Please Remind Me To Fish Here

Check out this pond.....or puddle.  It's about the size of 2.5 backyard swimming pools. It's a small pond, possibly one of the smallest ones I've fished (expecting to find fish).

I can easily cast from one side to the other, but shoreline to stand and cast from is very limited. There is a raised platform, likely for bird watching, but it's really to high to use as a place to cast. So, I'm limited to on small section. I have fished it, once, for a minute or two, but it was later in the year than this picture and it was weeded over pretty good.

So, I'm just going to ask that someone remind me about this little jewel in about a month or two, before the weeds take over again, because I do suspect that there is a fat bass in there that's just dying to attack one of my flies!

Oh, and while you're in a friendly "Remind Mike to fish" mood, tell me about the even more secluded pond just south of this one!

Two New Reels From Jesse James Fly Reel Company

I was checking out the Jesse James Fly Reel Company site the other day and noticed they now have 2 new reels out.

There is a saltwater reel with a water proof drag system, and cool double spider webs.

Saltwater Reel

And I found they have a smaller reel, for the rest of your fishing. A nice 4/5 reel.

4/5 Reel

LINK

GFP 2011- Review

Guys, Flies & Pies 2011 was a huge success! We had a great turn out and many new people attended. It's great to have new people join us and to see the event grow in size each year. As you all probably noticed, we were very close to running out of room. I'll be working on finding a new place for next year, so keep that in mind, and let me know if  you have any suggestions.

Scott's nymph with Frogs Fanny

We had some demonstrations this year which seemed to be well enjoyed. This allowed some of the new tiers, and those who never have tied an opportunity to watch a few flies being tied by some great local tiers! Thanks for that help guys!  We had a number of people tie their first flies at the event. A big thanks to Tim for helping Dan and his son tie their first! They seemed to enjoy it and have a great time.

Lucas demonstrating a Chubby Muffin

Chubby Muffin, bottom left

First Fly

It's always great to see how willing everyone is to show off their work and help others out. The word on the street is that our youngest tier had a great time tying with Ray and talked about his time with Ray the whole ride home!

Teaching the kids

Our sponsors (see their links below) helped out big time and we enjoyed a table full of door prizes and great raffle prizes. Some highlights of those items were the JP Ross rod with the pizza painted on the butt cap, and the rods from Midwest Custom Fly Rods and Wild Water.  UNI stepped up their support this year and provided some nice samples for the door bags, along with JStockards catalog (don't forget the discount on the back) and Lake Ontario Outdoors sending us the magazines. Rumor is one of our GFP guests will be an author in that magazine in the future. It was great to see the full set up go to Lou who lost all his spinning gear to a car break in a few months ago. Theft sucks, so it's nice to see him now have only FLY gear to get back out on the water with! Mike who won the Jesse James reel (2 new models are up on their website now) spooled it up the next day with line and is eagerly anticipating the day (hopefully soon) when he gets it out on the water! Thanks to all our sponsors, your support is much appreciated!

I hope everyone had a chance to check out the rods on display from JP Ross. He does great work and it's very unique for sure. His rods are the quality you'd hope to have, and well worth passing down for generations. Thanks JP for bringing out your display! If anyone didn't get a fishing Yoda shirt, they are available on  his website.

Custom rods by JP Ross

We had John bring some custom made reels and Lucas Carroll brought some photos, both were a huge hit!

Checking out Lucas' sweet photos (Photo: Lucas Carroll)

Custom made reels. Made with wood, metal, and delrin

We ended up placed 2 orders for pizza, and we did very well putting it all down. At the end of the night, we had about 1/2 a sheet left. Well done guys and girls!

Pies (Photo: Lucas Carroll)

A huge thanks goes out to my wife Crystal and her friend Rachel for working the door and raffle tables. Without their help I could not pull off such a quality event. My wife does more behind the scenes than you see at the event, and that help is greatly appreciated.

Say Cheese

Jesse James Reel Company (Photo: Lucas Carroll)

Full setup winner!

The wind, or someone, moved the sign! It was very windy on Saturday

Keith tied up this beauty

 

Great box of streamers. www.day5flies.com

Thanks again to everyone who came and helped out! See you all next year!

