Ants

Listening to Kelly Galloup's podcast the other day, he made one of those statements that a burns a place in a fisherman's brain-no memorizing necessary. "Ants. Throw 'em year round. Heck, I see 'em on the snow here in Montana." Well heck...same goes for Missouri!

I've never figured out why at least I, latch on to "year round" like I'm going carry a few of one thing in my pocket to catch a fish...year round. I get bored when something's working constantly well, and seek a new challenge. I often get bored when I'm catching fish at a steady rhythm, and go looking for a harder bite!

I have ants that I tied years ago. Yep, for trout. My biggest challenge fishing for fish like red ear and bluegill I seldom went after earlier in life with a fly rod, is making the adjustment. Usually, to a larger fly. Right now, a bluegill or red ear will subtly swallow a trout size fly to the point of no return. Or surgery to retrieve the fly. So I sat down this morning to tie a couple dries, and a couple wet ant flies on size 14 and 12 hooks for testing where I've got bluegill cornered on the lake that has the next Missouri record in it, I'm sure. And where these bluegill are really isn't the best area for ants to be falling in the water, so any action at all would validate Galloup's assertion.

I worked a rocky ledge (exposed bottom of a dry dam) about 100 feet one direction, and back. The areas where I've located decent bluegill at both ends of the 100 foot rocky ledge. Pretty easily exceeded (doubled) my gauge of fish per hour to consider it a successful hunt. The cooler nights already have them on the move. They weren't in either spot but everywhere in between. But I definitely noticed the size running smaller, and the ants barely hooking most of the bluegill-the bluegill were "settling" for the ant. Not really thrilled about ants. No longer than I was staying out my pocket fly box didn't need half of what I put in it. But it's the time of year that terrestrials can experience some kind of health event and start landing on the water like light rain, so I wanted to be prepared for that event that didn't happen. Next, I picked out the Bully Bluegill Spider. Most tyers say this thing is usually swallowed completely, even including the long legs. That's been my experience so far, too. Including today.

Ratio of big bluegill to smaller usually females on the ants was about 1:6 with the ant. That ratio flipped with the Bully-bigger bluegill about 5:6. It's a fairly consistent rule but with more exceptions than an impatient angler may care for, "Bigger bait-bigger fish".

I think the take away for "year round" flies is, it's nice to know you've probably always got something to fall back on to at least eliminate a skunk, if nothing else that for whatever reason you wanted to throw it, doesn't work at all.