Friday, May 18, 2012

The Bass Gurgler

The bass spawn may be about over.  I didn't see the amount of big fish activity in the shallows last night as I had last weekend.  Then again, it was pretty windy.  I tossed one of the Bass Gurlgers I talked about in some recent posts.  It is not MY original design.  I gave the credit where it was due in one of the previous posts.  It worked well again, and scored 3 bass (all under 14" this time) and a NICE bluegill.

I tied up a few more last night, and thought I'd post the pictures.  I tied one for bass on a #2 Streamer hooks in black-and-yellow.  I tied up 2 on #4 Streamer hooks that I think might work for white bass/wipers when they are feeding on shad near the surface or in the shallows.  Catfish might even go for 'em when they are feeding on shad.  I tied 2 different colors for these, one a sparkly white foam with white boa yarn body and a red tail, and one a sparkly silver/gray foam with a light gray boa yarn body and white tail.  After I took the picture below, I decided to shorten the marabou a bit on the 2 smaller ones.

I may do some in colors that smallies might enjoy, and maybe in slightly smaller sizes.

Here's some closer shots of the pattern...
Top:

Bottom:
And here is a close-up of the "mouth"...when tied tightly, the bottom lip and top lip both will naturally curve, forming a nice "popper" face.
I trim the corners off the foam lips, but this may not be necessary for an effective Gurgler.  Doing so seems to spread the lips apart better in this particular design, and since some of the foam sheets I use have adhesive on one side, this seems to help prevent the "lips" from sticking together.

4 comments:

  1. excellent fly. i make my a similar pattern instead of the maribou tail i use a rabbit strip and i use deer hair or a big hackle feather for the body. also i have never tried adding on the botttom lip. i typically double the foam back to give the fly a large rounded off head.

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  2. Nice looking fly pattern...it looks easy enough , I may have to tie a couple up and try em out around here.

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  3. Ok, for some reason my iPad posts don't show up. I second how awesome this fly is. The cut corners on the lips seems to give it really nice twitches in the water with quick strips. Awe-some.

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  4. Tied some last night, can't wait to try it.

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