| FLW Outdoors Magazine Jan/Feb 2006 The float ‘n’ fly’s lesser-known cousin By Jason Sealock For smallmouth fishing in the brutal winter months, the float ‘n’ fly has not had many rivals in effectiveness. The technique, however, is not for everyone. It takes a painstaking approach to catch a quality stringer on the float ‘n’ fly in the dead of winter, sometimes requiring working one small spot all day for five to 10 bites. Wal-Mart Bass Fishing League angler Nathan Light of Kingsport, Tenn., and his regular fishing partner, Larry Fitzgerald of Jonesborough, Tenn., adopted a new approach to catching winter smallmouths on their home lakes of Cherokee and Holston because, as Light puts it, “I can’t stand throwing that float ‘n’ fly in one spot all day.” In fact, their approach has worked so well on their home waters they’ve expanded it to catch big smallmouths on Dale Hollow and even in Canada. “We didn’t invent the technique, but I’d say we’ve perfected it over the past eight years,” Light said. It started when they asked a friend to pour some light jigs for them after getting beaten in a tournament by an angler fishing small jigs without a float. The first version of the jig was small – too small. His friend started widening his mold with a Dremel tool to meet Light’s specifications. The jigs were an immediate success, and Light and Fitzgerald decided that since they worked already, there was no need to smooth the mold out for production. They call their jigs “Ugly Heads” because of their brain-like shape from the rough cuts resulting from the Dremel tool. While Light didn’t see the bird it came from, he was told the dressing is duck feathers. Their technique is simple. They tie their jigs, weighing slightly less than 1/8 ounce, to 4-pound line and use 7-foot custom mahogany, medium-light G. Loomis rods with a large-spooled spinning reel. They like to target points and bluffs with their technique, but they are most fond of 45-degree chunk-rock banks because they allow them to cover varying depths. They cast the jigs to the shore and work them back to the boat, shaking the rod tip while letting the bait pendulum its way back to the boat. Many bites come directly below the boat. “The bite is the most unusual one you’ll ever experience, and the fight is the most exciting,” Light said. “You have to back reel because you just can’t count on your drag with fish this strong and line this light. “It’s not a lure for fishing brush, either. If you throw it next to a piece of wood, you’ve just donated that jig.” But the jig doesn’t get hung up if fished correctly. The key is to keep the bait just off the bottom with a quivering motion as it pendulums back to the boat. It’s not always a tournament-winning technique, but it has won Light and Fitzgerald quite a bit of money from December to April. Fifteen to 30 bass is not uncommon with this technique in a day of fishing, and Light has caught smallmouths weighing more than 5 pounds and limits of five smallmouths weighing more than 20 pounds. They only need a rod and a pill bottle of jigs to fish all day in the winter months. “We always seem to get better gas mileage in the winter,” Light said. “Once we unload all our other rods, spinnerbaits and crankbaits, the boat rides a lot better and burns a lot less gas.” |
