Montana in August 2010

Finally got into some fresh, Montana air couple weeks ago. I am STILL without a Utah fishing license and will continue to go without one as long as my right to fish PUBLIC water here is kept from me. 66 degrees at 1500 at Monida...we left my wifes family reunion in Inkom and it was in the mid 80's. The high in Dillon was a perfect 75!

Water on the Beaverhead was HIGH. I haven't seen Clark Canyon res this high since '92. Talked to Tim at Frontier Anglers and he said 4 lb fish are 3-5 inches shorter than average, they are all that fat and healthy. He tried talking me into fishing the Bighole as it was easier wading...brother-in-law Dan and the Clacka stayed home in Salt Lake. I passed on the Bighole...Browns Bridge area was full of people and I don't like fishing the Bighole of foot. Hunter and I did drive up there but decided to stay close to Dillon. (Grandma and Grandpa's old house in Dillon has been painted since being sold...chose not to take any pics of it as I didn't need a reminder of how much I STILL feel like kicking my dad in the nuts for selling that house!) The 'Beav is getting plenty of pressure from the floaters and they are sticking a lot of pig fish. For us, though, it was tough fishing. The water was way too high for me to take Hunter to any of the places I'd normally fish this time of year. We stuck to Buffalo Bridge and the walk-in between High Bridge and Henneberry. I will admit that on the first night I casted to and hooked a MONSTER boot slut rainbow...We were walking back down river to Buffalo Bridge and I have the boot sluts at my feet, eating PMD's and caddis larvae I'm kicking up. Felt like a douche but I couldn't resist...had 5 feet of line out with a PMD colored PT Cruzer on and let it into the feeding sluts...hooked an enormous 'bow and was into my backing by the time he shook off. The next day I took Hunter into the walk-in and even there the wading was pretty sketchy. Hunter ended up catching his first fly caught fish on a #18 split case PMD emerger...He was 'estatic'! Not many hoppers on the banks due to all the water in the surrounding area. Did see a lot of Crane flies which are a kick in the pants to fish, but I think it was a little early to key on them. The high, fast water made it tough to determine where the fish were in the column and Tim gave is normal response...fish to the fish, Phil.

Sorry for this shot of Hunter but the camera got turned onto some weird settings by the little girl.

Didn't fish Poindexter...Hunter wanted to hang out at Papa T's at night a play video games. On the way out I took this pic. The parking lot had cars from PA, WA, and AZ...these guys all looked to be beating the water with 6wts! Nothing touching the surface, I'm sure these guys put the fish down on their first casts and I guessed they had no idea that fish in this stretch have PhD's in "fuck you, Mr. Fisherman."

I got this nice 'bow at Buffalo bridge on a caddis emerger the last evening. There were bugs EVERYWHERE...caddis and PMD adults enough to choke you but NO action on top, which is what I usually expect on this river.

All in all, it was a great trip. Fishing was tough, but, sheeit, I was in Montana. Will be going back up over labor day and hitting it hard again. Hopefully the water will be down a bit, hope to see some Cranes. Got some great scenery photos as well that I plan to post and paint soon, my favorite being in Monida. Until September...fuck Utah fishing for now!

Graphin'

Something a little different today...my autograph collection....and first things first...99% of your common cards from the 80's till now ain't worth shit, let's just get that out of the way early. Now, after a 25 year hiatus from collecting baseball cards I got back into it in 2001. I was up fishing in MT and visited my 'cuz in Missoula. He had a room full floor to ceiling with white boxes, each one full of basketball cards. I saw a card that had a piece of the players jersey in it, saw some with certified autographs, cards with bits of court floor, etc. I was intrigued and decided to start yet another hobby. Got home to Utah and began to frequent a card shop in Salt Lake. I soon found that cards weren't as they were back in the 70's...I saw a pack of basketball cards, 4 cards in one pack for, wait for it...wait for it...$399!! Each of those packs contained one common card and 3 cards with either jersey, patch, autograph, or multiple autographs. There were 3 older gentlemen that split the cost of the pack. I soon learned that what they were hoping for was a Jordan autograph, maybe LeBron. I don't remember what all the cards were but one was a Kobe Bryant/ Camello Anthony dual autograph. He probably wouldn't have made his money back on a sale. Look at sports cards in ebay and type in "jersey card" or "auto" and you'll get an idea of what they look like. I spent a LOT of money (money that could have been better invested in fly fishing) on cards each month. A box of cards will say something like, "this box is guranteed to contain one jersey and one autograph on average"...as a collector you end up buying the whole $50 to $100 box and hope to get a big star like Pujols, etc. 99% of the time you get a no name player or a player that ain't worth the cost of a pack, let alone the box. On occasion I got some decent hits....Cal Ripken autograph, Ted Williams uniform pants piece, Jeter sweet spot autograph...my biggest hit of all was a Reggie Jackson/ A-rod dual autograph serial numbered 3/5...there were only 5 of those cards produced. Put it on ebay and in two days the bidding was up to $300...I spent $30 on the pack. I took it off ebay and ended up selling it to the card shop owner for enough to buy myself a new Lamson reel.

