an electronic medium such as on a web site, you provide a link back to www.ozark-lodges-fishing-trips.com in the author bylines, both where the web address is listed as well as well as with the text Lake of the Ozarks Catfish Fishing Guide Service...

About the Author
Jeff Williams runs a Truman Lake Hybrid Bass and Lake of the Ozarks Catfish Fishing Guide Service offering lodging and guided trips in Missouri. To book a trip, learn more tips, or find out how Capt. Jeff would fish your own local waters, call 1-866-HOOKSET or visit http://www.ozark-lodges-fishing-trips.com today!

General Fishing Product Category Review: Are Circle Hooks for You? by Jeff Williams

General Fishing Product Category Review: Are Circle Hooks for You? by Jeff Williams

Originally published in Procats Online Magazine

Circle hooks have created a debate in the last few years between anglers who fish rivers and those who fish lakes. When using circle hooks in rivers, I havent had much trouble fishing in good current. Although they performed well in current, fishing calm water areas such as the big reservoirs I ply for giant blue cats, the hook design gave me a bit of a problem with the hook-up ratio in the slack water. I began having hook-up problems when I fished areas with no current because the bait wasnt held straight on the hook. Full circles were oftentimes double hooking back into the chunk or live baits causing me to miss a lot of fish. What would I do when I am anchor fishing in a lake with a lot of slack in my lines due to boat sway from the wind? I went back to my old standby treble and J-style hooks for quite awhile.

Circle hooks are designed to hook the fish without much rod movement by the angler. Just leave it in the rod holder and as the line gets tight and the rod bows down, the pressure penetrates the hook into the corner of the mouth of the fish and the fight is on. I felt this was a no brainer in current areas, but I tried to picture how these specialized hooks were going to work in lakes without current. I tried to imagine how a fish swims off the bait in a lake as opposed to a river. Without current, the fish could swim in any direction with the bait. The fish might swim at your boat or they might swim crossways with your boat, making a tight line hook up with a circle hook very difficult. A year ago I learned from some other catfishermen that Daiichi came out with a modified circle hook that would work in all situations. If the fish didnt swim away from the boat, the angler could still set the hook on the fish! Last year I gave the new circle hook called the Circle Hook Lite a try.

After I began to use the hook, I found out in short order that a quick, had jerk wasnt the ticket to hooking blues manually with circles. As soon as we started using a long sweep of the rod, we started hooking fish that werent being very cooperative. Fish would move to the boat, away from the boat, along side the boatevery direction you could imagine and we were catching them just as good if not better once we learned good circle hook technique.

Anatomy Of The Circle-Hook Hook Set

Once you notice a fish has taken the bait and is not moving away from the bait and is not moving away from the boat and tightening the line, pick up the rod. Then reel in as much line as possible until you feel the steady pressure of the fish on the end of the line. Once the tip of the hook has started to penetrate, the hook and the fish will do the rest. Its as simple as that. If the fish isnt giving much resistance, you can use a long sweeping motion of the rod to bury the hook.

Other Benefits

The other neat option that the CircleChunk Light has is a bait-stop barb on the shank to help with that persistent problem of double hooking your bait. There is no perfect hook, we all have to accept the fact that sometimes the most bone jarring of strikes never result in a hook up, and some little pullovers result in a mighty deep hook set, but after using these hooks for a year Im convinced they work better than my old stand bys.

I was a pretty hard sell at first, Ill have to admit, but Im glad I gave the circle chunk lite a try. I have used them in both current and slack or dead water situations. These hooks perform the same wherever you fish. I feel good about using hooks with such consistent performance as well as being a quality-made and super-sharp hook right out of the package. After years of trying all kinds of hooks from big treble hooks to kahyle hooks, I believe that the improved circle hook Daiichi has come up with is a fantastic option for any angler.

Fishing done right is work, and the harder you work at the perfect hook set the happier you will be with the reward at the end of your line.

Copyright2004-2005 Jeff Williams

You have permission to publish this article free of charge as long as you are not selling it and that you include the author bylines immediately visible with the article and, if published in an electronic medium such as on a web site, you provide a link back to www.ozark-lodges-fishing-trips.com in the author bylines, both where the web address is listed as well as well as with the text Lake of the Ozarks Catfish Fishing Guide Service:

About the Author
Jeff Williams runs a Truman Lake Hybrid Bass and Lake of the Ozarks Catfish Fishing Guide Service offering lodging and guided trips in Missouri. To book a trip, learn more tips, or find out how Capt. Jeff would fish your own local waters, call 1-866-HOOKSET or visit http://www.ozark-lodges-fishing-trips.com today!