Some big news out of West Yellowstone, Montana this past week with the announcement that the iconic Bud Lilly's Trout Shop was acquired by Big Sky Anglers. The shop is currently undergoing a remodel and doors will reopen later this spring. The following is from the Big Sky Anglers Press Release.
Take Care and Fish On, Matt
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I work outside most of the year, and when I get off - I often go fishing, and I'm not one ot complain about the weather. Whether on excavation or fishing, I of course like most others do not enjoy wind and rain, and especially during the winter. Getting out of the rain for a break is nice, but it's equally not-nice to put back on damp, wet and cold raingear, whether it's cool breathable fishing-rain-gear or my heavy-gauge PVC excavation rain gear. But apart from that annoying wind/rain/low temperature combination during winter, I really don't mind rain.
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We - that is Konstanse and yours truely - like the ducks in the pic - are about to cross the line. We are moving together. It´s pretty exciting stuff and a big step for two so independent people like us to decide ... bla bla bla - you know the drill.
So there is not much fishing to report. I did a bit on my recent Germany / Austria trip. But it was far from enough.
In the light of the recent HT hysteria - the above mentioned means also that HT4 #7 and number #9 will be under one roof. HT4 #7 is Konstanses first ever flyrod.
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Tracy and I are still enjoying ourselves on Long Island, for the month of April we can compete with Paul and Bernd for the most days fished – so far we haven’t missed one. Today (I’m writing this on Sunday – how’s that for efficiency?) was not great in terms of the weather – poor light all day and a howling gale, but we went out regardless to keep the record up. We didn’t add to our bonefish tally though.
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The last week we had pretty low air temperatures peaking at minus 4 degrees Celsius in the night. During the day the temperature topped out at around 3 degrees. In between we were facing snow and ice falling down at us. All in all a great week of strong coastal Sea trout fishing!
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I'm covering for Gary today, from Thailand as it happens. Ashly and I have popped up here for three days to sort out my VISA (always a hassle), do a lot of Sexyloops work (the stuff that I haven't been doing because I've been fishing of course) and eat a Green Curry.
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We are very pleased to announce the exciting Hot Torpedo Owners' Club competition where YOU can win a brand spanking new Fast-Feel Sexyloops Hot Torpedo fly rod of a line weight and build of your choice. To enter send us your best Hot Torpedo story, photo or even a movie - it can be an incredible fish moment, or loss, inspiration to invent a new cast, or indeed diving into a river to save your rod/fish/girlfriend, or perhaps a great teaching story - accompanied with photos of the your Hot Torpedo (a really great photo can win in its own right and it's always going to get you points!). We will publish your stories and or photos as they come in and the very best story/photo will win the grand Hot Torpedo prize.
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I have the honour to write for Matt today, because he is busy. I\\\'m still preparing the slowly starting season, only a week left until we can fish again for pike. Today there was quite a lot of work with bringing the boats from our club back into the water. So now more and more toughs are going back to pike fishing. Here one of my favourite pike pattern in stillwater in a step by step for you
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In the last decade, some rivers have produced really magnificent salmon over 20kg, and I think the biggest from 2016 just pushed the 18kg mark on the scales. These salmon are truely impressive and massive, strong bars of chrome and silver.
- hardly a visible scale on them.
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A quick update from our trip. The shark fishing on the Bahamian flats can be frustrating. We’ve both cast to sharks over this last week and experienced some interesting fishy behaviour. A couple of days ago, James cast at a 70-80lb shark whilst wading a flat; it looked like a perfect cast to intercept the shark as it moved across the undulating flat with the fly sinking to the right depth. However once the line landed the shark simply did a 180 turn and slowly swam away, though it didn’t spook. Had it seen the flash of the rod, or sensed the line landing on the water? We have no idea. On another day, a 100lb+ shark came to look at the fly and then spooked and quickly swam away. I had a 30lb one follow my fly to the shore and not take it and then swim away. We did see a huge shark, perhaps 150lb, on a flat but it was always out of casting range. We’ll keep trying and hope that we find some that are in feeding mode, are in casting range and that want to ‘eat’ our flies.
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Some different tactics on fly fishing for coastal Sea trout.
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If you ever worked for a fly shop, or gave lessons to beginners, or maybe tried to introduce a friend to flyfishing, you probably have heard this question. It is quite possible you remember asking someone that same question yourself. It is also quite possible you are still mulling the question today.
Of course, the simple answer is “buy a SL Hot Torpedo”! But I just put that here to beat Paul to it. It might just be the right answer… but again I’m just putting that out to keep Paul at bay.
The question, though, is rather common. And the more I have thought about it, the harder that question has become. I am at the point now where I cringe when I expect it is coming. I tell folks it is like asking someone what shoes to buy. No matter how much they cost, or which name is on the label, if the shoes do not fit, the buyer will not be comfortable with them. With shoes, at least most people know their size, with flyrods, the beginners have no clue what so ever as to what might be their style of casting.
