Image via WikipediaWe have been married 26 years today. My wife says it’s time for some new fly fishing gear including waders and felt bottomed boots.

I have lost 60 pounds since my last purchase of fishing waders so I kinda just float in my old waders. Plus they have seen better days.

The multiple patches make them look like I got caught in a cross fire.

My felt bottomed fishing boots basically have no felt or bottoms any more so they gotta go as well.  Duct tape worked to hold them together for the last couple of trips but now they are just gone.

I have always been one to wear things until they have paid for themselves. I guess it’s the mentality of being broke through my entire youth. No one seemed to mind when it was my blue jeans but my fishing buddies just can’t stand to see my waders and boots any longer.

Smallmouth Bass are one of my favorite species for sport fishing on the fly in New Brunswick. I have caught them up to 4 pounds but only a couple of times. I usually max out in the two, two and a half pound area but I don’t mind because they all think their 4 pounds.

Smallies a blast whether your using a baitcaster, spinning rod or fly rod. My personal preference has to be using my fly rod for smallies. I do keep my spinning rod available for those days that the wind is taking the fun out of fly fishing.

I have mentioned a little hot spot for smallmouth bass that I go to when it’s too windy and it also makes a great place to learn how to fly fish as there are plenty of spots one can cast from without hooking up in a tree or a bush.

I have a little spot I go to when it just too windy elsewhere so I get to use my fly rod here most days. I try to keep my favorite spots a bit hush hush and in the past 20 years or so I have only told two people where this spot actually is. One of those people is my son and I am sure he won’t tell any one.

The smallmouth bass in this spot only seem to grow to about 14 inches but what a day of fun you can have with light action gear.

Another reason I love this place so much is that it’s only about an hour from home and I am within about 15 minutes of trout fishing and pickerel fishing and even Atlantic salmon fishing. Can’t beat that with a stick.

These waters don’t require you to fish using a fly rod like a few other places I fish so those that are just learning can go back and forth between a spinning rod and the fly rod.

Come and go fishing with me, as long as you don’t mind wearing a blindfold while getting there.

Over the past thirty years of fly fishing in New Brunswick I have found may great hot spots for Brook Trout. I like to think these are my very own little secret hot spots. I even have a few that my closest fishing buddies aren’t aware of.

Excuse the poor quality of my photo I shake a lot. I do have a new digital camera this years so I hope to take better and less shakey pictures.

New Brunswick has a large number of Beaver ponds that make for great trout habitat. They are not always easy to get to, which is great for those willing to fight through a few bushes for a great day on the water. The spot in the picture however isn’t one of those hard to get to spot. It’s visible from the road and has an easy path right to the water. You can even drive down to the water to launch a canoe.

I had driven by this spot hundreds of times but this one particular day it was almost windy enough to push my car off the road so I was heading to a more protected spot to fish. As I was driving by I of couse glance through the trees to look at the water but something else caught my eye this day. I thought I saw water further back in the trees.

Well I hit the brakes, backed up and waited for another gust of wind and sure enough I did see water. I got a little excited but I have been fooled before after a good rain fall only to find a big water hole.

It was not easy to get through the trees. They are thick and the branches go almost to the ground making it tough to get through, but I didn’t mind as most people tend to be lazy and wouldn’t struggle to get to a fishing spot.

The little trek through the bush wasn’t a disappointment and it was worth every scratch across my face. It was another Beaver pond and it was only a couple of minutes further through the bush and yet in all the years I have fished this spot I never knew the other pond was here. Cool.

Later I found that if I followed the brook from the first pond for a few yards I could get to the new pond easier and I could come back the same way.

Even though this beaver pond was a bit smaller that the first pond it was all mine. I walked around the pond and never saw another human track which made me really excited.

I wonder how many other great fishing spots are just out of view?

Like I said at the start I have been fishing in New Brunswick for more than thirty years and I find at least one new spot to fish ever year.

I am in love with fly fishing in New Brunswick, well that’s what my wife says. Really I am not in love with it it, it’s more of an addicted if you ask me. If I dont’ get my fix of fly fishing I get cranky. Like now, since it’s been way too long since I was able to wet a line last.

When we visit family in Ontario the subject of fly fishing in New Brunswick comes up. All the guys in our family are fishermen but I am the only one that fly fishes. In 30 years I have not been able to convince any of them to come down here to New Brunswick and do some fly fishing with me.

They don’t know what their missing. Instead they just sit in the middle of the lake where our cottage is and dangle their lines and drink beer. That’s not for me, plus I don’t drink until after the fishing is done for the day.

I still enjoy getting together with my relatives but I don’t enjoy their fishing strategies, or lack of them.