Fly Tying Symposium: Utica NY

First - Thanks to everyone who attended Guys, Flies & Pies last Saturday! It was a great turn out and I had a great time. I'll be putting together some pictures soon for a post, so keep an eye out for it.

Second - Now let's turn our excitement towards the Fly Tying Symposium in Utica NY next month. I've told you before about it, and maybe you listened, but I have quite a few children of my own, so I'm not use to people listening the first time I talk. So, in case you missed it the first time around, he we go.

To keep you interested long enough to get to the details, I'll offer up this free link (one free link per customer please.) http://www.jprossflyrods.com/staff/ffaa

Here's what it is, but go to their website to see more details. I went last year a room full of vendors (fly fishing, boats, tying, etc), a room full of demonstration tiers, and a table set up for kids to tie. It's been said that in the few short years of this event, over a hundred kids have learned to tie!

Seth, he learned from the best! (I might be biased)

My wife and I'll be there tying, as well at least a few other guys/gals from GFP last week.  In total there will be over 25 tiers. In addition, there will be various presentations.

I'll give you a minute to pull out calendar....................ok, now mark this down!

Date: March 19th
Location: Hotel Utica, Utica NY (The Hotel is located just off Genesee Street)
Time: 9am - 4pm
Cost: FREE

I hope to see you there!

Hold Your Breath Until You Are Done Reading This

Sure, this is cool, but I can hold my breath while waiting for a bass to take my fly!

I'm starting to think that fly fishing is for wimps!

Find Your Way

 

Make sure you take a look at the directions page to see how to get to the party tomorrow!

Remember, the access road to the building is tucked between two houses, but this sign is out front, plus we will have a GFP sign out at the street too...providing the wind storm they are predicting today/tonight doesn't know it over!

One note of caution, if using Google Maps to map the location. In the past, Google didn't accurately mark the location of the building, but today it appears to be corrected. Just make sure your map looks like the one above and you should be all set!

See you tomorrow!

3pm - Doors open
3:30pm - First of 3 demos start
5:30pm - Pizza
7:30/8pm - Raffle winners announced

Door prizes will be givin out throughout the event!

See you then!!!

The JP Ross Beaver Meadow

Maybe you've seen the rumors on Facebook, or maybe you've just been dreaming at night that you could have a JP Ross Beaver Meadow fly rod. Well, the rumors are true, and there will be a Beaver Meadow fly rod on the raffle tables this coming Saturday!

 

 Check them out online now, and check one out in person this Saturday!

...But we finally made the news

At lunch today a coworker of mine casually said "I saw you in the paper yesterday." I was caught off guard, because I didn't remember getting arrested for anything.  So, it turns out it wasn't me he saw in the paper, but it was Guys, Flies & Pies that he saw in the paper. The local newspaper ran the following snippet in the sports section yesterday.

GFP in the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle

Pretty cool to see it getting some publicity.

UPDATE: Found the yearly announcement for GFP on page 21 of the Rochester Business Journal in the Time Out section.

GFP in the Rochester Business Journal

Frozen Pond

Last night after picking my son up from his friends house, we past a local park with a pond I've only fished a few times. I knew it would be iced over, but had to stop. I was surprised however to see that someone had placed traffic cones on the ice. I'm guessing someone was playing out on the ice....now way you'd get me out there. Of course, the fisherman in me took a mental note (and this picture) to mark the location of the cones, so I can try and hook a fat bass that might call the cone its home this summer!

Forecast for GFP

With just about a week before the event I figured I'd check out the weather forecast (not because tying depends on the weather, but travel to Rochester's largest fly tying party might.)

Imagine my surprise when I saw the following forecast for next week and the Old Farmer's Almanac listing of historical happenings for February 19th. 

A Fly 35 Degrees! I'll take it!

Check out the entry for 2011

 This is a forecast I can live with!

A Few Demos At The Event

Guys, Flies & Pies is just a relaxed fly tying party meant to provide a time for you to tie flies, while being well fed on pizza, and having the chance to walk away with some sweet gear. However, we are trying to add a few things here and there without losing focus of the relaxed party. This year we have added a few demos. We will have 3 local tiers doing short 1 hour demos. This will give everyone a chance to see some local patterns being tied by some local tiers.

Here's the line up, with a general time frame.

