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Vision Grand Mama 9' #9

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  The nine weight GM has proven to be a great allround rod for pike and heavier perch fishing. General info and appearances The Grand Mama series is the newest addition to Vision 's pike line up. It consists of two rods - a nine weight which I will review in this article and a ten weight. They compliment Vision's existing pike line up perfectly as they are fast action rods that are set in mid range when it comes to price. They retail at 495 € in most fly shops. The nine weight GM is a true fast action rod meaning the top third of the rod bends more than the rest of the blank. It's also overall relatively stiff so it can handle modern nine weight pike lines with ease. The tip is beefy enough so it won't overbend easily when using big flies and heavy lines.  The tip section has plenty of beef/diameter to handle modern condensed pike lines and big flies without bending too much   The rod has a EVA handle that is pretty much immune to wear and tear. It's pretty nice to...

Fly lines, leaders and thoughts for summer time Pike and Perch fishing

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  This huge Beast of a pike was caught by using summer time tactics I've been doing more and more summer time predator fishing over the past few years here in Finland and get loads of questions about what gear I use. This type of fishing is getting really popular as the warmer temps are making trout and salmon fishing more difficult. So, here's a few words on the subject. Warm water fly selection When the waters warm up and you start to "multi-task" and focus your fishing on both pike and perch it's good to do some changes to your fly selection. Even though traditional pike flies will still work at times, the bulk of the fishing will be done by smaller and more weighted patterns like different Clouser variations, rubber tails and other aggressive patterns that have plenty of movement. Of course top water patterns come to play too. Fishing these types of patterns very aggressively can produce amazing fishing in the so called "off season" that's also c...

"The material is called Nayat or Snow Runner"

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  BIG 10inch fly with a Nayat+flash front part. The title is the answer to about 50% of fly tying material related questions I get online. Even though Nayat has been around for a while it's only now starting to get wide spread international interest and you can get a lot more useful information on how to properly use it. I'm hoping that this small article will be among the most useful ones. So what is Nayat? From what I know it's a specific goat or sheep breed. Unfortunately I don't know anything more about it's origins.  The fur ranges from semi soft to semi coarse (overall its a pretty soft fur) and it retains water. The magic thing about Nayat however is that it sheds water substantially faster than other soft furs. It dries up at least three times quicker than icelandic sheep hair and nearly six times faster than fox hair etc. It is probably the fastest drying soft hair on the market. It also retains it shape significantly better in the water than many other sof...