anyone ever cast for bass with the fly rod here?  I have  a friend new to the area who is a big fly rod enthusiast who wants to go out after bass.  We have a good population of smallies on the river, no idea what type of lure/fly to suggest he throw?  I do well on tubes, crankbaits and occasionally buzz baits.  Any suggestions?

Well the choice of effective flies for bass are nearly limitless! If I were you I would go with a good selection of popper and darter flies that are about say 2 to 3 inches long. Now i know that the thought of a fly that big is abit hard to handle for a pureist fly fisherman but with the new materials used to make flies nowadays these flies can be cast long distances and they hold up very well. Where once the cork bodied fly was the standard for bass bugs today with materials like flashabou and others you can have a fly with bulk but less weight and wind resistance. Most of these flies can be bought at a good tackle shop that caters to both fly fishermen and bass anglers. An 8 to 10 weight rod is ussually sufficent.

As to a presentation try whatever type is productive with your ussual casting bass fishing. If a popper works tie on a popper and so on and so forth. But with the new sinking flies available it would like working a suspending jerk bait. Alot of flies are weedless and this can provide wonderful sport when you try to land bass in weeds and lillies. Like I said you are only limited by the amount of time and your imagination. Personally I love a diving fly made of deer hair and flashabou. Works like a Rapala. Oh and if your freind does any salt water fly fishing tell him to try some of those flies that might resemble a shad or bull minnow. I guess if he is a trout angler then just kind of use bigger flies. Good Luck.

Well heck, wouldn't you know it? We have articles on that subject too:

http://www.bassresource.com/fishing/leaping_largemouth.html

http://www.bassresource.com/fishing/flyfishing.html

Enjoy!

I can always catch 'em on wooley boogers.

I love tossing Dahlburg Divers and deer hair bugs in the morning and then switching to streamers like the woolly bugger or the shinabou shiner during the midday hours.