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For the last four days I've been fishing with my good friend Tim Kempton who has been visiting from Australia. It's Tim's third trip to Malaysia so we knew this time for sure that he'd catch a Toman. However partly because of some very heavy rainfall on his day of arrival, which saw the lake level rise by a full meter and put the fish down, and partly because Tim obviously thought it would be better to cast behind the fish (so he could catch them by the tail) things were not as smooth as they could have been... however on the fourth day, Tim successfully executed the perfect shot and was rewarded with a trophy 5KG Snakehead.
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Happy eastern everyone! Today you get my favourite streamer pattern for trout as a step by step. What I like about this streamer is, that the hook is in the end of the fly. Specially in the spring our trouts, often just bite really carefully. After missing quite a lot of takes, i started to bring the hook more and more to the end of the fly. The second advantage with the wire is, that I can change the hook if this is to destroyed from the stones. So have fun at your vise and tight lines!
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Happy Easter or happy spring or whatever - I am lame today and have not had the opportunity to write very much. So I run the page from last Friday one more time. The beautiful art Lars Anderson makes is so fascinating because the beauty is coming directly from nature. The wood ...
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Gotland is a beautiful Swedish island offering us a fantastic coastal fly fishing for sea running Brown trout (Sea trout). Right now spring is arriving and we are having a blast. Everyone in our group has caught at least one nice fish yet!
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Fishing in South Florida is a very seasonal activity despite what many seem to think. There are plenty of folks who complain that South Florida has no seasons at all. Usually these “season deniers” are North Americans from the northern states who are accustomed to obvious visual clues - like leaves turning colors in fall or the snow melting away in spring. Many of the northern anglers have to deal with an actual end to fishing because the water freezes, unless they go ice fishing, which probably does not include fly anglers, but I may be wrong. How would I know?
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I've been trying for a couple of weeks to make a video about the HT10 but it's still not what I want, so in the meantime I'll just write about it instead! The first thing important to understand is that flyrod technology doesn't develop as fast as marketing companies would like you to believe, and the real differences between rods are quality of the materials, quality of the components, workmanship and the number one difference of all, certainly with regards performance, is the design of the rod itself.
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I like to mix up my front pages between my own aimless ramblings about fly fishing and some actual real, useful news for everyone.
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Or rather *a* habit. We all have habits, some more than others, and even those who claim to have none have at least one. I mean, you could simply call it a habit to have none.
Habits are often good - some of them are the result of experience, others are the result of routine (which some will argue is another word for habit, but let's not dwell on semantics.
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Tracy and I have arrived safely on Long Island, Bahamas for our annual DiY saltwater trip. It’s always an enormous relief to arrive with all our luggage, as with airline security being as it is, we pack the fly fishing gear in the cases – so no cases, no fishing. We did have a close call one year with a small airline, they’re all small in the Bahamas, but the one in question had the pilots handling the luggage so you can imagine. Baggage reclaim on most of the islands consists of a truck driving to the side of the building and then a free for all as people dive in to retrieve their bags. On this particular occasion Tracy’s case did not turn up, even though we saw that it was loaded at Nassau. With the plane’s engines powered up and it ready to start taxiing to the runway, Tracy started wildly waving at the pilots – they clearly recognised their mistake, powered down and re-opened the doors. An embarrassed looking co-pilot then trudged across the apron with Tracy’s luggage.
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Right now spring has arrived to Germany. Almost 20° Celsius outside and a lot of different species of fish start to get active. Excellent time to fish for some of them or maybe all of them!?
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I spent last Saturday with an avid angler addicted to chasing large tarpon on fly. At the end of the day we speculated we had covered 80 miles in his speedy flats boat. Most of our day was spent moving and looking. The remainder was essentially big rod flycasting practice for me. We saw six tarpon roll, or maybe the same tarpon roll six times?
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It's been a very wet few weeks. Now I personally rather enjoy fishing in the rain, however I'm not so keen sleeping in a wet bed, in wet clothes, night after night! And Ashly's not too keen either. So I'm busy constructing a new roof for the Flying Titanic, one that looks less like a condom and more like... well, two condoms. The morning fishing however has been rather good, with plenty of opportunities at taking shots at Snakehead with babies.
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Finnaly the world is slowly back to be in colours, today was the first day with over 20 degrees and with the sun in our back we started the trout season. Also when it was quite tricky and they aren't really motivated to move...
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I'm not sure how long ago it was that textures on fly lines were introduced. As far as I remember, it was AirFlo who introduced the first ones, the ones with ridges along the length of the line. For a few years they stood alone on the market, and I believe that Scientific Anglers were next with their "SharkSkin-lines", which sported a sort of microscopic cross-hatch pattern on the line's surface.
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