How many fly fishermen on here.

[oldtestamentman]

Yep, you can always tell who the out of Baffin fisherman are. They think fishing is like a golf scramble or something. Lord if they see your pole bend, here they come to use your spot ;-). Mansfield is the most ridiculous place I've ever been. Its good, but not worth the gas money. I haven't even explored Alazan Bay much as of yet. I hear there is a school of 50 plus reds that live in the backwaters.

I'm game for fishing anytime its warm. When the flats warm up, the fish move in even during the winter.

I guide about once or twice a month because I have a full time job at the college in Kingsville, but anytime you or AtTheWall want to head out, sounds good. Baffin is a great place.

[jaker_cc]

Yep, you can always tell who the out of Baffin fisherman are. They think fishing is like a golf scramble or something. Lord if they see your pole bend, here they come to use your spot ;-). Mansfield is the most ridiculous place I've ever been. Its good, but not worth the gas money. I haven't even explored Alazan Bay much as of yet. I hear there is a school of 50 plus reds that live in the backwaters.



I'm game for fishing anytime its warm. When the flats warm up, the fish move in even during the winter.



I guide about once or twice a month because I have a full time job at the college in Kingsville, but anytime you or AtTheWall want to head out, sounds good. Baffin is a great place.

I know Alazan pretty well, there are some good flats back in there. I'll let ya know next time I head down to the house.


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[AtTheWall]

I always stay 5 to 10 yards from shore. There is usually a wave trough seam that I can slip into and work both sides easily. The first time I take clients out, they can't believe how many big fish lurk between the trough and the first grass line and reds literally 1/2 exposed in 2-3 inches of water right against the shore. I'm talking 20 to 30+ inchers.

This is the same setup on the backside of St Joe Island, above Allyn's Bight. It mimics the Gulf of Mexico coastline in many ways. The near shore gut, is very defined. Then there is two to four channels, further out into Aransas Bay, as you progress off the shoreline. That first gut, fills up with redfish, as the tides drop out of the saltwater lakes behind. And specks will pile up beyond these outflows, waiting for washout prey. They are formed by currents and winds, working against that shoreline, with the deeper waters of Aransas Bay, providing the depth and wave fetch, to really scour that shoreline. A few sections near Long Reef, are littered with oyster shells and you will find a lot of slot blackdrum and sheepshead working the flats nearer to Long Reef.

There are days when it pays to wait till mid-day to work this shoreline, especially when the tide is falling and well into nearing it's bottom drop, where the flats along that shoreline become too shallow for most. This is the time to work it skinny, with the sun vertically overhead, you can see fish and bait in each one of the guts, with a steady outflow of super warm water, pouring out of those saltwater lakes. It's a great area on sunny days during the winter and all through the spring warm-up. I've visually spotted and stocked specks along the shoreline consistently, at high noon to 2 pm, well after the morning crowd has cleared. I've even picked up a few Spanish Mackerel along this zone, during the Springtime.

I love finding shallow flats, that drain out into deeper water shorelines, during the cooler months. On sunny days, they become a warmer water feeding zone and setting up on the outflow, with the wind and sun at your back = consistent fishing action.

The great thing about this area, Aransas Bay is pretty deep, so some of the bigger trout, will skirt this shoreline, if the pressure is down. And this barrier strand doesn't see much pressure, above Long Reef either. You can literally work up into Carlos Bay, Mesquite Bay and even San Antonio Bay where it transitions from St Joe to Matagorda islands. The only drawback up there is, you start to clear the quality seagrass flats, and the transition turns into oyster reefs and more central to upper coast strata.

Poling out of the saltwater lakes of St Joe island, floating quietly and freely, is pretty cool. Even the airboats don't shoot out of these small inlets. They can probably skid over them at speed, but floating them freely, that big V8 engine with fan, drops their stern down too deep to drift cleanly. So when the fan boats are roaring around those lake flats, they essentially shove a lot of redfish down and out off of those flats, filling that inside gut with redfish.

I got into one hole, power poled down and within about 45 minutes, caught and released 18 redfish. The hole was basically a widening effect of that inside channel, bordered by grass, where it's center mark was probably 3 ft deep at best and about 18 yards long and 10ft wide. It was ridiculously fun!

[AtTheWall]

The folks at Blue Halo are very cool! They sent me a hand written note on my Sales Invoice saying THE LAGUNA MADRE IS FUN!

And the blank quality is excellent.

I finally got the REC seat and Portuguese cork setup last night. U-40 Rod Bond and a lot of reaming out the cork, to fit the larger fiberglass blank's butt.