They are going to read this post and most likely be a bit annoyed with me but hey, I get under their skin all the time. I am the youngest of the bunch at 55 and don’t plan to change.

I don’t care to tell people where I do my fly fishing. New Brunswick anglers can be pretty tight lipped. I can tell you a few locations, just not specific enough for you to find my honey holes.

Just a little plug for one of my website design clients, Big Paw Outfitters. Kevin knows the best places to take his clients when they come to him for a fly fishing New Brunswick experience at their lodge. So giving you Kevin’s website may just lead to you finding a few of my best spots but when a fly fishing guide is taking you there I guess it’s ok.

Big Paw Outfitters is located in Renous, New Brunswick and is only a stones throw away from prime fly fishing for our great Atlantic salmon.

Check out Big Paw Outfitters website. Kevin also guides for black bear and moose, but I will let him tell you all about that.

Here in New Brunswick the Atlantic salmon don’t always make it back to the ocean the same year they head up river to spawn. These are the salmon I am aiming for when fishing season opens.

The Atlantic salmon don’t feed when the come up the river and if you want to catch one you need to know how to get a predatory reaction or you won’t be fighting anything but time and black flies. Okay there won’t be any black flies, yet.

Today I am ready to tie a few of my favorite early spring in New Brunswick streamers, the Mickey Finn.

The Mickey Finn was just about the first Atlantic salmon catching fly I ever tied. It’s simple to tie and only takes a few minutes so I can tie a bunch in an evening and I can even tie them right at the waters edge and be fishing it in under 10 minutes. If I am really excited it might take me 15 minutes because I get real shakey.

The Mickey Finn I use to catch the hunger black salmon in the early spring.

The Ingredients that make for an early spring Atlantic salmon’s dinner.

Hook: Mustad #3665A, #38941

Sizes: 2-10 and maybe even a 12

Body: Flat silver tinsel right off your Christmas tree, it’s still up right?

Ribbing: Oval Silver Tinsel

Wing: Yellow bucktail for the bottom of the wing, red for the middle and then yellow again for the top layer of the wing.

Thread: Black

As you can see there isn’t a lot that goes into the Mickey Finn but the salmon love and destroy them even though they are very durable flies, so I like to keep a few extras on hand. My fishing buddies never have enough. I like to give them a hard time so I pretend that I don’t have any left and then I start checking my many pockets and before you know it I come up with one or two more.

FACT: Something I didn’t know until recently was that the Mickey Finn was made famous by John Alden Knight in the 1930s.

When I started fly fishing I began fishing trout in small streams. Nothing like a good feed of brook trout while the water is still really cold. Later in the season as the water temperature rises I tend to strictly catch and release as I find they are a bit wormy by then.

After I had practised fly fishing for a while I moved up to fly fishing for salmon. That is an experience you can share but it is always best experienced to really understand why it’s so addictive.

Fly fishing for salmon and trout is great but one day I decided to fly fish for bass. I found this to be a great way to get some one hooked on fly fishing. The main reason is that you can fly fishing for trout and salmon but a lot of care needs to be taken to keep out of the trees but not so with the places we fish for bass.

I purchased two float tubes so that I could reach areas that are out of reach of other boats and even canoes, plus I was equipped to take friends fishing.

Over the years I have found a ton of places bass live. Out of those many great fishing spots I have a few places that are just made for fly fishing newbies. They can learn fly fishing basics, catch fish with dealing with the wind or getting hooked on everything around them.

As they grow in experience I introduce them to some of my other fishing spots that take a bit more learnin’ and practice.

My favorite spot to take fly fishing newbies is a flooded strip-mine that has been stocked with smallmouth bass. This is such a great spot because it has little to zero wind, a lot of hiding places for bass to ambush their dinner and you can fish this area with or without a boat or float tube.

The area is surrounded by high hills created by all the mining which keeps the wind down. Plus over the years trees have taken root and now there is even better cover for the bass and more trees block more of the wind on those windy days.

Fly fishing is my favourite method of fishing these days and has been for about 30 years now. The only reason it was before that was because I didn’t even know it existed.

Fly fishing can be a fun and most relaxing, yet exciting, sport, allowing one to spend quiet time with your friends, family and YES even with Mother Nature.

As a fresh water fly fishing addict I fish mostly rivers here in New Brunswick but you can also find and catch a variety of fish species willing to take a fly in just about any ponds, lakes, rivers and streams. I was just telling a fishing buddy about a beaver pond that had some great brook trout and how we used to fly fish for them in amongst the trees and how challenging it was but also how rewarding the experience was.

Even though learning to fly fish only takes a few minutes it never gets old and you can spend your entire life learning new ways to fly fish. Fly fishing is such a great way to fish that I think everyone that fishes should give it a try.

Have fun and maybe I will see you on the water.