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   Pineywoods Fly Fishers

                Founded 1988

    Chapter of the Southern Council of the Federation of Fly Fishers

          Web Site http://home.sprynet.com/~waltermc

President: Jimmy Lee             Secretary/Treasurer: Ken Baker

 

 

December 2004

 

From the President

Jimmy has an article floating in cyberspace on the Internet. As soon as I find it, I will forward it to you.

 

From the Editor

By Walter McLendon

 

Christmas Party

December 4th at the Chamber Room, Chamber of Commerce on Chestnut @ Loop 287 diagonally across from Lowe’s. Bring a covered dish to share (club furnishes the meat) and a $10 white elephant exchange gift from each family member who wants to take part in the game. It is always a lot of fun whether you end up with the grand prize or the oil filter. Hope to see you all there.

Lost a Good Member

Tammy Plumer moved to Lake Jackson and asked to be removed from our email list. She said they are getting into saltwater fishing now. I hate to see us lose members like her and her son. Life dictates these things but I know she enjoyed her short exposure to our club and hope she decides to seek out the Houston club and continue in fly fishing.

 

Trout Stocking Project

Our trout were stocked at Tonkawa Springs and Thanksgiving Day was our opening day of PWFF trout season. Only three members have taken advantage of this opportunity so far. Don McMurry, Howard Hinton and Ron Scheepstra all caught about 5 fish each on their separate trips. There did not seem to be any magic formula, the fish are aggressive and Don said they really fight. So pack your rods and flies and go give them a try. Take your family and have a picnic.

Free Fishing

Texas State Parks is hosting a special year long (until 8-31-05) “Family Fishing Celebration” to encourage parents to take their children fishing and adults will not be required to purchase a fishing license to fish in any Texas State Park. The significant thing here is that your family will be able to fish the special trout stockings and you can spend more time with the kids.

 

Soft Hackle Tying Class

I conducted our first fly tying class in a series just for our new trout stocking program. Since several members have never fished for rainbow trout before, we decided to teach some good patterns to fish with. Rusty Byrley, James Vest, Howard Hinton, Don McMurry and Ken Baker attended while Jay Renken looked on. Don was again our gracious host at his home and Delores baked apple strudel that melted in your mouth. That Don is a very lucky husband. I was surprised that most everyone managed to break their tying thread. I want to apologize because I should have stopped and taught everyone to properly set their bobbin tension to prevent that. You first pull on the tread to see how much tension the bobbin has on the spool. If your bobbin pulls the thread under its own weight then it is too loose. You loosen the spring between the two arms holding the thread spool by spreading the arms apart enough to bend them a little to lessen the hold or press them together to increase it. Then you pull on the thread to see how much the tension has changed. If you choose, you can leave the tension loose and use your fingers to cradle the spool to prevent it from turning unless you loosen that pressure. I like to use the bobbin tension. If you are breaking thread then the tension is too much.

 

We learned to dub the fly body and to make a dubbing ball behind the hook eye to help spread the soft hackle umbrella. If this is Greek to you then shame on you for missing my class. We learned different methods of preparing soft hackle to palmer around the hook to make life-like legs in the water that makes soft hackle flies come alive to fool the trout. I hope everyone learned enough to go home and practice tying these beautiful effective flies.

 

We hope to have class each Tuesday night if we can coordinate it. For you guys not receiving email, you need to be calling someone to keep up with this or get your kids to relay the news to you.

Electrofishing Houston County Lake

Jimmy Lee and I assisted Texas Parks & Wildlife with their regular survey of the lake’s fish. We kept all the bass we shocked up along with their normal food, shad, minnows and bream. It was our very first really chilly night but things went well and the night was beautiful. It was Jimmy’s first time and he immediately asked to be invited again. TPWD has a very nice aluminum 18 foot flat bottom boat but much bigger than you are imagining. It has large live wells in the center section, a center console, a front raised deck with a railing enclosure and a 90hp Mercury motor. Jimmy and I rig up 7 or 8 foot shocking probes that protrude out front at about 45 degree angles. Each probe has four, 5-foot long cables which drag through the water to deliver our 1000 volts at 8 amps. Volts and amps depend on the water conditions, they can deliver from 500 to 1000 volts at about 12 to 14 amps under the right conditions.

 

We stand beside each other separated by a large cooler filled with ice to keep the fish on. Each of us has a floor button we stand on to energize the probes when we are given the command. We shock for 5 minutes at 12 computer predetermined locations on the lake, each located by GPS. Jimmy and I each have 8-foot long nets to dip out the stunned fish. We try to fill our nets until we can no longer hold the weight, then we swing the net back to a person who dumps our fish into his container and then we return to dipping. It can be a challenge to determine which fish are bass when they turn upside down or drift down head or tail first. We were lucky that most of our catches were exactly what we were assigned to retrieve but some odd balls always get in. The water in most places had a steam cloud rising about one foot above the surface making detection difficult. I had never seen that before. Like Jimmy said, it looked like sand flowing though the water at first.

 

It was disappointing to see what once was a trophy lake yield only 1 or 2 pounders. I saw one 3 to 4 pound bass drift under the boat before I could reach him. We also were instructed to bring in at least 30 bass below 9 inches in length and we figure we did that without specifically counting. The experts on board do the culling of specific species not to be removed from the lake so that makes Jimmy’s and my job easier. Even the experts get stumped sometimes and did that night too. It was a lot of fun and an unusual experience that fly fishers do not get to see.

