Jack Gartside's blog: a place for tales, tips, and other random musings.
In case you missed it (or even if you didn’t) here’s a hilarious interview Jack did last March with his old friend Snag Hoofish (aka, Strayhorn Spadewater) on Snag’s Fishface Radio show. Jack was concerned beforehand that he might not sound sharp but he managed to deliver classic Gartside. The interview starts about 17 minutes into the show. Enjoy.
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This video of Jack was shot a number of years ago during a stopover at LAX. I don’t know much of the story behind it. The pattern looks like some sort of soft hackle streamer. While it turns out that tying while driving is not an offense in Los Angeles county, Jack was ticketed and fined for exceeding the maximum turns of thread allowed under California law.
In the current Pointless Poll (see the Home Page) it’s a dead heat for favorite knot between the improved clinch and the loop knot. Which is surprising to me. I like loop knots, don’t get me wrong, I just never realized how many people use them on a regular basis. The clinch knot was the first fishing knot I ever learned. When the improved clinch came out I switched over to it because it was, well, improved. And that’s pretty much where I’ve been ever since.
There’s an odd tendency for certain knots to stick in your brain, while others don’t. I have this theory that once a knot takes possession of your mind it gets territorial and uses its knotty powers to prevent other knots from gaining a place. For example, the trilene is a great knot. But somehow, even though it’s not that complicated, I can’t seem to tie one unless I have a diagram in front of me. The improved clinch just refuses to let it reside in my grey matter. Conversely, I have no problem remembering how to tie blood knots, nail knots, snells, bowlines, and sheepshanks. It’s as if the improved clinch realizes that these knots are not direct competition.
Jack likes to laugh and say, “I know two knots, and one of them is a wind knot.” We’ve fished together for over ten years and he still won’t tell me what that second knot is. It can’t be all that great because, as fine a fisherman as he is, he does snap off quite a few fish. Or maybe it’s the knot itself asserting its will, coming undone on purpose to get even with him for not giving knots their due respect.
A few years ago Jack and I were into some fast and heavy striper action when a nice bass snapped off his fly. So he tied on another one and the next fish snapped off his entire leader. Unperturbed, he tied a fly directly to the fly line and in short time hooked a really big fish which ran him into his backing–before breaking that off and swimming away with the fly line. After that he was reduced to flailing away with a fly tied to nothing but backing. Even then he caught a few more fish until finally the current died and the bass moved off.
I’ve heard about Mother Teresa’s face being seen in a bagel, Elvis’s image popping up in someone’s toast, and the face of Jesus being revealed in a potted asparagus fern as well as numerous other images appearing unexpectedly in unexpected places , but this one beats all.
One of my readers claims that an image of yours truly appeared on the shell of a Gurgler that I had tied for him years ago, one that he recently retrieved from his fly box in preparation for a new season. He claimed further that the fly proved to have miraculous powers (he didn’t say WHAT powers, however) and that he was considering putting this up for sale on eBay. Asked me what I thought he should ask for it.
What do you think? Is this a hoax? Or could it really be true? As yet I’m undecided–but if any of my readers have found similar images, there will be a further investigation. Stay tuned.
…in which Jack demonstrates that Guglers can work at night. We shot this video on a cool-ish night in October. In my humble opinion, it’s got everything a Gartside video ought to have…exuberance followed by equipment failure followed by a brief (but heartfelt) obscenity. Enjoy. 😉