The last three afternoons I have rekindled my love of bluegills. I have been fishing out of my yak trying to get used to it for a trip to the Cape for stripers. The small ponds that I am fishing are loaded with bluegills. They have sucked down, slashed at, ignored, and jumped over my poppers with abandon.
I'm listening to a Frank Zappa tune in which the ending refrain is "How could I be such a fool?" This simple line represents me and the bluegill. In my quest for big fish I had forgotton the fish that turned me into a fly fisherman in the first place. I know its been said before but if these guys were 5 plus pounds I wouldn't get past the nearest pond. Oh ya a 1/2 pond bluegill can move a yak. :chuckle:
shadfreak or sould I say bluegillrekindled
They are a blast to catch, especially on floating flies. It sometimes looks like a tip-off in a basketball game: a bunch of fish gather around under the fly and a couple of them jump up and try to get it :chuckle:
I've been having great success with a #12 soft hackle this year. An amber glass bead, peacock herl body, and 2 turns of natural colored Emu feather. Fish it it with short strips, and get ready to practice your strip sets .
If we're using a basketball analogy here, then some of the bluegills I've hooked this year are probably named Shaquille. :hehe:
My hot fly for these huge 'gills has been a green/yellow frog popper in a size 4, complete with split hackle tail and rubber legs on the sides. I usually catch them when I'm casting to bass structure, but it's not disappointing when I realize that I've hooked a bluegill. Like Shadfreak said, these are the guys who have gotten so many of us started in the first place.
Not only will they move a kayak, but I've had a couple start moving my 11 foot john boat. Big shoulders and big attitude! A great combination.
Well as a newbie to the flyfishing world, RTF is going after bluegill as one of his first try's. Now if I can just fiqure out all the language slang you folks are slinging around I'll be fine
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