Tying Foam Flies
July 13, 2010 by admin
In my memory banks, I hold a combined blur of countless lazy, sunny afternoons standing in the shallows of the lake, long after more serious quarries have been abandoned in favor of hearing the plop of a fat foam fly and the delayed smack of a never-satiated bluegill rising to pull it from the surface. [...]
Fishing North Shore Steelhead
May 10, 2010 by admin
By Nick Simonson
If you’ve ever laid eyes on a steelhead, you know the color they bring to a spring fishing trip. The hens are a glistening chrome with a faded pink stripe down their sides and a light green top. The bucks turn a deep pink – almost purple – throughout their sides [...]
Stocked Trout Fly
May 3, 2010 by admin
Stocked trout are known as the eat-anything additions to their foster flows, and they probably aren’t as sharp as their more naturally occurring cousins. However, they can still be a challenge and are definitely a lot of fun as the angling season gets going. While many trout anglers prefer using spinners to cover [...]
Brown Trout Fishing
April 27, 2010 by admin
It’s What We Make of It
By Nick Simonson
A year ago this very morning I was sitting across from my old boss in a conference room as he explained the layoff benefits the company would be providing me until they’d run out or until economic conditions improved. As I had been the one handling the [...]
Fishing Diary
March 30, 2010 by admin
By Nick Simonson
There have been a lot of changes in my life over the past five years. I’ve lived in two states and three towns and have had six different jobs, with this one being the most consistent. In that time I’ve fished over 60 lakes and rivers, gaining some level of familiarity [...]
President Obama Attacking Fishing Industry
March 22, 2010 by admin
Sport Anglers Alarmed by Proposed Obama Policy
A controversy has erupted in the sport fishing community over a new federal management plan for oceans and Great Lakes waters. Recent opinion pieces circulating on the internet and reported on numerous radio stations have stoked the flames through revelations that the policy, if implemented, would prohibit recreational fishing [...]
The Glo Bug Fly
February 1, 2010 by admin
By Nick Simonson
Last week, as I braced myself against the wind and made my way up the walk in the glow of the front porch light, I saw through the blowing snow that first sign of spring. It wasn’t a robin, hiding its head under its wing in the late January cold. It [...]
Life List Lunkers
January 20, 2010 by admin
By Nick Simonson
There are hundreds of days booked in my fishing logs and countless others banked in my memories. From watching a field of tip-up flags pop for northern pike on a chilly winter morning to a steamy July evening spent fishing an inexhaustible school of white bass, it is tough to keep track [...]
Fly Tying for the WinterTime
December 29, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors – By Nick Simonson
From Bismarck to Brainerd to Balaton, the region has been blasted with the most epic blizzard since those doubled-barreled every-other-weekend storms from the winter of 1996-97. My wife and I crawled along I-94 to visit my family just before the Gulf-fueled, moisture-laden monster dumped 16 inches of snow. [...]
Spring Steelhead Fishing
November 10, 2009 by admin
By Nick Simonson
As my offering drifted around in the pool eddy, I hoped that my brother would see a fish caught – if not by me, then by another angler, or maybe himself – and he would experience the finned allure of the north shore of Lake Superior beyond the lichen-covered bluffs and pine-shaded streams [...]
Lightning Bugs – Pheasant Tail Nymphs
October 22, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
Of all the game birds sportsmen pursue, none is more colorful than the ringneck pheasant. Which makes it a pretty odd fact that the most popular fly used by outdoorsmen is the generally drab looking pheasant tail nymph – or simply, the PTN. Of course, trout, bluegill and other fish don’t seem [...]
Fall Trout Fishing Time
October 20, 2009 by admin
By Nick Simonson
With all the hunting opportunities around us, it’s tough to set the shotgun or the bow down for an evening and pick up the fishing rod. However, fall provides an excellent chance at some fast trout fishing, particularly in those deeper pits and ponds where agencies have stocked trout for put-and-take fishing.
If [...]
Smallie Streamers – Flies for Bass Fishing
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
Except for a few wily grayling in the cold running streams of northern Norway, few freshwater fish have fought as valiantly on the flyrod as the smallmouth bass of my home water. These fish, from late April through October on the Sheyenne River and others like it in the upper Midwest, are happy [...]
Fall Success Provides Great Fly Tying Materials
February 5, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
Fall not only represents a time to return to the field, but also a time to restock fly tying and lure making materials for the winter. From partridge and grouse in the early season, to ducks, pheasants and deer as cold air sets in, the bounty of nature on the wing and hoof [...]
THE SMALL LAKES: Good Fishing For Everyone
February 5, 2009 by admin
By Bill Mitzel
For as long as I can remember, I’ve touted the joyous benefits of fishing the small lakes. They’re abundant, they’re easy to access, they’re productive and they have few limitations in terms of weather, crowding or lack of fish. Yet sometimes, when I look at the copious crowds fishing the Missouri River, Lake [...]
