"mu" wrote

Until I moved to
California and fished Lake Crowley I had never met anyone bobber
fishing with midges in stillwater. The tungsten beads I have are not
round but faceted so they are easily distinguishable from other bead
head materials - at least on my flies.


Crowley is where I was introduced to the technique, too. I've seen it
used elsewhere since that time, it's fairly common on Hebgen. It's amazing
how much more effective it can be than "traditional" stillwater wooly-bugger
stripping, at times. Another less common lake technique is very fast
sinking lines and floating, foam, flies ... the Brits call them 'boobies'
.... it's another very effective approach and one fish don't see much,
usually a plus .. slowly slide the line along the bottom, thus swimming the
fly just off it on it's short leader

I saw some faceted beads but never considered the idea that they would be
easy to tell from others ... just that they might flash more vigorously as
each flat caught and reflected light. I'll get some, somes like a logical
solution to my probem.

Now, moving on. I assume you know the trick of attaching your forceps to
the fly and slowly lowering it to touch bottom to measure depth and help set
the bobbicator to keep the fly just off the bottom ( obviously you remove
the forceps after the measuring ;-)

One problem I've never solved is the difficulty landing fish if your fishing
depth is more than about 8 feet. The bobber jams onto the rod's tip and
keeps you from reeling in far enough to get to the fish easily with a net.
So I sometimes end up grapping the leader and praying for the last few feet
as I pull without the shock absorber of the rod ... the better the fish, the
more fervent the prayers ;-) This risks breaking off a good fish, that
may have been played a little too long since that tendency follows from not
being able to land him quickly, and I always hate that few seconds.
Have you come up with a better solution to this "can't reach him OR reel in
any farther" problem with long leader bobber fishing?