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Summer of Smallies

Discovery While Japan is known for its bass fishing industry, where I live there's not a lot of opportunity for the fly angler and where there is, the number of fisherman is unbelievable- really not my cup of tea.  I like to get away from the crowd, which makes carp ideal as almost no one here targets them.  I started fishing a new river about an hour north of Tokyo that as far as I knew didn't hold bass, it certainly didn't hold bass fishermen. I'd fished it a few times since last year and had caught some lovely big carp to over 20lbs in super clear water, it was great especially as the fish were pretty predatory and willing to chase down big flies. That's a size 1 hairy fodder hanging out of that fish's mouth This spring I noticed a fish out in a deep pool that clearly wasn't a carp didn't seem to spook from the flies it wasn't eating, I took me a minute to realize, but then it dawned on me.. bedding smallmouth and no one was fishing for the

Redington Behemoth First impressions

Here's a short video of the first impressions. I'll be testing it on Sails in November at Kuala Rompin. I'll follow up with a full review after I return

Too much work, not enough play

This year has been a bit of  a desert as far as fishing is concerned.  Between, work,  studying and  some terrible weather over the summer and into autumn there's been little done.  That said ther have been some good  moments. In March/April, David and I headed down to Kuroshima in the Yaeyama archipelago. It was my second visit and his first. The weather was better this time, but unseasonably cool and we were unlucky with a couple of storms blowing through.  Fishing was tough but we caught a few on the flats and had some shots at GTs and triggers(the target species) unfortunately we couldn't translate these into landed fish. Victims of the triggers We also had a lot of fun jumping small sharks that were really keen on little bangers We did manage a few other species including parrotfish thick lipped trevally, needlefish, small grouper and some kind of emperor.  As well as spotting some golden trevally, bluefin trevally and what while unconfirmed could have bee

Mexico is Great

Right Guys just got back from 18 days at Costa de Cocos (http://www.costadecocos.com/) in Xcalak where I had a mix of guided and DIY fishing and it was amazing, so amazing that I'll be back in August.  The lodge was nice, fairly basic cabanas but spotlessly clean, very friendly staff with great food and local craft beer. There are also some great little restaurants in the village. The guides were good, I took a mix of in house guides and other local guys-on balance the CdC guides were better and generally more personable. The fishing was great, although I can't really comment on the tarpon because I got so sucked into chasing permit that I didn't spend any time chasing them. My relationship with permit was almost exclusively one of rejection, I only got one eat despite seeing numerous permit- I didn't land the fish either.  I stopped fishing bones with the guides after the first day because they were just so numerous and easy from no pressure that it was ge

Permit tips

Reading up and getting ready to fly to Cancun in two weeks. I came across this article in Hatch Mag Thoroughly good reading. http://www.hatchmag.com/articles/3-tips-presenting-flies-permit/7711205

Getting closer

My first trip to Mexico is  coming soon, almost ready on the gear front, just need to pick up some new leader material and make sure my shots are up to date.  The fly tying is almost done too, still a few more crabs and stuff to tie for the permit, but bones and tarpon are taken care of.  Might stick a few sundries in for jacks and cudas . Getting excited.  

New Relationship

I recently joined the pro-staff of Sybai materials  . As I just took delivery of my first batch of materials, you'll be able to see some of the flies I tie with their stuff on the Sybai YouTube page soon. Looking forward to featuring a range of carp, saltwater and trout flies on here soon.