North Shore Steelhead Initiation
February 4, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
Though the weather is an element that is always out of my control, I try not to let it dampen the spirits of a fishing trip; particularly when that trip is my first of the season and my first to a new place. Despite highs in the forties, rain and cold swollen streams, [...]
Discovering Trinity
February 4, 2009 by admin
By PJ Maguire
Easter weekend, with most of my peers hunting snow geese somewhere from Nebraska to North Dakota, I was in Northern California. My father and I had made the journey from St. Paul together by plane. We were going to visit my sister and her fiancé and their new child my first nephew Martin. [...]
Tying Egg Flies
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
In my quest for steelhead knowledge, I have found some interesting patterns, from complex streamers to simple nymphs. Stocking the fly box has been both rewarding and exciting as my arsenal takes shape for my trip to the shores of Lake Superior this spring.
The most enjoyable box to compile has been the one [...]
The Woolly Bugger
February 4, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
In my journeys into fly fishing and fly tying, I have not found a more enjoyable fly to put together on the vise and put under the water’s surface than the woolly bugger. The beauty of this streamer comes from its simplicity, both in how it is tied and how it is fished.
The [...]
Partridge Patterns – Tying Fly Patterns for Panfish
February 4, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
As hunting season hits full stride and the first few birds are placed in the pouches of my upland vest, I can’t help but plan for two things – dinner, of course, and the number of patterns I will tie with the feathers attached to the birds I harvest. With the first partridge [...]
Catch & Release Tips
February 4, 2009 by admin
By Doug Leier
I’ve always preferred simple tackle for fishing – bobbers, jigs, spoons and hooks – though I’m not categorically against using the latest tools and technology. Provided, of course, their use is within the constraints of the law.
I call it low impact angling. Some call it bobbers and worms. Whatever you declare, it’s more [...]
Fly Fishing Tying – Terrific Terrestrial
February 4, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
The Fourth is behind us, and summer is in full swing. If swarms of mosquitoes weren’t a sure sign, the vast numbers and array of other insects present during the day and at dusk is a definite reminder. The table is set for summer’s great binge, and every fly fisherman needs a few [...]
Fly Swap
February 4, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
Quilters have their bees and bakers have their cookie exchanges. At these events, the artists in their respective hobbies get together to exchange patterns and recipes, adding a little more to each other’s experience, each taking away something new to try. The equivalent for fly anglers, the phenomenon that is fly-swapping, accomplishes the [...]
Hoppin’ & Poppin’ – Tying Flies
February 4, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
The exciting thing about tying flies and fly fishing is trying out new patterns. Questioning whether a fly looks edible, how, when and where it should be fished and more are part of figuring out the grand puzzle.
The trial for every tied fly comes in two phases; first, the selection and assembly of [...]
Time to Start Tying Flies
February 2, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
Over, under, around and through, that’s the way to tie…a fly? Well, that’s the way I finish them at least.
Another great start to a fall bird season and the switch to daylight standard time has dashed my hopes of anymore after-work hunting trips. But once again those pre-standard time hunts have given me [...]
Fly Fishing for Beginners
By Doug Leier
At this stage in my life I feel satisfied with what I’ve bagged, tagged and caught, including deer, birds and a few lunker fish. A 40-inch pike is a favorite memory because of the light rod and tackle I was using and my struggle to boat the fish. It was a classic case [...]
Why Do I Fish?
February 2, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
Why do you fish? Now that is a question with as many answers as there are people to ask it to. And it is likely that anglers will have more than one response when posed with such an inquiry.
I was asked this question recently, and all I could come up with (to my [...]
Fly Fishing Basics
February 2, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
When most people think of fly fishing, they think of the movie “A River Runs Through It,” pristine mountain streams and a glistening rainbow trout held aloft by the L. L. Bean-clad angler. But that isn’t fly fishing; at the most it is a minute part of it. Just like walleye fishing isn’t [...]
Sorting the Fly Box
February 1, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
What’s in a fly box? Flies, obviously, but it is the stories those flies tell of a winter gone by and the promises of an upcoming season that make the arrangement special.
Monday night, after a particularly frustrating evening of fishing current rushing by at 1300 CFS, I called it quits and went home. [...]
Free Fishing Log – Printable Fishing Log
February 1, 2009 by admin
Our Outdoors
Nick Simonson
“Putting together the fishing pieces of the puzzle”
Fishing, no matter how good a person gets at it, is still the grandest puzzle of all. There are so many elements that have to be put into place such as weather, season, bait, lures, and so on. When looked at in hindsight, these puzzle pieces [...]
Fly Tying Kit Becomes the Gift That Keeps on Giving
January 31, 2009 by admin
By Nick Simonson
I couldn’t even cast a fly rod last year at this time. In fact, my only experience with longrodding was a lame attempt a few summers ago on an Idaho stock pond near a hotel we stayed at while my dad attended a conference.
After awkwardly whipping the rod through the air for [...]
