5-15-12
Hardy 8 wt pro axis put a quick turn on this fish in skinny water!!!!
Quick Maine Report.
Although my focus the past month or so has been Tarpon, a fun report came yesterday from a friend fishing in the Camp Ellis/ Saco area in Maine. For a couple of hrs the crew there pick up fish at a pretty good pace and in the end his count was 14 striped bass in the 18-28 inch size range and two Shad. For early season striper fishing on a fly rod this is a good report and was followed up by a few nice photos of bright fish, and as I continue with my journey back to Maine with a flats skiff in tow from the FL Keys the positive reports.~~~
Gear Reviews.
I never intended the little gear reviews to have much traction on this blog, but the amount of emails and questions about the fly lines from airflow has been fun but also helpful and allows for some good feed back to the companies, so I decide I would continue with a few more reviews and touch base on some products that have spent some time in my skiff and are newer offerings from the manufactures..
So the last year and even more this year I have been seeing a growth in the popularity of one piece fly rods and now have anglers who fish with me often storing these rods for the season and travel with just there reels. So what is this all about, I was first introduced this modern one piece fly rods with tarpon anglers and at the time I though it was a great ideal for fish fighting and durability. But when the new Hardy Pro Axis landed in my skiff I new there was something different from the get go, rigging my anglers line and building out the leader for a day of tarpon fishing, I was able to make a few cast and the conversation running out to the flats turned to how quickly the rod loaded for the more often then not tight shots found on the flats, move forward a year and there is now 1/2 of dozen these rod in my quiver in line weight 7 thru 11. I have a few mixed in the 4 piece. but for me I travel with a flats skiff in tow and find that one piece rods even fit in my Tacoma truck if needed, but as one of my anglers said casting this rod is addictive and for the angler who lives near there fishery they are worth any storage challenges you may find..
Hardy- just plan and simple does not build crap,never has, have they had old school look and actions that I did not appeal to me,,, yes but welcome the mind set of the North-American crew adding tarpon angler Andy Mill into the mix and we see a Hardy product that fits our yankee style with performance and durability. A rod that loads at 30 ft with a longer leader and can be bent over the gunnel while attempting to float a tarpon for a clean release has my attention and now is filling up the rod storage on my skiff.
So what is the makes the rod works so well??? First off you cannot have a performance fly rods with out great tapers and they did there home work!!! and as I continue to learn about these rods I learned about investment Hardy has put into R&D that very few companies can afford to match, now add into the mix of resins and fibers that take strength to another level. I am not going to get into the science behind this, my suggestion if you are into the material lay up of these rods, is to google (hardy sintrex) its pretty cool stuff. In the end you have a very light in the hand strong to the feel of the cast and connection to the fish fly rod, that to me has proven more than it's durability!!!
Capt.Eric Wallace
207-671-4330
www.coastalflyangler.come
Some good stuff happening out there!! reports from striper fishing here in Maine over the weekend where pretty positive,Casco Bay fished much better than average for this time of the year and we found fish spread out throughout the bay, the rivers from Freeport south and west treated the early season anglers with a few good full on blitzes bringing smiles and striper thumb back to the dock on sunday, Reports I got from a very good angler/guide on the Kennebec where some very large Mackerel, have not herd of any striper action up there yet, my guess they are there and reports will start to surface soon, Carp fishing last week was great on Merrymeeting Bay timing to the tides is a little off this week to fish them in the skinny other than short windows, unless this weather pattern changes, the carp thing is happening a little sooner as well this season last week fish where moving a few ft to eat a fly in less than a foot of water, now those males are getting more interested in the female doing there pre spawn splash dance in the channels, for more on Maine Carp Fishing see the link our site updates from this weeks fishing with Don Causey editor of the Angling Report and photos will be posted in the next few days. Back to the Stripers, to the south of Portland there are lots of fish but a unreal amount of bait the sand eels are very small and plenty and last week fishing a brief period of good sky on the sand flats it was holy wow on the amount of fish that where ripping by us on the sand, we where able to turn a few and get some eats the fish where full of themselves and fought great. Size wise the rumors of the little fish are true!! this weekend we got a few fish that where under 12 inches followed up by 30 plus so they are mixed in together. Water temps are 58-63 and that includes the outer island surface temps, the different herring are in the river and the bluebacks are coming in a little earlier as well. So to sum it up It seems like we are about 2 weeks or maybe more ahead as far as number of stripers in the Casco Bay / Portland area bait wise the larger fin bait the herring, we often have good runs without a ton of stripers with them early but the big change that I have not seen in 5-6 season is the amount of sand eels this early. Hope for a continued push of fish and good stable weather..
Capt Eric Wallace 207-671-4330
