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The image is unforgettable.
It was a late-May, Kodacolor day filled with eight hours of casting exercises and curses against the winds. The effort resulted in three strikes and the netting of a 10-inch largemouth bass.
That’s when a bulky body of burnished gold from the tannin-stained lake ascended in super-slow motion. My chartreuse popping bugs disappeared so slowly I nearly ignored setting the hook in favor of savoring the splendid scene.
“That was just like a giant tarpon take with the monster mouth coming open and the fly vanishing,” Don Perchalski gasped as the big bass shifted into gear and totally disrupted the reed-lined pocket where she’d been lying.
Again Mrs. Bass retaught the lesson that’s difficult for even the best anglers to digest. That theorem states: Despite the ease of spin and plug tackle and the efficiency of strongly scented soft plastics, fast-sinking living-rubber jigs, holographic spinners and a million other fraudulent but lifelike baits, never underestimate the attraction of a small fly-rod surface-popping bug.
Lobbing colorfully painted cork popping bugs at lily pads housing freshwater bass and their various sun-fishy cousins is the same as gobbling roasted cashews and kettle fried potato chips. All are delightfully addictive activities for which there is no cure. Fortunately for a handful of us, the popping-bug craze has been around for more than 100 years and still hasn’t caught on, while other high-dollar, ESPN-sponsored, bass-chasing shenanigans – just like poker tournaments – are the rage.
Some of my earliest fly-rod dalliances involved plopping froggy-looking cork poppers along Tamiami Trail flood-control canals in the Everglades. These efforts produced two additional theorems:
1. Look away momentarily and a bass or bluegill always strikes.
2. Slow retrieves with “forever” pauses are best.
Back when gas cost pennies a gallon and operating a 12-foot aluminum john boat via a 9-1/2 horsepower outboard, oars, push pole and early electric trolling motor was a relaxing way to spend the day, my largemouth bass expeditions never had many takers. Today it’s even worse. Nearly all my friends down South focus on superstrong saltwater species. A few such as Jack Allen, Don Perchalski, Frank Catino, Jim Grace and Jay McGowan still humor me with trips to Florida’s tannic freshwaters (the St. John’s River system and the Everglades). In Louisiana, my redfish-loving guide pal Gary Taylor occasionally surprises me by pushing his Hells Bay Skiff into some sweet-water areas where largemouths provide topwater bug blasts.
Chasing freshwater black bass with a fly-rod has been practiced longer than just about any other form of modern fishing. Many of the antique cork, balsa wood and reed-based fly patterns were particularly innovative for their day. Unfortunately, the “surface only” traditions of fly-rod fishing served to discourage many potential participants, especially when poppers didn’t produce regularly.
No fish species reacts to micro environmental changes as quickly as largemouth and smallmouth bass. Even in tropical south Florida, a minor cold front with a subtle north wind change can instantly drown an otherwise brisk surface-feeding period.
Enthusiasm for subsurface fly-rod bass presentations is increasing with shad, crawfish, wiggly worm imitations, diving frogs and even salamander patterns being sunken into the faces of stubborn bucketmouths. Innovative weed guards, rubber legs, epoxy, foam, spinner blades, gummy minnow tape and rabbit fur can all be turned into bass-fooling devices served on everything from sink tips to shooting heads and “flipped” with split shot.
Boone Bait Co. out of Winter Park, Fla., created the most consistent fly-rod tidbit I ever used. Boone’s “Queen Bee” poppers came in yellow and black stripes like a hornet and black and white stripes that resembled a paper wasp. From tiny bluegill sizes right up to giant nighttime chuggers, Queen Bees were wonderful producers of quality largemouths. Despite my fishing heroes such as Charlie Waterman, A.J. McClane, Dave Whitlock and Lefty Kreh writing extensively about the effectiveness of clipped bucktail hair bugs for bass, I continue to fancy hard poppers. And they aren’t always very large, either.
Long ago, Jack Allen, a Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., fly-rod popping-bug addict repeatedly displayed how mild size 4 and 6 poppers brought Everglades bass, bluegill, oscars and even South American peacock bass broiling up for a surface smash when they ignored everything else I presented.
When Queen Bees became hard to locate, it required a switch to Peck’s, Accardo and Gaines cork poppers, of which I now have many.
Probably 15 years ago, Jim Grace, a sales representative, former Naples snook guide and collector of cute sporting goods gear, called excitedly to report that I had to order some southern popping bug creations by Mr. Bob.
“They are absolutely perfect,” Jim panted. “You’ll love ’em.”
As usual, Jim was absolutely right. The enamel finish of the Mr. Bob poppers was museum quality with perfect hooks, tail hackle and rubber legs that didn’t rot away after one season.
Mr. Bob’s poppers attracted bluegill and bass very well. But a nagging feeling that they were too good to last soon came true, and due to internal family problems the product vanished.
Several years ago, while pawing through the fly bins in Orlando Outfitters, I was astonished to discover a Mr. Bob look alike called the Boogle Bug (www.booglebug.com). Pierce Yates, a former Mr. Bob’s disciple, has re-created the look and quality of the perfect popper, albeit going offshore to do it.
Fearing the worst, I stocked up on Boogle Bugs, especially the chartreuse models, which I pitch whenever I can. Last May with Don, we had covered 15 miles of the St. Johns River and lake systems near Melbourne when, as a last resort, I suggested we try the fly rod on Lake Washington before loading the boat.
“Where did you get that bug?” Don asked as the latest size 4 Boogle Solar Flare splashed next to the maiden cane. After a day of little or no action on plastic worms, lizards and jerk baits, topwater and suspending lures as well as spinner baits and buzzbaits, it took fewer than a half-dozen casts for the 4-pound, 15-ounce largemouth to gently inhale the almost insignificant popper.
Since that experience, Don and I wonder how fishing would have been if we’d presented Boogle Bugs all day instead of taking the Bassmaster approach.
We’re going to find out soon in the near year.
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Paul Bruun writes weekly on his adventures and misadventures in the great outdoors.