3:30pm - Ché Nolan will tie crayfish flies.
4:30pm - Brian Bradfield (flies to be announced)
6pm - Lucas Carroll will tie midges and/or dries (Update: Might tie some 6 inch streamers instead)

So if you are looking for a break from tying, stop by the demo table and check out their techniques and patterns.

See you all in a week and a half!

Let's Talk Knives

Back at the beginning of the century, my wife got me a new pocket knife for a project I had at work. Since that day I've carried a pocket knife with me daily. As much as this might sound all outdoorsy and manly, the truth is I use it mostly for cutting straws down to kid size at McDonalds, but I'm OK with that. Sure, I've used it for other manly tasks like freeing a newly gifted Barbie from the box, or for freeing a Transformer from the grips of cardboard and zip ties. A pocket knife is just a great tool to have close at hand.

Recently The Fiberglass Manifesto posted about carrying a whistle while wading. In response to this, Fishy Kid ordered up a bunch of whistles for those willing to support Fishy Kid and safety! This of course got me thinking about safety a little and what I do, which brings us back to knives.

I like to carry a knife while wading.

A few weekends ago I went to a gun and knife show in town and was looking for some cheap knives...the kind you can carry if you are out on the town and know you might get frisked going into a concert and not care if you have to give up the knife. My daily knife cost me close to $60 and I don't feel like handing that over for admittance into a concert, know I'd probably never get it back. So, searching around the show I spotted a knife shaped to look like a grenade. Immediately I thought I had to have one. I checked the price and it was $18. For the knife I thought $18 was pretty good, but I wasn't quite sure I was going to get it.

My friends and I continued checking out everything that was available when one of them spotted the same kind of knife for $10. When I picked this one up, the guy selling it told me how to open it. It was a spring assisted knife and the moment I moved the blade it snapped open! It was the best assisted opening knife I've ever had the joy of opening. I knew right then, that for $10 I was going to buy one of these. I then checked out both the Army and the Marine version of them, and decided I'd get both. As I was reaching for my $20 bill the guy says "how about both for $15?" I immediately took him up on that offer!

So, why this knife? What's so noteworthy about a $7.50 knife made in China? A couple of things. First, when I go wading I always put my knife on my waders so it's right there, just in case I need to cut my waders off in a hurry. I've never taken a fall in the creek, and therefore never been swept away in the current and logged under a tree....but, should it happen, I have a knife ready to help free me of my waders.

THIS knife has a few things to keep in mind if you are looking for a knife. First, it's spring assisted. This means that once you start moving the blade to open it, a spring takes over and the blade flies open. Second, this knife can be opened with EITHER hand. I can open and close my daily knife with only my right hand (even if my left hand is unavailable), but this one I can open with either hand, without help from the other. The ability to open and close the knife with just one hand is a huge thing.

If you are interested in this type of grenade knife, I did a search online and found them for about $10. To me, it's a great knife to show off because of what it looks like, but even better because it's single hand spring action. Make sure if you find one online it is spring assisted, that to me makes the knife a great buy!

Your Next 2 Weeks

Here at the GFP headquarters, we know that life isn't all about fishing (at least that's what we have to say so we don't get into too much trouble). With that knowledge, we know that many of us have other obligations outside of tying flies and chasing fish. One of those responsibilities is coming up in the next two weeks, and comes uncomfortably close the the big Guys, Flies & Pies fly tying night. But, don't fear, we've run the numbers and determined that you have plenty of opportunities to impress your better half and still secure your availability to come to tie, eat, and win on the 19th. So, don't miss out on GFP just because you forgot about Valentine's Day. You've been warned.

So, here it is in nice visual format. The boldest heart represents the actual Valentine's Day, and the lighter ones represent all the days before GFP that you can take her out to Taco Bell for a romantic Valentine's dinner. Hey, it's all about the romance.....or, it's all about faking the romance so she doesn't mind that you ditch her for GFP later in the week (better yet, bring her with you to the party!)

You've Got 2 Weeks, Make It Happen! See You On The 19th!

So, go get all your chores done, pick up your dirty underwear off the floor, paint that wall that's been on your list for the last 6 months, and take your wife out to a nice dinner at Taco Bell....then remind her of all that stuff you did so you can make it to the tying party!

See you then!