After a couple years of this I decided to stop with the buying and start collecting autographs through the mail. I found a cool website, sportscollectors.net. For $14 a year you get access to thousands of home addresses to players, both current and retired, in baseball, football, basketball, hockey, and "miscellaneous" (golfers, celebrities, etc.). There are chat rooms, message boards, etc. so collectors can see who is signing, who charges, who won't sign, who's sigs are fake, etc. The fakes suck...I sent an 8x10 to Terry Bradshaw, got it back signed, and was excited as hell. I posted my success on the site and was told by a veteran collector that Terry hasn't signed a ttm (thru the mail) autograph since being inducted into the HOF...his brother signes his mail! I forgot to look that up on the site. Of course, I don't know if any of mine are real or "ghost signed" but who is gonna fake a sig of a minor league player that gets maybe one piece of fan mail a month? Being new I quickly learned that if you send a letter to Ken Griffey, Jr., Roger Clemens, or that prick-bastard Barry Bonds, you ain't gonna see any return mail.

In 2006 Topps came out with a set that was a little over 300 cards long called the Topps 2006 '52 Rookies. The set consists of 2006 rookies but the cards are based on the 1952 Topps cards, Mickey Mantle's rookie year. I am up to over 275 of the cards signed. The players I have left are tough signers like Prince Fielder (got his dad, Cecil a while back) and Geovany Soto. These guys aren't necessarily huge names they just don't sign ttm. This is where sportscollectors.net comes in handy. I find a fellow collector that lives in Detroit or Chicago and the bartering begins. Usually I will offer OMLB's (official major league baseballs) in return for the 'graph. I paid two balls to a guy in Seattle for my Kenji Johjima auto, a notoriously tough signer.

This Dustin Pedroia I got before he became a big star...his success percentage is down nowadays. The Joel Zumaya I got from a guy that was down at Spring Training, he is a tough sig to get and from what I hear, kind of an asshole.

These are from the Topps 2004 All Time Fan Favorites set. This set is 150 cards long. I have about half of them signed. I wont ever finish it as I ain't gonna pay hundreds for Mays or Aaron. This set has some sentimental meaning. I wrote to Buck O'neil and talked about my son going to his first ever MLB game while visiting Cinci. My son had a game bat given to him after the game. Mr. O'neil wrote a nice letter back along with signing the card above. He died a couple months later.
I have hundreds of autographs that I have obtained ttm and in person. I have tried to concentrate on baseball but have some great football and basketball players as well, most of them being on 8x10's. These cards here are generic hockey cards from theautographcard.com. These are all signed by the 1980 Olympic Hockey team. Many of them also signed the 3x5 index card I had included. There are 2 players that are near impossible to get...I read a story about a guy who had a 16x20 print of that game in 1980 right after the U.S.A. won and all the players were charging the ice. This guy had each player sign that poster next to their pic. He knew the last 2 players were toughies so he sent a "permission" slip to them first, telling them of his project and that he'd like to send the poster for them to sign. He got permission and sent it to the first guy...never saw it again. Started over and did the same for the second guy. Again, got permission, sent it away, and never saw it agian. Luckily mine are just cheap cards so I'll try anyway.
There are all kinds of projects I'd like to take on as far as collecting goes. A couple years ago I decided to collect sigs from all the pitchers that threw a homerun pitch to Hammerin' Hank. Many of the pitchers are dead and many have disappeard as far as getting an address. I have about 30 of them so far...never will be done but fun anyway.
Of all my autographs, one of my favorites from a man that never played a major league game. See, I started getting a little sick of players thinkin' their shit don't stink and that everyone is out to make a buck off their signature...I'd gone to a Bees game and had 3 cards (all the same card which is an no-no but they were for a fellow collector in Florida) to get signed by this guy. He says, "Man, I ain't signin' all dem...you jus' gone sell em!" Yeah, douchebag...I'm gonna make money off of this dunce who's spent the last 5 years in the minors and is going on 36 years old... I'm sure all of a sudden your gonna get huge and make me some money. "Well, moron, why did you want his sig?" you may ask...again, not for me but a fellow collector, and not cuz' it's worth anything but to complete a set. Anyway, back to my favorite... I sent a letter to Joe DiGangi. This guy was what baseball is all about. He wrote me a long letter, sent me pics of him with some of the greats of the game (Babe Ruth), sent me some military pics (Navy guy like my gramps), and basically told me how much he loved baseball. Never made much money but did something he loved and hung out with some of the biggest characters in the sport. One of my favorite auto's.
Getting this written up has made me wanna start collecting again. I took the last year off and let my scn subscription run out last October. Now ain't a good time to start sending to current players...I've had my greatest success sending to Spring Training. I will renew my scn subscription soon and get ready for next season. One thing that surprises me how long it takes to get returns. I sent a letter to Chipper Jones when I was new to the hobby back in 2002...I got a signed card 3 years later! Great hobby for kids. You can even send emails directly to the team web site and get fan packs sent to you. Usually a couple decals, pocket schedules, and pencils but occasionally you get cool stuff like bobbleheads. I even got a little pack of dirt from Fenway! Any questions on the art of ttm collecting just let me know and I'll help you out.

