Busy Time of Year!!

Well I would love to say I've been fishing everyday since the last post but that hasn't been the case. Between the weather, writing the proposal for my grad project and just life in general it has been pretty hectic. This is a bittersweet time of year for me, between the hours of researching for hunts this fall and forking out the thousands of dollars to play the tag drawing game, and prepping for steelhead and fly fishing season it sure makes it a burden on my pocket book. I've already dumped my money into the Utah, Arizona and Wyoming draws, hopefully with any luck we'll pull a Beaver Mtn. nanny tag and a late season deer tag in Wyoming in the Big Sandy basin. Don't get me wrong I love doing the research and compiling draw odds and harvest statistics but I hate the money thats involved, so I made a pat with myself that I'd start fishing more and hunting less (or just apply for points vs tags) and put that money into some relaxing time on the water. I haven't tied any flies in probably 12 years and I sat down today and whipped out 30 wooly buggers and leach patterns (I impressed myself needless to say). I've spent the last month fixing old reels, sending rods in for way over do repair and ordering new lines, rods and reels for this upcoming spring (so I went from spending money on tags to fishing gear, not time on the water).

Got to love 70's shag carpet!

I got in on a good buy at one of our local sporting good stores that was selling fly's for over half off, needless to say I went overboard and bought close to 200 flies, mostly sculpin, clouser minnows, chironomids and a few dry patterns. I figured I saved over $200 cause most places sale the clousers and sculpins for $2-$3 each.
This is gonna be a good week, The Western Hunting and Conservation Expo is this week going down for a day or two, I turned in my grad proposal and I'm going fishing this Saturday and will be reviewing 3 new rods from Echo, St. Croix and Redington and 3 new reels from Ross and Allen Fly Fishing, a bunch of Scientific Anglers new lines and some new fishing bags from Cabelas.

Allen Flyfishing Alpha II 

I was fortunate enough to snag myself a couple spools of the Scientific Anglers Sharkwave thats coming out later this spring, yeah thats right I got some prototype stuff and It's very interesting to say the least and has got some serious R&D for the fly fisherman!! If you like the Mastery Textured or Sharkskin it blends the best of both worlds into one and I will have a detailed review on it coming up in the future. I wish everyone luck in the up coming draws and watch for a blog update with some cool reviews on some great new gear for the savvy fly fisherman and hopefully a few fish on the fly!!