Streamers are my favorite big fish fly. I learned from my fly-fishing mentor, Grandpa Foley, who loved his Mickey Finn and always said that "any fish worth fighting will eat a minnow". Lee Wulff's articles on tying without thread and his fascination with glues were likely responsible for starting me experimenting with hot glue guns, epoxies, and eventually Softex.  And I have been fascinated with shaping streamer wings ever since Nick Lambrou, one of New England's best fly designers and fishermen, showed me how to shape the back of a streamer with a little head-cement between my finger and thumb.

The J.B.L. Flash Minnow (top in picture)--

With fishing buddies Bill Koladish (one of the sport's most innovative Largemouth and Striper fly creators) and Larry Alting, many hours were spent playing with the sink rates of Flash Minnow prototypes in the kitchen sink and in water glasses, as well as extensive field testing on the water. Together we have fished some pretty ridiculous experiments over the years, some so ugly that I slip downstream for fear of being laughed off the water. But in the J.B.L. Flash Minnow (named, of course, after Jack, Bill, and Larry) I think we found a real winner. At least it works for me! I think it will work for you, too.

JL91 (bottom in picture)--

Larry and I had been chasing Stripers all night and just before daybreak the tide changed and we saw the water boiling with sand eels (lances). They were clearing the water as if Snapper Blues were tearing them apart from underneath. We fished in the pod for more than an hour, never hooking up. We left scratching our heads.

The next night we made our way back to the same spot. Again, the water boiled. But this time, in the light we could make out a brownish 14" fish busting the skittering sand eels.

"Pollack", I asked?

"What's the smallest streamer you have with you?"

"A Mickey Finn in the back of the Shad box. Try it."

Well, Larry threw it about a hundred times with no luck, finally skating it with a double-handed strip until the only stupid fish in the bunch tried to commit suicide. It's a brown trout!

I told Larry to bring a 4Wt and some 5X tippet the next day, and I would bring the answer. I spent the afternoon at the fly bench refining my latest experiment, matching the hatch not only in size and color but in sink rate and action. When dawn broke, I was able to hand Larry one of the prototypes. I had made six different sink rate versions of the same fly. Larry started with the floater, and over the next hour all hell broke loose. There wasn't 20 seconds when both of us weren't hooked up. As the frenzy started to subside Larry looked over and said "I just landed and released my 50^th fish!" I had caught only 41, but had continued to experiment through the frenzy. As we walked back to the car Larry asked me the name of the fly. I responded: "I didn't have one until today…. Perhaps we'll call it Jack and Larry's 91!"