Hickey's Hornet

I found this bug in a Northwest Fly Fishing magazine as I was cleaning the reading material out of the john. I dig when guys tweak well-known flies and make em' their own. I 'spose this one is a variation of a prince nymph. It's a super easy and fast tie. As I said yesterday I have WAY too many blank hooks, about 8 50 ct. boxes of Dai-riki's in different sizes and styles, about 20 25 packs of Daiichi hooks- my favorite brand, and 5 25 ct packs of Tiemco. Then there is the giant hook holder that holds all the big stuff and salmon hooks.

Probably a size #12 nymph hook with an oversized gold bead. One thing I learned from Tim in Montana was bead color. He tells me that late in the season when fish have been beat to death and seen every type of bug imaginable that the bead can spook fish. I will tie a dozen of these with black beads later tonight.

I wanted this bug to be pretty heavy but I didn't have anything but real fine gold rib. So I spun the wire together to double it up and get a little more weight and flash. Here we have the biot tail, olive 8/0 thread, and a pretty much overkill bunch of dubbing. I found some dubbing in my desk that looked, moved and felt like a Brilo pad; really stiff, heavy, and able to hold its shape, plus it had a dull, almost pale greenish olive color. I mixed it up with equal parts of olive flashabou dubbing and olive super bright dubbing...so much for spooky fish!

I added a piece of pearlescent strip for the wings after dubbing the body.

After dubbing the body and clipping the wings back to about the bend of the hook I used peacock dubbing for a collar and tied off. An easy bug, would work great as weight bug in a two fly rig as an attractor above a more hatch specific bug.




These are probably my favorite flies that Tim has come up with, the PT Cruzer. My mom was up Montana visiting gramma a couple weeks ago and I had her stop and get me some bugs to copy. I called Matt at Frontier Anglers and had him set aside all the material, recipe and instructions for tying these. They are a little involved but, man, are they sexy. He sells them in all kinds of colors from natural to yellow sally to attractor pink. I'll be tying mine in #18 or #20 on Tiemco 2457 or 2488H's.

I am also about ready for a new vise. When I moved to UT back in 1988 a guy my mom worked with taught me to tie commercially...how to tie a bunch of bugs quickly without wasting time looking for scissors, etc. doing stuff assembly line style. He told me, "you ain't a fly tier until you've tied a thousand yellow humpies..." I will never be a tier, I guess because I don't use them much and hate to tie them. He taught me on a georgeous Regal vise. I had been using the vise that came in my kit. Then I moved up to the Griffin Superior 3ARP and have used that since, and it has been a perfect tool, especially for big stuff, with those big beefy jaws. I wanted to try the rotary but didn't wanna blow the dough so I bought a Griffin Odyssey Spyder vise. I had done without rotary for 15 years and still don't think I need it. I used my bro-in-law's Dyna King Barracuda but find I don't like the room for my sausage sized fingers behind the hook and don't really need rotary for tiny bugs. So I have narrowed it down to two vises; the HMH standard (not the Spartan) and the Dyna King Supreme. I am leaning towards the Supreme so if any of you have positives or negatives I'd like to hear any. Back to tying.

