Uncle Gink's Cave - Winter Newsletter

Fly Fishing Newsletter - Page 1

GEHRKE’S XINK

Patented Streamer Sink For Steelheaders and Salmonoiders

xink Getting the lead out of your streams is vital. GEHRKE’S XINK makes your Salmon & Steelhead Streamers Track Naturally. Salmon & Steelhead chase things which gives them the correct profile and swimming action. Trout know when things aren’t natural if they drag. Streamers & Nymphs with lead tied in them flip upside down. Nymphs without lead but dressed only with XINK, sink faster but drift naturally in the current. You should out fish lead weighted NYMPHS & STREAMERS three to one. At least, this is what our customers are doing. Yes, you may weigh your tippet knots but do NOT put weight inside your wet flies and nymphs from now on. This method helps prevent you from hanging up on the bottom as often as your nymph drifts along just over the top of the rocks turning and moving naturally within the current. This is why you never want your final tippet shorter than 20 inches in length for dead drifting because your fly has more slack between the fly and the leader. Slack = Natural Movement. This is just one of those neat little secrets that can make you a better fly fisherman.

Salmonoider Streamer Streakers and Ironheaders want a shorter leader made up of eighteen inches of butt, mid, and tippet sections on their sink tips and full sinking lines. An example is as follows: (18 inches of 25# test Butt / 18 inches of 15# test mid section / 18 - 20 inches of 8 - 10 pound tippet section) You must have that beautiful streamer tracking as close as possible to the depths your fly line is presented. Streaking a Green Butted Skunk just over the bottom , for instance, when your streamer is dressed with XINK makes Streamers TRACK level with the fly line. Isn't this what you've always wanted to make happen? Of course it is! This is just one of the things XINKdoes for our more serious Steelheaders and Salmonoiders.

How to Fool Cruising Bulging Trout

Xink Dress the first two - six inches of your tippet and emerging nymph caddis (for example) and float the rest of the leader on top with PZ Fly Line Cleaner to catch budging fish. Often, fly fishermen mistake the breaking of the water as a trout taking a fly when in fact it is the fishe's back that is fooling the foolish. Naturally, we will stand there and watch flies popping and floating on the surface and it "appears" the fish are taking the naturals on top. This activity is especially effective in fooling fly fishermen during Caddis Fly Hatches and here is why.

Caddis Emergers, in order to survive and escape the water enviornment to which they have been bound must swim literally for their lives. Caddis Emergers are very quick and erratic swimmers. This is why the slashing rise is a sure give away that the trout are taking them as they are emerging. The trout attack from below and this is why often, if it isn't a slashing display of breaking the water surface, on slower emergers such as Midges, and May Flies, the trout cruise looking for them and their backs break the surface more like a regular rise then that which precludes a Caddis' stylish display. In lakes, the caddis emerger seems to be more casual in swimming to the surface but this depends upon the depth of the lake bottom from which they come. It is important one identifies the way the trout are taking the dry on the surface and if indeed they are. Watch for the nose or the dorsal fin. If you see the dorsal, you need to dress your emerger with XINK at a depth below the surface you need to be at.

Cast in front of a coming fish that is cruising. The fly sinks to a foot below the surface instantly and the rest of your leader should be on top of the water. As he gets within range, TWITCH the emerger so the trout sees it twitch toward the surface . . . and so, do we need to say more?

Bottle of Xink XINK works because it’s wetter than water without washing off. . . which is supposed to be a chemical impossibility. GEHRKE’S XINK is the only patented fly sink in the world. When friction is removed from a fly falling in the water is like removing air from around a falling feather. XINK makes wet flies and streamers sink instantaneously!

Every fisherman who fly ties needs to replace this mind-set that flies need lead to sink to their satisfaction . Serious nymphers and/or wet fly fishermen easily double their daily nymphing success by using GEHRKE’S XINK with no lead in their wet flies.

Thoughts On Dry Flies & Nymphs

Trout have conditioned responses after hundreds of thousands of rises to floating flies. It’s the fly tier that can replicate that which is the perfect fake, for the problem is indeed not only trying to defeat the vast experience a large fish has gained through experience (that’s why he’s large in the first place), but everyone has to defeat more than one defense mechanism. I can name two front line protection barriers. The first is that incredible eye. A trout’s eye can see a gnat ten feet away. The fishes’ eye is excessively keen. His senses are wired to a lateral (magnetically sensitive) line that can sense the wigglings of a nymph’s legs several yards away. It is for this reason (referring to nymph fishing along with dry fly fishing) why BOTH approaches have their individual difficulties, and if frankness be known, it is more difficult to become a successful nymph fisherman than it is a dry fly fisherman.

Consider first, those wiggling legs under water are only six in number. This is why defeating the lateral line is best done with a nymph that is worn down to nearly six fibers and suddenly, the more it becomes worn, the more fish the nymph fisherman begins to fool. We not only have to defeat the eye, we need to defeat sonar.

The dry fly fisherman has the advantage of sight. It is what makes dry fly fishing so exciting. The sudden take, the sudden parting of the waters, the massive pull and leap a second or two after . . . dazzles the eye in an explosion of spray and life!

Reading with the eye, just the leader where it enters the water, without benefit of a bobber, begins to presents itself as ‘interesting’ because the nymph fisherman not only has to read the water on the top, they have to imagine the currents and life struggles below, then mentally separate fact from fiction. Nymph fishermen need to control a level drift without drag and they need to understand how to present a dry fly wet that has legs that wiggle in the current naturally. These are a few reasons why those who use indicators cheat themselves of life’s imaginations and this is why really good dry fly fishermen end up being good at nymph fishing, once they get past vanities. As air is a fluid, so is water. Nymph fishermen are more experienced fly fishermen than dry fly artists who insist on taking advantage of the simplest, most obvious way, in how trout feed. They wish only to fish the cream on top, and of course, if its fun for them as it is for me, that is what they should do. Fact is, I’m not a fixed style kind of fly fisherman. Dry fly fishermen are not purist. The purist strives to be a complete fly fishermen. We should savor the entire banquet nature offers astream. He who fishes with only one eye sees only half the world.

Conclusion: As important as the perfect size of hook used is to under-dress the dry fly. More often, less is better. Three fourths (75%) of the dry flies I see are over-dressed, even though the size of the hook is correct. Under-dress nymphs because trout see better under water. At least, that is my two bits worth, considering the cost of inflation. gg

Gehrke's Fly-Maker’s Wax

Fly Makers Wax This is the world's finest dubbing wax without a doubt. Gehrke's Fly - Maker's Wax is clearer, sticker and more manageable then any other dubbing wax and when you want to get it off your fingers, it rubs off under pressure with one try. With a suggested retail of only $6 there is enough wax to last most fly tiers for several years. Fly - Maker's Wax has a long shelf life.

There are two ways a fly tier can basically apply wax. Streak a little on the thread or put a finger on the wax and use your sticker finger to spin the dubbing. This stuff is absolutely beautiful to work with! It looks and acts like an item that belongs on your fly tying table, which it does.

I think, the place I enjoy using Fly-Maker's Wax the most besides taming coarse fly tying material is when I get down to very small flies that need the proper shape on the body with very fine furs . . . there is nothing (and I mean nothing) that will help you control shape better then this product. What one needs to do is this. Wipe a little Fly-Maker's Wax on the very fine 8/0 threads. The mink or rabbit dubbing needs only to touch the thread. That is enough material, which sticks! Spin only that around your tying thread and then go ahead and spin. Now you may taper the minature body perfectly without unwanted build-up. A Professional or Personal Fly Tyer cannot ask for anything finer.