How many fans of Bass on a fly rod?

[Whatever]

I am curious on how many of you Bass anglers prefer fly fishing, and why? I pursue fish with a variety of gear, but fly fishing has always been a favorite. If nothing else I cry far less over losing a fly I spent 15 minutes tying, versus breaking off a $10 lure.

Anyone else have thoughts on this subject?

[billmac]

I'm afraid I'm not a fly fisherman although I have a fly rod, somewhere.  I have wondered if in the long history of bass tournament fishing, any competitor has used a fly rod.

[TnRiver46]

I’ve done a whole lot of fly fishing and been an instructor/guide for about 12 years. Therefore I hate fly fishing !  It can be very effective, especially in late summer floating shallow water for smallies . Though it may be effective, I don’t like it . But out-of-towners with lots of money sure do! So I press on......

[Team9nine]

46 minutes ago, billmac said:

I'm afraid I'm not a fly fisherman although I have a fly rod, somewhere.  I have wondered if in the long history of bass tournament fishing, any competitor has used a fly rod.

 

Bassmaster held a couple fly fishing tournaments in the very early days.

 

As for fly fishing for bass, I have a couple fly rods. I pull them out about once or twice every 5 years or so. They just seem way too inefficient compared to traditional gear. That said, there is a pretty decent river/creek smallie fly fishing group in the area that keeps all things 'fly' alive.

[roadwarrior]

[redmeansdistortion]

I don't fly fish, but I do have a friend that fly fishes exclusively.  You'd think he would gravitate towards trout, but nope, he fishes carp and smallmouth on the fly.  It's pretty impressive watching him land a big carp or smallie, and a lot of the time he will be catching fish when nobody else is.

[Mat_ski]

Have couple of rods, dedicated good amount of time for fly fishing and even fly tying, but in the end I share the sentiment with mr. team9nine.

It is too d**n inefficient and I cant relax and enjoy myself knowing I could be using my time more effectively. 

[Muddy wolf]

I love the challenge. I’ve had to back off because of shoulder problems but that will be fix and I’ll be going again. I’ve fished for almost all fish in my area with a fly rod. And out fished my friends that were using spinning and baitcasting. It’s a blast. 

[GaterB]

I admire fly casting, having given it a try recently. I’d never sell my conventional gear and go permanently to fly fishing, but it’s an art form and certainly has its appeal. The challenge is there, and I enjoy a challenge. 

[GetFishorDieTryin]

3 hours ago, Whatever said:

I am curious on how many of you Bass anglers prefer fly fishing, and why? I pursue fish with a variety of gear, but fly fishing has always been a favorite. If nothing else I cry far less over losing a fly I spent 15 minutes tying, versus breaking off a $10 lure.

Anyone else have thoughts on this subject?

If you dont like catching bass on a fly I don't want to business with you.  A 2lb bass on a 3wt is really fun.  There isn't as much gear involved overall in fly fishing.  Just like anything else it takes practice to become proficient and it can take years to perfect a cast.  I didn't fly fish for years and took a trip with a buddy to try to catch the green drake hatch and it took me a couple hours to get my timing back.  

[bulldog1935]

here in the Texas hill country, it's because of where they live.  

We call our endemic creek bass, Texas brook trout.  

They occupy the same niche trout do in coldwater, and are the only bass species that can escape into aquifer caves to survive our droughts.  

 

I caught 7 in the frame of this photo, and if you look back at the first photo, on a fall bite, caught 70 in the frame of that photo.  

 

 

 

 

 

Also going to add casting a fly rod is way over-rated.  Stealth is the single most important skill - spare your casts so you won't put down fish - if you're doing this right, reading the water, sparing your casts, you should catch a fish every 3rd cast.  

[Whatever]

Bulldog, that is gorgeous water, and beautiful fish!

