A RUFF BLOG 2023

Winter Woolly Buggers - DOUBLE BUGGERS - Fly Fishing Long Island. Fly fishing and Woolly Buggers. May be the perfect fly. Double buggers, just plain deadly! The Woolly Bugger will catch about anything. Yellow perch, bluegill and crappie today. I worked the tandem flies about 18" apart. #12 Grizzly on the bottom, #14 white on top. Give the fish a choice. Color and depth. Have 2 spectrum's covered in one approach. Had some yellow perch, bluegill and some nice crappie right at dark on the Wooly Bugger. Anyone new to fly fishing I will always say, get yourself some Woolly Buggers in a few different sizes and go to town. They just plain work! Work even better tandem style as in this video. Get yourself a fly rod, fly reel and a pocketful of buggers and catch some fish!

Backwoods BEAR Country - Winter Trout Fishing a New York State Backwater. Snow in the winter. Makes a nice walk. See tracks all the time. Have a good idea what they are. Some tracks just stand out. Specially the big ones. Kinda like people. Took a hike into the backwoods deep in the valley. Fished a couple of bends, pools and such. I found some active trout. They were tricky. Missed a few nice brown trout, and saw a huge rainbow trout take a dart at my #5 Rapala. Lost my breath.

Walked to another pool deeper in the backwoods. I came across some big paw prints in the snow. First thought, and they were, black bear tracks. I rarely take a pause when I fish. This time I had to take a breath, and a pause. All I could think, in that valley... Me and that bear... The two biggest creatures... In that valley... This was my fourth and most distant bear encounter in my life. Something about being near a bear makes one feel enchanted. Awe I guess. A bear can instill fright, but that's for another day.

I walked back to the bend that I found most pretentious. Went back to my newly acquired routine of the day and pulled out a beautiful brown trout in the backwater. It was bit of work. Fishing always is. A lot of walking. Watching. Seeing what the water does and hoping the fish do. I have not been back that way in a few years. I love going in blind and finding. The feeling is like a blind man slowly regaining his sight. That's how it goes when you do things on your own. Think I see a fly rod back there in the backwoods backwater in the future. Blind, ha! Now we can predict.

Spin Fishing for WILD BROWN TROUT with the Rapala Countdown Minnow. Each every day is different when you go fishing. No two days are alike. Kinda like them pretty patterns on a brown trout. I started way up stream. Saw how spooky the trout were. Was not feeling it so walked back downstream and starting to think about bass. Went through some lures. Down to the Rapala Countdown Minnow and had the first wild brown trout! Had fun walking downstream fishing promising water for a trout about each bend, pool and rip. The cold snapped in and the fish seemed to turn off. Gloves on and fished the way back. It was a fine day.

Long Island - BIG LARGEMOUTH BASS - Rainy Cold Winter Freshwater Fishing - First I would like my friend Mario from sunny Florida - Game Hog, @gamehog2696 on YouTube. He sent me a reel to try as a gift. It is the one used in this video. I will run something separate on the reel most likely in spring or summer. The fishing. It was great! It was not cold, low 40's here in Long Island NY, but the rain and wind made the air bone sinking. The first hour was null. As predicted the second hour I caught a random crappie on a #3 gold Rapala minnow. I picked another, followed by another bout half hour in. The fishing was on. That's for another video. What I did do different was bring 2 rods. I rarely do that except on boat. I worked a big Rapala #7 in gold to poke through the crappie and pull some big ones out. That we did, plus, Christened the reel @gamehog2696 sent with a big old long island largemouth bass. Thank you Mario!

Tasty Heartwarming Fried FISHCAKES with Pickerel / Pike or ANY Fish Cake Recipe Made Fun & Easy. The pickerel is one of my favorite fish to catch. It is also and unknowingly one of the best fishes to eat. Yes, the pickerel and pikes are bony, and that is why most frown on them as table fare. The fillets are great fried. Pickerel fillets are even better when made into tasty heartwarming fishcakes that will brighten up the blackest of hearts. If you don't have pike or chain pickerel you can use any fish to substitute to warm your heart up. In this simple, easy, fun, yet messy fish cake cooking video we talk you through the whole process when you prepare your glorious catch into perfect fish cakes.

INGREDIENTS:
1 to 2 Pounds Pickerel, Pike or ANY Fish Fillets
2 to 4 Slices of ANY Bread
1 or 2 Eggs
1 to 4 Garlic Cloves
Salt, Pepper, and/or Cajun Seasoning to YOUR taste
Enough Frying Oil to Cover Your Pan up 1/8 to 1/4 inch to YOUR Liking
Fresh Parsley, Cilantro, Dill, Sage, Oregano, Scallions to YOUR Taste - Chopped and Mixed Last if you want to get fancy

Fly Fishing - BIG SLAB TROPHY CRAPPIE - Jumbo Crappies on the Worm Flies. Worms. I love worms. Fish love worms. Crappie love worms. Trophy crappie love worm flies. Had some good crappie fishing I could not stay away from. Good bite, and fly fishing on the mind. Summer had me thinking worm. Fly fishing. Worm. Going to do worm fly today. Wow. It was great. The crappie went from trophy to decent. Reverse order into the night on the fly tackle. The trophy 16+ inch crappie was the first fish caught on the yellow #5 worm fly. The jumbo crappie followed and finished with some decent crappie into the night. All on the worm fly. It was great! Worms are great!

SPRINGTIME HERRING - Pier Fishing the First Day of Spring in New York City. I think it took over 2 hours to drive to the pier today. All I could think was I could be at the Salmon River by now, ha! That's OK, I was in no rush. Figured the bite may be later. Still sunny at the pier but windy and a cold spring first day. First day of spring. Springtime herring. Spring time. Springtime. Left my gloves at home. Made some makeshift gloves. Bobby gave me a hand warmer. I laughed. Told him some things never change. He had an honest smile. The herring were slow to start. Start in the dark, or is it dark? The bite picked up as the pier started to close and caught some springtime herring.

Finding & Catching BIG LARGEMOUTH BASS with the #13 Rapala Minnow. It was one of those day I knew I had to work a large volume of water for A fish. These are the things you need to learn. 7" black purple Culprit worm to start. These are great on a slow to fast bite day. This day was a no bite day. The worm told me that. A no bite day tells me "I gonna have to cover water." Wading in the shallows I had to pull out the Gold #13 Rapala Floater. Give the largemouth bass something big to spend effort on that will cover the shallow volume and wide area. Something to the flash and pause that says "eat me" to bass. I had to work 3 coves 3 times over before I had my first strike. As I expected it was a big beautiful spring winter largemouth bass. It is still cold out. The sun was setting quick as I joyfully cast out into the dark.