 

Flies to MSFF

Slim Mitchell, Ken Baker, Jay Renken, Buddy Price, Bill Heugel, Corinne McLendon and I tied a dozen or more flies each for Mid South Fly Fishers in Memphis, TN. These are to be used for their club fundraiser on December 4th.

 

IDEAS FOR DISCUSSION AT OUR JANUARY MEETING    By: Jay Renken

(1). During the TEXAS FOREST AWARENESS events, we have many kids come by our station.  Most of them are casually interested and others quite interested in Fly Fishing.  We could have a sign-up list for them for them to come to a Beginner Class for Fly Tying and a Fly Casting Class as a Saturday event.

(2.) It has been mentioned that the Club has a good cash reserve that we should spend.  We could give away A GUIDED TRIP with one of the guides that has given programs and discounted trips for the Club.  Possibly a rental unit on the coast for a GROUP TRIP.

 

From Bill Heugel:

Trout Stockings    

Each year TPWD stocks trout in some of our local ponds and small lakes.  These are really a put and take arrangements since the fish do not survive the summer here.  If you want to have your line stretched some and try out some of the flies that you have tied this presents a great opportunity.  Last year I fished for one day at Boykin Springs and actually out fished one of the bait dippers using power bait.  While the pond is small getting there during the week in the late morning or afternoon seemed best.  Also fishing from a float tube can be very effective and gets you away from the weekend bank fishermen.

 

Boykin Springs      Jan 9, 2005                                3,500 fish

Lake View Pond    Jan 23, 2005                             530 fish

Rusk State Park     Dec 16, 2004                            1500 fish

Tyler State Park     Dec 3, 2004 & Jan 7, 2005        4000 fish.

 

Fish Hatchery
The TPWD has decided on the new location for the Jasper fish hatchery.  It is scheduled to be located somewhere close to Sam Rayburn, I would guess somewhere below the dam.  It will require a minimum of pumping since according to the article there will be gravity flow for part of the time.  The hatchery will be put on 200 acres of land previously owned by Temple.

 

Fly Tying

The first class on trout flies class was scheduled for Nov 30 at Don McMurry’s house.  Walter Mclendon will be teaching soft hackle flies.  Some of the most effective fish catchers one can have in their box.  Walter sent out information on this class including the time and what will be covered. The next class will be on Nymphs taught by Jimmy Lee.  This will include bead head and weighted nymphs.  The class will include Prince, Red Squirrel, Hares Ear, and Pheasant Tail nymphs. Royce Feaster will be teaching the class on streamers and Ken Baker will do dry flies.

This is the beginning of the trout fishing season both here in Texas and in Southern Arkansas and Southern Oklahoma.  While some of these areas support trout fishing all year round the best times are in the winters.  No crowds, the fish population is up and the fish are active.   

 

January 8, 2005 we will have a class using rabbit fur.  I have used flies with rabbit to catch trout, bream and black bass. A look through the pattern books shows how a large number of flies that use rabbit in some way.  This is testimonial to their effectiveness.  In addition to tying the rabbit flies, we will be covering how to cut zonker strips and crosscuts.  The rabbit hides are readily available at Hobby Lobby for about $4.00 each for the white.  Even some of the highest quality hides can be bought for about $12.00 from the fly fishing suppliers.  Rabbit also is easy to die.  Most of the hides purchased in the store are tanned and clean.  This only requires cutting them and dying the strips.  One rabbit fly designed by Scott Sanchez won the Yellowstone one fly contest so many times it was banned. 

 

 

 

 

Programs

 

Library

Don’t forget to return your video or book to the library at the meeting.

 

 

Monthly club meeting are held in the Lufkin Room, Lufkin Mall at 7 PM, the program for the first hour and then door prizes and fishing discussions until 9 PM.

 

Club Calendar

Dec 4      PWFF Christmas Party, Chamber of Commerce

Dec 7      Fly Tying Class at Don McMurry’s at 5:30pm

 

2005:

Jan 8         Rabbit Hair Tying  class, place to be determined

Feb 5         Fly Tying Festival, Houston Holiday Inn (I-59 @ Kirby)

Feb 18-20  Little MO’ Fly Fishing Festival   Murfreesboro, AR

Feb 26       Lower Mountain Fork River Foundation meeting Broken Bow Library

Mar 5        Fly Fish Texas  Athens, TX

Mar 17-19 Sowbug Roundup  Mt. Home, AR

Apr 9        Workshop, Kurth Lake Staff House

Apr 15      Spring Rendezvous  Lake D’Arbonne State Park, LA

May 6-7   Smallmouth Rendezvous  Tahlequah, OK

Jun 2-5    Southeastern Conclave  Calloway Gardens, GA

Jul 15-17 Grand Isle Outing  LA

Aug 8-13 FFF Conclave  Livingston, MT

 

Newsletter

Send your articles, photos and other material to mailto:[email protected] or mail to Walter McLendon 139 Lancewood Circle, Lufkin, TX 75904. I can scan your photos and return them at the next meeting. If you know of any future events or activities of interest, please send them to me. Monthly article deadlines are set on the 25th of the month so the newsletter can be completed by the Thursday preceding our Tuesday meeting.