[GTN-NY]

After a long time off of fishing I wanted to try fly fishing creeks for trout. We have lots of good trout streams around me. Problem is I know nothing about trout and even less about streams so I started FF for panfish, bass and pike. Bought a 5,8 and 12 wt setups. I can cast fine but it’s the finer details like roll casts, mending the line and catching fish that give me problems which frustrated me. So back to spinning and casting gear. 

[Captain Phil]

When I first started bass fishing, lures were heavy chunks of wood or spoons.  Casting them with the reels we had was a chore.  I decided to try fly fishing.  I bought a mail order bamboo fly rod, a cheap reel and some C level line.  Most of my fishing was done with popping bugs.  I caught a lot more bass with my fly rod than with those old bass plugs.  I started tying my own fly flies and experimented with streamers.  My best streamer was nothing more than tin foil wrapped on a long shank hook with a short piece of white buck tail tied on.   Most of my fishing at the time was done from the bank.

 

Everything changed for me when my fishing buddy bought a Mitchel 300 spinning real.  This was also when plastic worms started appearing.  We loaded our reels with 4 pound mono and could cast a Creme worm all the way across the canal without a weight. No more whirling reel handles, tree hanging back casts, or tangled line to step around.  Plastic worms caught more and bigger fish than our popping bugs.  I still have a fly rod in my garage.  I get it out once in a while.  A fly rod is not the best tool for bass fishing.  It's challenging.  Those that enjoy it, love it.  I think it's the wrong tool for the job.

 

I'm not against fly fishing in general.  I've caught bone fish, tarpon, snook, permit, jack crevalle, barracuda, red fish and even a sail fish on fly tackle.  There are more effective ways to catch these fish, but it's the challenge that fly fishing is about.

[Mobasser]

I have an old Heddon fiberglass fly rod my dad bought I think in the early 1960s. I used to take it out to a pond I fished, but I havnt used it for 25 yrs. I did catch a few fish with it, on poppers. Mostly smaller bass

[moguy1973]

I really enjoy fly fishing, but I have never fished for anything but trout with it.  I would really like to get to the point where fishing for bass with conventional rods is boring and I need something new, but I don't think I'll ever get to that point with the time constraints I have for the foreseeable future.  I have a really nice St. Croix 7wt my mom left me that would work great for bass fishing.  I may have to try it out next year on the farm pond.

[Spankey]

I thought about when I retire I'll get into fly fishing a bit more seriously. I do fly fish, mostly for trout and creek Smallies. I know the basics and can handle myself, but I guess like anything else the more time you put into it and all the surrounding things that are needed to be know, the better you are or will be. I sort of put myself in a category of being a hack that needs to refine his skills. A work buddy and I stopped off at a local lake after work in the height of the summer for some bass fishing. It turned out to be an afternoon of some giant bluegills caught on woolybuggers. The lake has a size moratorium on its panfish. That was my last time out with the flyrod. Good luck.

[MarkG52]

I fly fished exclusively for many years, Warm water species, cold water species, and even in the salt. Waded, drift boat, kayak, flats boat, love it. Since we got the new bass boat I have yet to fly fish out of it. It will happen though.  

[Sphynx]

Taking bass on the fly is great, among my favorite ways to take any kind of fish, but I generally consider it a river only activity, I find that deep, still water is not at all conducive to using fly gear, and conventional tackle works far more efficiently for that, I think just like with conventional gear, topwater is my favorite way to get them, poppers, deer hair, sneaky Pete's, mice, all great, if you have to go subsurface I like tossing clouser minnows and I am still playing with a few other designs for streamers, and one of these days I'll get around to figuring out craw flies. As far as tournaments for fly fishing for bass, it's evidently popular enough that St. Croix designed the mojo bass fly rods to be within tournament specs for rod length, and they are still available which means somebody is buying a rod that is much shorter than average, can't understand why you'd do that unless you had a situation where you couldn't use a 9ft rod because of rules, or because you live in an area that is extremely difficult to cast in on account of vegetation. 

[the reel ess]

18 hours ago, billmac said:

I'm afraid I'm not a fly fisherman although I have a fly rod, somewhere.  I have wondered if in the long history of bass tournament fishing, any competitor has used a fly rod.

