The Super Salamander

Comprised primarily of pony beads and Latigo Lace, this 'super salamander' approaches 12 inches in length.  Bulky chenille yarn and googly eyes surround the long lace tail tied onto the 4/0 hook's shank.

I would like to fish this in a farm or retention pond containing trophy-sized largemouth bass and a limited food supply.  However, I'll more than likely cast it about my local reservoir sometime soon.

How To Sharpen Fishing Hooks

How To Sharpen Fishing Hooks

Recent Works

Now tying worms and flukes with beads and leather.  The beads float, providing an interesting characteristic for designing floating or neutral buoyancy subsurface lures.

Bucktails

Rarely do I tie bucktail jigs.  However, I'm often looking to expand my experience with materials, so I took a little time recently to tie a couple.

 Materials:

• Unpainted ball-head jigs weighing 3/16 and 1/4 of an ounce with 2/0 and 1/0 hooks, respectively.
• Rosey's Powder Coatings - Olive Grey 85% Gloss and Green Grey Powder Coating - RAL 7009.
• Rosey's Powder Coating mixes with glitter - Clear Coat High Gloss 100% with green and red glitter, respectively.
• UTC Ultra Thread (140 denier) - olive.
• Hedron, Inc. Flashabou - red.
• Bi-color tinsel - emerald/magenta.
• Wapsi Strung Rooster Hackles - olive/natural.
• Wapsi Bucktail - olive.
• Lion Brand Suede Yarn - olive.

Reapers

Designed after the Mar-Lynn soft plastic bait from years ago, only these are made of ice chenille and leather.  Silver glitter is applied to the tail using Tulip Puffy Paint.  The tail's 'rays' are formed by cutting the  leather at 45-60 degree angles in hopes of segmenting the the tail for better flexibility and movement when wet.

Other versions will be created, provided that they fish fairly well.  I look forward to fishing them in the local river while trying my luck for smallmouth and spotted bass.

Pinkies!

Tied with kip tail, pinkies are a favored style of jig for my mid-winter to early spring fishing.  I've caught trout, bluegill, crappie, and both largemouth and smallmouth bass with them.

Each is tied on a 1/32-ounce darter-head jig possessing a #6-8 Aberdeen hook.  Used a 70 denier (or slightly smaller) polyester thread to keep the bulk down on the jig collars.

I like to tip these jigs with curly-tailed grubs of about 1 inch in length and fish them beneath a float.  It's a bit like still fishing, but during winter it allows you to take in your surroundings and enjoy nature's wonders.  Do dress appropriately to stay warm!

The image below shows a couple of commercially-tied pinkie jigs with grub trailers attached.

Filling A Jig Box...Gradually

Tied the three of these this weekend.  Two of the jigs are tied with a material called 'Fish Silk' which is sold by FlyMasters of Indianapolis.  The other jig is a tri-color combination of calf hair (kip tail).

All are tied on 1/16-oz darter-head jigs with #4 hooks.  The blue-heads with hot yellow fish silk may have good possibilities for crappie fishing.  All should be fished for smallmouth bass at some point this winter.