• From: Lafayette
  • Registered: 2010-03-24
  • Posts: 234

Topic: Dont Buy Academy flies

So this weekend were gonna go fishin at Big Alabama and suposedle the crickets are killin. Being a fly fisherman i wont use livebait. So i needed a cricket Patern to use and fast( within a few days). So i went to Academy knowing they had a small selection of flys to choose from. I saw extremely lifelike cricket patern so i decided to buy it. I didnt really check it well ,but i bought 6 flies 2 cricket 2 grasshoppers and 2 crawfish babies . On the Cricket and Grasshoppers i had to cut off the heads 
of the flie because the eye of the hook was covered in plastic and on the crawfish there was only 1 hook for the two of em...

So to test it out i went fishin with em in my backyard which is stocked with bream bass catfish and crappie and fishing is to easy. I couldnt entice a bite from any of the 3 paterns .  Im no Lefty Or Wulf but im good enough to c atch fish on a windles day in a 20 ft rance. I am extremely disapointed that spent 10 $ on 6 Flies that dont even Catch fish in a Pond Overstocked with fish.

Sorry for the rant ,but i just wanted to warn yall.

  • Registered: 2008-12-11
  • Posts: 500

Re: Dont Buy Academy flies

I feel for you, cher, since I've been there/done that. However, it should be a lesson well learned - roll your own!!!!!!!
Bon chance.
Pete

  • From: Baton Rouge/Lafayette
  • Registered: 2010-02-24
  • Posts: 16

Re: Dont Buy Academy flies

To add to this, I used to buy academy poppers all the time, and they worked amazingly, that is until the hackle on the back would come off after countless fish, mostly due to bream.  I really need to learn to retie them but need supplies first, as I have about 10 bodies with hooks and no filling on the back. (not foam, balsa wood with lacquer)  Anyways, they stopped selling the good little #8 and #10 poppers since I picked up my flyrod again, and are only selling crappy foam poppers that disintegrate within a good day's worth of fishing.  And they are something like 7 bucks for two!  Guess I'll go to Bass Pro and get some hackle and learn to tie, haha.

By the way, does anyone remember the old brand?  I want to say it might have been H&H.  I know it was a local brand, which makes me think H&H and damn good flies IMO.

  • From: Lafayette
  • Registered: 2010-03-24
  • Posts: 234

Re: Dont Buy Academy flies

you could always give those bodies to me.... (just jokin)

  • Registered: 2008-12-07
  • Posts: 856

Re: Dont Buy Academy flies

Yes, it was H&H.  They still sell their "Bayou Bugs" thru their website at www.hhlure.com.  Not cheap... $3.65 each!

My favorite poppers for bream - other than the Stippled Popper - is the Accardo Miss Prissy and Spook. You can get those in sizes 8 and 10, and various color combinations, from www.breambugs.com or in-store at Bowie Outfitters in Baton Rouge and Security Sporting Goods in Alexandria. Walmart no longer carries Accardo.

  • From: Redstick
  • Registered: 2008-12-08
  • Posts: 84

Re: Dont Buy Academy flies

They used to have a deceiver fly that worked really well for some fish. I haven't seen that fly there for a long time. That's it on the top rod, that pattern caught all of the fish in this picture:
http://members.cox.net/lafishing/pics/slabs.jpg

noahvale's Website

  • Registered: 2010-05-03
  • Posts: 40

Re: Dont Buy Academy flies

I have been "rolling my own" since the early 1980's so the poppers I used to buy before that are no longer made at least by the original company/owner, Pecks and Accardo. Don't know of the quality of the new ones.

I good friend, Capt Bubby Rodriguez swears by the Gaines poppers after the round Dinny, also found at Breambugs.com http://www.breambugs.com/index.php?_a=v … p;catId=17

As for the original post and Academy flies, the type flies you bought are ones I've never ever really had any luck with, IMHO, it doesn't really have anything to do with Academy. Those molded hard plastic lifeless flies never did work for me although I never really tried them more than once or twice.

I've always been a firm believer that a fly that moves and breaths and acts alive is more effective than one that merely looks alive but acts like a dead doornail. Of course, I could be wrong.

Kirk