There used to be one that was 8' long because there was a rod length limit rule in B.A.S.S. at the time, I believe. I think Sage made it. I hope I'm remembering that correctly.

 

I feel the same way about fly fishing that I do about hunting. It looks like a really cool pursuit, but I'm too lazy to do it. I have an old Daiwa Apollo graphite composite flyrod with a Martin automatic reel spooled with dry line and a small assortment of bass and panfish poppers. It's barely used. I actually have had the rod since I was a teen. We used to put spinning reels on them and use them to jig under docks for crappie. This was before you could get longer jigging poles. So an 8' or 9' rod got you closer. I've always felt like bass fishing with a flyrod was like fishing with one hand tied behind your back. Basically, purposely putting yourself at a disadvantage for the sport of it.

[Sphynx]

3 hours ago, the reel ess said:

There used to be one that was 8' long because there was a rod length limit rule in B.A.S.S. at the time, I believe. I think Sage made it. I hope I'm remembering that correctly.

 

I feel the same way about fly fishing that I do about hunting. It looks like a really cool pursuit, but I'm too lazy to do it. I have an old Daiwa Apollo graphite composite flyrod with a Martin automatic reel spooled with dry line and a small assortment of bass and panfish poppers. It's barely used. I actually have had the rod since I was a teen. We used to put spinning reels on them and use them to jig under docks for crappie. This was before you could get longer jigging poles. So an 8' or 9' rod got you closer. I've always felt like bass fishing with a flyrod was like fishing with one hand tied behind your back. Basically, purposely putting yourself at a disadvantage for the sport of it.

Interesting enough I find casting a fly rod less complicated than dealing with a baitcaster, don't mistake me for saying that you can look like one of the real artists of the sport after a couple outings, but you'll certainly be good enough to cast a popper or clouser minnow out there and hook a bass, I also don't really think your much disadvantaged by use of a fly rod either, on a river or stream wading I think fly gear is just the right tool for the job, it does have its limitations though.

[the reel ess]

2 hours ago, Sphynx said:

Interesting enough I find casting a fly rod less complicated than dealing with a baitcaster, don't mistake me for saying that you can look like one of the real artists of the sport after a couple outings, but you'll certainly be good enough to cast a popper or clouser minnow out there and hook a bass, I also don't really think your much disadvantaged by use of a fly rod either, on a river or stream wading I think fly gear is just the right tool for the job, it does have its limitations though.

Maybe. But you're less likely to present a lure to a PB bass deep in a laydown with a fly rod and get that bass out. I don't even try that with a spinning rod. Now, I do understand the allure of the fly rod. It's just not my bag (yet).

[The Bassman]

I've owned several fly rods over the years. Used to wade a local creek and sight fish carp. If you led them just right they would take. Like some have mentioned I found it to be too much work. I was always picking up pond scum as I would begin the next cast or would be fishing in the trees. These days I'm much more efficient with spinning tackle and an eighth oz. Pop-R. I've caught scads of bass, some nice ones on it. Basically just bass bugging without the hassle.

[Sphynx]

37 minutes ago, the reel ess said:

Maybe. But you're less likely to present a lure to a PB bass deep in a laydown with a fly rod and get that bass out. I don't even try that with a spinning rod. Now, I do understand the allure of the fly rod. It's just not my bag (yet).

I guess it depends on the weight your using, I could grab a 12 weight designed for offshore fishing and horse any bass in the world out of any laydown with impunity, of I could use a 4 or 5 weight and force myself to play that fish out, not especially different to using traditional tackle I guess, but you do have to invest in the appropriate gear if horsing fish our of cover is your game, your average 7 or 8 weight rod is not going to be suited to that, 9+ probably could do just as good at it as any standard 7ft MHF rod though...depending on rod composition etc.

[Bankbeater]

Using a fly rod from the bank, around over hanging tree limbs is quite a chore.