Stuff

When I was a young guide I kind of thought  that all the 'stuff' that goes with guiding was pretty darn cool. I'd have all my rods out and gear displayed so people would say "wow, that's a lot of stuff". But 30 some years later I've come to view it all as just tools, like a carpenters hammer, the only difference is that I've never seen a hammer that didn't work.

So that peg board is something you see when you enter my garage / office/ headquarters and studio. That wall is a testament to America and fishing. Guys like me will buy anything that looks fishy or even seems fishy....and we'll usually buy more than one. A good chunk of them end up here on the losers wall, after all the stuff that works ends up in your tackle box, right? So lets take a look at a few of these products that were sure to make fishing magic for the Pro's from Dover....

Luhr Jensen makes some of the most successful salmon lures in the world...and the Flutter Jig ain't one of them. The development of this lure is a salmon fishing legend. In the early 80's an Oregon fishing guide was spotting  these King salmon on his fish finder that were holding on the bottom in 30' at the mouth of the White River where it meets the Columbia.  The water being deep and slow there was no way to get at the fish with the usual salmon egg type lures so he put on a saltwater jig and dropped straight down to them....walla....the first one was snagged right in the mouth and the vertical jig fishery had begun. Well it didn't take long before folks  started to notice that these fish were biting an awful lot with other parts of their body besides their mouths which kind of complicated the fishery and other techniques came back to use. The Flutter Jigs that I have were purchased at John' Sporting Goods in Everett Washington in the 80's. This place is a fisherman's dream and has a real cult following so whenever we're close we get to John's for a look see. The day I bought these he had shelves of them at 7 bucks apiece. I went to check out with two of them and John says "I'll give em to ya for a buck apiece if you buy 20 " ......mmmm.....that should have told me they'd end up on the wall.

The stingfish lure is a spin off on Luhr Jensens venerable Kwikfish lure. It has an 'e-chip' built into the bill that emits an electrical charge. The package says " as the Stingfish lure is trolled the e-chip emitter on the front of the lure gives off tiny electrical pulses duplicating the nerve discharge of a wounded baitfish". Well....I don't know about everybody else but I've towed the paint off these things and all it ever caught was water. What they seem to work best for is when I have people fishing to close behind me I chuck em into the water and invariably the guys cheap gene clicks in and he moves the boat to go get it. Perfect. I got my collection from a friend who was a tackle rep and asked me to help him sell pro cure at the Great Alaska Sportmans Show. I stood on my feet for two days selling egg cure and got paid with cases of Stingfish lures and oh....I guess I got some "monster bite' scent to,  but that's another story. I'm hoping that someday my friend Craig will call and want to go fishing, got any idea what would be a good lure for him to fish with????

Now that Nitro Diver there is impressive. The Stingfishes technological advantage had to do with sound and pulses, well this baby has a 'scent delivery system' it has Phermone technology with its included ' Nitro Gravy' with 'Factor X2'...that's gotta work right?  Once again it seems to be a take off on a Luhr Jensen Product, the Jet Diver that every salmon fisherman owns many of. The Jet Diver puts the Kwikfish lure down where the salmon live and helps it 'track' properly through the current. So what could be better than add 'gravy' to this already successful formula ? So I guess maybe I never had it rigged right  and I just gave up on them....if you really want to put the 'sport' in sportfishing I recommend you tow one of these around for an entire day with a Stingfish behind it.....and bring a book.

I saved my favorite for last, the Tasmanian Devil, made in Australia. We all know Australia was founded by prisoners and criminals so its no wonder these babies ended up on the market. The package says "They bite like the Devil"....and that's pretty darn catchy. Throw in the graphic cover of the screeching bat like varmint himself and you have a lure that any red blooded fisherman can't resist...but the fish sure can.

I'll let ya know when we're having the garage sale. I'll sell this stuff cheap, almost free as they say in Mexico. Like I say, I've got lots of stuff.