Bugs

Haven't had a chance to get out and fish lately, 'cept to get skunked chasing wipers at Willard a couple days ago. I HAVE been THINKIN' about fishing, though. I have also been tying flies like crazy, probably because I noticed I have WAY too many undressed hooks laying around. Sorry for the pic quality but these feller's are tiny.Here are a few of the latest:



Barr's Emerger. This is one of my favorite patterns. I tied a couple dozen with and without beadheads.


This is the rootbeer neon gnat. I'd been tying them in olive and pink and have done well with them in the fall and winter for both whities and browns.

I am a big fan of Tim Tollett of Frontier Anglers in Dillon, MT. This is one he came up with called the MVP. Don't really know what they represent with the body shape and hump but they look pretty sexy. I tied them in the usual PMD and BWO colors and a few others in attractor colors.

MVP recipe:

Tail--z-lon, I used rust and olive for PMD and BWO and then different shades of dun for the others.

Body--2 or 3 strands of krystal flash in yellows, olive, pink, chartreuse.

Rib--fine silver wire.

Hump--McFly foam. I used pink, dead egg, flourescent green, and yellow.

Legs--dun hackle tied wet style.

Collar--dubbing of yer choice.

Bead--silver.

I think these look best tied on Daiichi 1150 hooks. Tim advertises them in larger sizes for targeting steelhead. I am working on an upside down variation with chain eyes for carp.

For some reason I got into a midge mood...wife at work, kids at school and me at home all day filled this box in a couple hours. Disco's, crystal dips, tailwater tiny's, etc. I also filled up a couple stonefly boxes with much needed nymphs. Now I just need to get out and use some of these little bastards!

Hog hunt in Corinne.

The day finally came for Hunter's hog hunt in Corinne, UT. This was the hunt that Hunter won at the shoot at Sterlings upland property. Hunter has never fired a high powered rifle before. Dave let us use his .270. I took Hunter up to Bountiful range a couple times and he did ok, not a deadeye but was ok at a 100 yards...all his shots would have given up a dead animal. We got to the Sinclair in Corinne at 0930 and were met by Sterling and the guide, Lee. Dave, Tanya, Hunter, and I followed Lee to the hunting property, south and west of Corinne. We parked on the edge of the 1500 acre property and the five of us started walking into the brushy areas. Lee, the guide told us that they will let the pigs (half ferral pig, half russian boar) mate on the property and hunt them as they grow. There were two sections of property separated by the Bear river. On the other side were the big boys, up to 900 pounds. We passed some of the English and 4 horned sheep on out trek out. We walked for about an hour and saw nothing. I couldn't get used to the brush...the stuff was pretty thick and I wondered how a. you'd shoot something in that stuff and b. how the hell I'd get out of the way of a 500 pig that we happened upon! We did a loop and Lee said we would go to the other side of the property if we saw nothing. Lee then spotted these two about 200 yards away. Sorry for the shitty pic, I zoomed in too far. We all moved up to about 75 yards away and Hunter and Dave got ready for their kills. Hunter chose the black and white hog and Dave would shoot the big brown one. I could tell Hunter was going to have a tough time. He couldn't get a good spot in the prone position and the riverside was choked with brush. I have Hunter move down about 40 yards so he was on the edge of a cut bank and could get a good prone shot. We probably should have practiced in this position, cuz' he still couldn't comfortable. So I got on my hands and knees and Hunter used my back as a rest. I kept whispering to, "you got a shot, tell me when you got a shot, tell me before you take the shot." He told me he was ready, I held my breath to give him as steady a rest as possible and he let go...BIG mistake on my part...the fucking concussion from that gun? Everything is still hollow in my left ear, ringing as I type this. As soon as Hunter took his shot, Lee told me he hit him in the stomach....great...pig shit all over our meat...Dave then took his shot, a clean head shot that dropped his hog in its tracks. We walked up and met up with Dave and Tanya. Hunter's pig was wounded good, couldn't run, so Hunter put a last shot in him. The last shot was free standing and right in the right shoulder and out the left, would have been the perfect FIRST shot.

