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Monomoy Shrimp

4.8K views 28 replies 11 participants last post by  BigDave  
#1 ·
OK...I will go with this at Monomoy this weekend...Brown sand color, Poplovic style...tyed on a #2 Verivas hook... with a 4X or 6 or 8 pound test... will be tyed on the tippet with an improved clinch knot, not my usual Improved mono-loop.
 

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#2 · (Edited)
...looks a little like...

...a ParanoidPenguinShrimp?! sorta...
The one I gave you at N Monomoy, I tried for sand colours to match what Jim W and I were kicking up.
A smaller/finer, less obvious hook might be a consideration?!
Soonerorlater we'll break the code!
The boat leaves at 0800...be under it!
 
#7 ·
Re: ...looks a little like...

Penguin said:
...A smaller/finer, less obvious hook might be a consideration?!
I wondered about this when I was at SB on Monday. In my quest to find a fly that the fish would eat, rather than just follow, I pulled all the flash out of one of my small tan flies and even clipped the tail/wing so the fly was smaller and stubbier looking, much like the baitfish I saw. When I checked the fly's look and action in the water, I thought it looked good but noticed that the hook stuck out like a sore thumb (which I suppose is better than sticking into a sore thumb :hehe: ) The bright, shiny hook was the first thing I could see when I tried to spot my fly during the retrieve. And it was only a #1 or #2. Maybe a smaller bronze hook is worth a try, even though it won't last long in the salt?

Q
 
#8 ·
Coupl'a good lookin' crustaceans there. Nice ties, fellas.

Especially like the tan one - the shrimp I have been seeing are almost white. Kind of translucent too.

I played around with some bodi-braid last night and will be bringing my own experimental patterns to the island this weekend. We might just need to show them something they haven't seen before :devil:

BigD
 
#9 ·
Nice shrimps.

Here's my take on those little critters. One of these has a lead keel, a couple tied on #2 one on a #4. I wonder about working them though. Seems they were on the bottom making 6" bursts. Even the weighted shrimp is not going to stay on the bottom. I wonder if instead of matching the exact look another angle would be to tie super small craft fur clousers? Hmmm... maybe after fishing tonight. I'll be on the 8 Sat.:D
 

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#12 ·
Dave..I did pick up a striper on shrimp at Monomoy...see a past post... I was however blind casting is one of the holes and twitching it.... I had fished that hole with everything else...until I used the shrimp. By the way the verivas hook is not shinny but plain.
 
#13 ·
Dave and others..please bring a copy of any shrimp's you are tying and if I can borrow them I will post with them all together. A great way to compare styles and it would be great if we discover the one that works or if they all do... If they don't...back to the drawing board...knowing the way this season has gone Monomoy will probably be full of crabs this weekend and we will really get screwed up.... I will bring a huge Lobster fly and tarpon fly... a couple years ago an old friend who used to work at the Harwich Orivs shop..Peter Alves... had tried everything one day to no avail so he took a tarpon fly he happened to have and tried that and caught one fish after another with it.... so..howabout my huge Murphy Lobster fly just sitting there in it's tied defensive position.
 
#15 ·
I'm in for this one. I tied up one out of some puglisi hair. We'll see how it works. What times the dance? 8am?

nick
 
#17 ·
Too funny. I may have to tailor a few more contestants this evening. Maybe we can even have one of Juro's Drag Deep Eel's in the contest. :hehe:

Nick
 
#21 ·
Very amusing thread!

The problem with shrimp is that stripers do not feed on them explicitly - they graze them where they are available in concentrations. Even though 40" bass feed actively on shrimp, they are not singling out a shrimp and chasing it. That's why you don't "see" them eating them even when they are. You can assume when they are grubbing close to the bottom in a current where there are lots of shrimp they are indeed grazing on shrimp.

I've always had much better luck in the greater scheme of things using something that will wake them up out of their shrimp funk, even if it means having dozens of non-takers through the day. If the overall results are several takers, huge sight fished bass, then the net results are just fine by me.

I've noticed that several years ago when few were fishing crabs their effectiveness was far better out on the flats than they are today. Until the last couple of years, the flats style deep eel got few rejections, but then again I may have been the only one out there using it. Aside from the migrating visitors these fish are in large part the same fish returning to the area each year, they've seen it all. I am convinced they become accustomed to seeing certain things and learn to avoid them. Keep in mind a cow bass is 12, 14 or more years old. Yet the fly is not everything... of the four critical factors for success on the flats, the fly is the least important item.
 
#22 ·
Oh Juro!...your taking the fun out of the thread. You are correct about the crab patterns ... They are the only fly that worked for me two years ago and not often...but the fish were takers at that time.... the fly may be the least but I wonder what Yor secret fly will produce ..so don't hold back on me.... I will have to take out that tarpon fly too.;)
 
#23 ·
Secret fly is not a tarpon fly... you'll see. Also re-created another, based on a fly that fell apart on me one year and I caught a bunch of finicky fish after it broke. Purely deep-season stuff, although there isn't too much of the dog days left in 2002...
 
#24 ·
John -

I've never fished your stretchs of SB/Monomoy, but this time of year and a little later, I've had sporadic luck up in Nantucket harbor with a shrimp fly I shamelessly cribbed from Jack Gartside.

Unlike the Popovics--a true imitation, the Gartside shrimp is an attractor pattern. Estaz, marabou, and a bit of flash. It undulates more in the water. Easy as hell to tie.

I don't have a digicam, but here's a link to the pattern on his site. <http://www.jackgartside.com/fly_tan_shrimp.htm>

I tie this in a lighter tan than he does--on 4 and 6 hooks. At one of the winter shows, I even saw him tie it in chartreuse--which I haven't had the courage to try.

One more piece of the puzzle. Bon chance.

Jay
 
#25 ·
Jay..nice to hear from you... I hope your not spending all your time with all the celebrities on Nantucket... How is Cross Rip Outfitters this year..nice fly shop...But Barry Thurston's shop does not have alot of fly stuff... Have you been fishing alot this year? The gatside shrimp is also one that he has in Dick Brown's book on Bonefish flys... I will add it to my tieing list.. see you soon.
 
#26 ·
Quentin's comment about the hook stick out like a bum thumb got me thinking...dangerous, I know, anyway.

my question is this:
Has anyone tried tying the pattern on a salmon type (black) hook to help camoflage it?

Also - I got to look at the flies in Alan Caolo's bag o' tricks. The patterns he fishes aren't the exact imatation type but more like wooleybugger style approximations. One fly could be a crab shrimp or other misc. bait. FWIW...

Good luck out there and please post results for the jealous/envious.