That's part of the challenge with building a fiberglass fly blank. Most of the cork and reel seats sold today, are designed for the super small graphite blanks used by the majority of fly anglers. You really have to study the components to find a suitable system, that will fit the blank.

The Blue Halo folks do a great job of providing measurement detail to the blanks they build and sell.



A nice touch, 4 inches above my cork grip. I'm gonna have to wrap some bling wrap just below this.

[AtTheWall]

The Galvan 5/6 wt came in today! Spooled with 6wt WF line, rounded up 3 sets of loop to loop leaders and some matched tippets.

I'll have this rod build done before Sunday night. Cold and nasty weather, good weekend to get this done. I have tons of fly lines, leaders and tippets and I'm spending some of the weekend to organize my gear.

I've got tackle scattered around with a lot of offshore and surf gear ready to go at the drop of a dime. Must organize my pile of fly gear and get a good gear bag setup so I can grab and go. I have 7 or 8 fly boxes with crap piled up on my work bench. It's organized but it's not ready to fish.

I'll make this rod's first cast on Monday. Can't WAIT!!!!!!


I'll post some build pics, as I progress through the build. The marks on the blank now, mark guide placement and center spine points. The long white marks are the spine marks. Short white marks, guide placement locations.

I wrap each section alone, it makes it much easier than spinning the entire blank fully assembled. Base has stripper and bling, then the center and tip each will be wrapped individually. Should be sealing thread Sunday evening with a full night dry spin till Monday morning.

[AtTheWall]

Wrapped my Blue Halo 7 wt today. Long day but the heavy work is complete. I'll finish up with thread sealer tomorrow.

Base wrap down and pattern thread wrap started.

[AtTheWall]

Thread sealer done and dry. I'll make its first cast tomorrow.

Fiberglass blanks tend to be a bit tip forward with weight. Fiberglass is a bit more heavier than graphite, always is.

But I got the balance point I was looking for, right at the top of my grip where i hold my line as I strip. With the reel off, it's tip heavy.

[oldtestamentman]

Very nice! Quality and pretty!!
I can't wait for a warm up after deer season, 3-4 days then maybe spot a red or two out at Baffin. They crusie the flats around mid day. I shift to fishing the North shores this time of year. We also have a few good trout holding out on the N Shore.

[AtTheWall]

Thank you Oldtestamentman!

Once we ever get a warm up, I do believe those fat sow trout will be on a feeding roam down there.

[SwampRabbit]

That blue really pops... kinda makes my eyes hurt.

[froghunter]

Thread sealer done and dry. I'll make its first cast tomorrow.

Fiberglass blanks tend to be a bit tip forward with weight. Fiberglass is a bit more heavier than graphite, always is.

But I got the balance point I was looking for, right at the top of my grip where i hold my line as I strip. With the reel off, it's tip heavy.

So let's hear the story behind that cuda.

[Clay C]

So let's hear the story behind that cuda.

HA! That's what I was thinking too. Need a story on that one.

I just booked a trip to Xcalak next month to target Permit, but one of the things I want is a good sized Cuda on the flats. A buddy of mine just got back from there and said they saw several big Cuda while permit hunting. I think I'm going to pick up an Echo Bad ***** Glass 9 wt or 10wt before I go. I was going to pick up an Epic 990 kit, but they said they don't know when they will be back in stock. Something about a big Cuda on glass just sounds awesome.

[froghunter]

I hope my 8wt makes it back from the keys a 2 piece and not a busted up 10 piece. I already have my steel leaders ready for cuda and shark.

[Clay C]

I hope my 8wt makes it back from the keys a 2 piece and not a busted up 10 piece. I already have my steel leaders ready for cuda and shark.

Haha It's possible it may come back that way! When I was fishing Flamingo back in April, I had to remind myself not to cast to some of the sharks we saw. Some of those Lemons were freaking huge. 6-7 footers in some skinny water. Every sensible part of me was saying "ddddooooonnn't do it", but the kid in me (99.5% of my personality) was saying "you know you want to, don't be lame". We were rigged for Snook and small to medium sized tarpon on 8 wts so I wouldn't have won that battle.

[jaker_cc]

How many fly fishermen on here.

I need some opinions, I'm looking for an 8wt setup for the bay. Flats mostly, and shorelines. I went into bass pro yesterday and looked at the sage VXP which felt great in the hand, super lightweight. There were a couple of sage reels that caught my eye and were also extremely lightweight. I'm thinking of going with the 3200 series 7-8. Anyone have any other suggestions or opinions? I have a 10wt that is zero fun to cast all day. May be getting rid of it if I can get this setup bought right after New Years.


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