In a post last January (http://mainestripedbassfishing.blogspot.com/2009/01/new-false-albacore-and-striped-bass-fly.html) I presented a fly called the "Monkey Brain" which showed promise of being a great false albacore fly.Well, the 2009 false albacore fishing on Cape Cod's Vineyard Sound and Buzzard's Bay was fantastic. The Monkey Brain did produce well, but calling fishing it a test was unfair as most any previously used fly for fishing fat alberts would produce hook-ups. The prevailing bait was tiny.(see the attached photo) I wondered how much better the fishing would have been if a smaller Monkey Brain fly were used. Not having fly tying equipment with me, I waited until the end of the season to make some new and smaller flies to try next year.
You can see from the photo that I created a set of Monkey Brain flies. I labeled them: standard, junior, mini and micro. The two larger flies are tied on a size 1/0 Gamakatsu live bait hook and the smaller ones on a size 2 Gamakatsu live bait hook. Note the size of the micro and mini sizes in relation to the dime and the bait spit up photo. For the two smaller flies I had to use very high quality hackles like the ones Kenney Abrames of "Striper Moon" fame uses on his beautiful, flowing striped bass flies. Using such a short piece of the tips of those high quality hackles was troubling. However, I retained the remainder of the hackle to use as collars on future flies.
So, I will have to wait for the 2010 season to see if Garret Booth's Monkey Brain fly will be a magic attractant for fussy false albacore. Time will tell.
Striped bass politics is a frustrating activity. There is much happening on that front and I will address that in a post soon.
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