Hunter did a great job for his first big game hunt. After all the pics the work started. Lee was great. He gutted both pigs in about 10 minutes. He scooped out the guts and threw them to the side, telling us the other pigs would take care of the gut pile...not a very comforting thought. I looked back and Hunter and he had his back to me...I thought I saw a little heave....Hunter almost lost his breakfast! I guess the gut pile was the kicker for him, his eyes were red and watery. He didn't throw up, though. Lee took the heart and tried to hand it to Hunter to take his customery bite but Hunter wasn't havin' it...he wouldn't even hold it, he just kept telling Lee, "I'm good, no, I'm good." Lee said it was the first time he'd seen someone nearly puke from the cleaning. After the gutting Lee went and got the truck. We winched up the hogs and followed him to MB Meat Packing. We ought'a be eatin' hog in a couple weeks! Awesome trip, lots of fun. Hunter did great on his first big hunt and can't wait for more!

Hotspotting

Time for a rant! On a local fly fishing forum under the "stories and reports" board I wrote of my buddy catching his first fish with a fly rod and gave a short report about the river conditions and how it was fishing. I think I wrote something like, "the Weber above Coalville." From Coalville upstream to Wanship the distance is approximately 8 miles, that's straight line distance! I immediately got attacked for "hotspotting," telling the "lurkers" out in internet land and all the people who may see my post where the fish are biting. My response is go fuck yerself! I don't understand how you hotspot a section of river that is the most popular reach of water for flyfishers. There is a long, straight, dirt road about a mile in length that has 4 or 5 access points onto private land. Each access point has a fence hopper (ladder over the landowners fence) with a sign that reads something like, "blue ribbon trout fishery," and "the owner of this land has graciously allowed fishing here, please respect the property," or something to that effect. And this is a secret?!? How am I hotspotting a river that has trampled down trails from the fence hopper to the water, signs everywhere, earth tamped down from all the cars and people who park and fish...As Hunter S. Thompson said, "there is nothing more helpless and irresponsible than a man in the depths of an ether binge." The forum cops that accuse people of hotspotting an area like this must surely be huffing ether! The funny part is how many people viewed the post...one post had 5000 views and 80 responses but was started 2 years ago. My post? After only 1 day it had over 2000 views and 70 responses! Now, I can understand the whole argument. There is an area an hour from here that not many people know about. My first time there my buddy and I had the entire stream to ourselves, loads of slutty fish rising to any dry we threw, and, after awhile, we both thought we were trespassing, the fishing was so good (we were legal). I won't go posting about that place, I'd like to keep it on the downlow. But the Weber River? There ain't a section on the Weber that hasn't been hit by every type of fisherman, bait, gear, and fly. After awhile, the whole argument got funny...people getting mad online...typing in all caps...douchebags. I threatened next time I may just post the GPS coordinates of where I go, that'd really bring on pain from all the asshole forum cops. Surprisingly, I didn't get booted off the site. Done, glad to get that off my chest, sorry for the language...the image above, by the way, must be why all these turds are afraid of hotspotting. Combat fishing the Kenai River.

Works in progress...

This is one in progress I'm working on for my mom. Have never done snow before this one. I've been learning some about underpainting with acrylic and really like the idea of starting this way. When it's finished I plan on spraying it so it looks like it's snowing. That brown thing in the front is gonna be a bench overlooking the stream. Happy with the way this one is turning out but I wish I could get myself to be a little more "free" and no try to put so much detail in the background.
This is the first acrylic I've done, followed along with Jerry Yarnell on TV...I'm so past Bob Ross and his little coke nail! I will do this one again and add some cattle in the grass. I know, the cut banks look a way too symmetrical, but, hey, it was the first try! When I do this one over I'll underpaint in acrylic and finish the whole thing with oil. I like the sheen from oil and the way the colors hold...acrylic, I have learned will dry a little darker.
This one is from a photo I took on the Kenai River in Alaska a couple years ago. This would be just above the Russian River Ferry boat crossing looking upriver. Still gonna do some work on it, especially in the foreground. Really happy with the way the trees on the far bank turned out. I was also pleased with people knowing where it was...I showed Sterling a picture of this painting I took with my phone and he knew right where this was taken. Instead of painting on a regular canvas I went to home depot and bought a 2'x4' sheet of 1/8" masonite. I had them cut it into 12"x12" tiles and scrubbed each one down with acetone after giving them a rough sanding to remove any oils in the wood. Costed me 3 bucks and got 8 canvases out of it. I plan on doing this more with smaller pictures...seems like any bigger and they may start to warp. I don't know if my technique of prepping the board was proper but it's working so far.