By Sam Looper What Fish Will Eat the Spineless Minnow? The Spineless Minnow was designed to target White Bass and Hybrid Bass in my local waters in Middle Tennessee. I grew up fishing a Rebel Crawfish for "redeye" in East TN and I wanted to design a small fly to imitate the wiggle action from the Rebel lure. About the same time, I was tying a lot of Blane Chocklett’s T-Bone for Musky, and I wanted to tie a smaller version for smallmouth bass. Development of the Spineless Minnow Pattern In the first step, when shaping the tubing for the T-Bone and after I had attached the material to the hook, I could see the back half of a small minnow. I immediately found a Flymen 22 mm shank and created the dome shape for the head, and the Spineless Minnow was born. It took a few more months of development and dialing in all the right materials to en...

What Changed when Running Zoetis & Dectomax? Despite his initial hesitancy to invest more in the initial cost of Zoetis products over generics, Vic finally did volunteer to try something new and give Zoetis a chance. We joined him on his ranch in Montana out by the Smith river for our first administration during branding. Be sure to read the start of this experiment and learn what Vic already had to change when switching to Zoetis. Vic started the day off by running Dectomax Pour-on on all his cattle. Dectomax controls 33 stages of internal and external parasites with a single, convenient application... at least that's what the label said. Vic was surprised to hear this claim, and it is something we are really looking forward to watching and reporting back on come fall. Our Dectomax is available for online order and delivery her...

Where are Winston Rods Made? Montana, of course. I have driven by the Winston factory in Twin Bridges, Montana, a hundred times, usually on the weekends and usually on my way to the Ruby, Jefferson, or the Big Hole, and I'm not really looking to stop anywhere. However, a week earlier, Winston's sales manager Jeff called and asked if we could attend a dealer event at the factory. So Fred, our Great Falls fly shop manager, and I made a 4:30 AM drive to Twin Bridges to attend. I've never really taken the time to understand Winston rods. I've known they make really fine fly rods and pride themselves on quality. I knew they used boron. I knew they were green, and I knew they were made in Montana. I suppose that much should be just about enough. However, we got the real story and a behind-the-scenes look that most people never get to see. So, ...

With tons of fun and cool craft ideas circling the web today, we decided to try our hand in the crafting world. We already had tons of fun with our Recycled Rope Wreaths, so we once again looked close to home when coming up with a new project. Want to check out our Rope Wreath Project? Read all about it here As spring was coming up this year, there were two things that people were getting excited about: chickens and gardening. So- we figured, why not try to combine the two? This led to the Chicken Feeder Herb Project. Looking for more unique gardening techniques? What not try straw bales? What we did was grab a couple of metal chicken feeders (which we spray painted North 40 blue, of course), some herbs and some potting soil and set to work. After packing in the herbs and some extra soil, we were excited by the success and couldn't wai...

It’s been a week since we learned of the ongoing parasitic fish kill on the Yellowstone River and we are awaiting more information about the problem. There remain many great waters to fish throughout the state of Montana. Hopefully, we won’t see any additional outbreaks. Anglers need to stay informed and learn how they can prevent the spread of invasive species and disease. If you are heading to the Missouri River (or anywhere for that matter) from the Yellowstone region, please, please Clean, Drain and Dry. This should be standard practice anytime one moves from one body of water to another. The Mo is fishing well right now. Fish a hopper. Nymph a crayfish. Rip a streamer. Target rising fish. Blind fish a dry fly. Short leash a couple bugs. Everything is working to some degree. Certain techniques will provide more fish, but success ...

I am hearing reports of fisherman at Lake Pend O'reille hooking big Smallies in anywhere between 10-30 feet of water. Gear fishing is definitely producing bigger numbers, but as the water cools down, I believe fly fishing will begin to hook more fish. Want to know how the lake is doing? Check out the current lake elevation here Right now, I have found days when the bass are extremely deep and sluggish, and other days when they are active and eating anything in their path. A couple days ago, the Smallies were in 30-40 feet of water, and I could only get them to eat plastic worms. The next day, we found the bass in 9 feet of water, and eating plastic worms, grubs and KVD dream shots. As far as flies, we threw woolly buggers, clousers, worms and even shrimp with only one bass to show for it. Want to try out some new flies? Check out our fl...

  The scene in front of me matched the mental picture I had for a southeast Alaskan steelhead stream. Emerging from ungodly deadfall and bramble, the creek met the ocean half a mile downstream. The water braided into several channels, and tide depending, had the possibility of holding fish that rode in on the rising water. Oh yeah, and two bald eagles circled overhead. Might as well make it a postcard or something. As I worked the first good holding water upstream of the salt, a chrome-bright hen of ten pounds or so came up and smashed my strike indicator... My heart instantly hit my throat. Holy cow!! Our trip to Prince of Wales Island in southeast Alaska for spring steelhead had been on the books for six months and to say it was highly anticipated was an understatement. From the information we could gather, we knew we were in for ...

What is N40 Coops 2.0? In case you aren't in the know--N40 Coops is an annual event where we showcase the most amazing chicken coops we can find, and introduce you to the passionate people raising those chickens. We have entries from all over, and we hear some of the coolest chicken stories you can image. To help with this effort we, North 40 Outfitters, partnered up with Nutrena and together, we're on a mission to find fantastic chicken coops and their equally incredible owners. Why Are We Doing This? Last year was our first ever N40 Coops season, and needless to say, we not only received hundreds of amazing coop entries, but more importantly, we learned the stories behind each of the coops and found out why every coop is truly special and unique. We also want to encourage people to start chicken farming by showing them the fun it ...

Most of the fly anglers that come into the North Central Washington area have one target in mind, and that’s trout. The local lakes have been a revolving door of activity. With the area rivers still running a little too high to see any action yet, I don’t know if you want to call it an overlooked fishery or one that does not generate much attention from fly anglers in our area, but there is a great opportunity for an angler to chase after what some might call "that other fish." "That Other Fish" "That other fish" would be our area's bass population. North Central Washington possesses both large and smallmouth bass in many of our area lakes and rivers. There are those who look down on bass as a trash fish or an invasive species, or simply the illegal supplementation of historically salomonid-only fisheries. In any regard, and no matte...