stash for the cache

I love finding deals. I lucked into a whole lot of them last week, starting with a few trips to the World's Foremost Outfitter. At two different store locations, I benefited from a little inventory downsizing on their Ultra Wire. $2.29 a spool retail, marked down to $0.88 a spool. I cleaned out every last clearance spool they had on the shelves. Can't figure out why they discounted some of the colors, as they had the exact same stuff sitting on the shelf. The only difference I could find was that on some of the current spools, they were marked chartreuse, whereas the discount spools were marked as fluorescent chartreuse. They were the exact same color; figured that UTC changed the name only just to clear out retail inventory and move more product. Their loss is my gain.


I hit the craft store circuit while I was in the metro the other week for the F3T show in Minneapolis. I scored on more clearance items, including some craft trim. I love it when the only colors that are marked down are colors that I want. Pretty tough to beat a quarter for a 10 yard card of yarn. I also scored some cheap hackle and foam for making bass, pike, and muskie poppers. They were in a clearance store for a buck, and the day I was there, everything was marked down another %20. Total score.




While browsing the shelves, I found a few interesting items at regular retail price. Copper bead chain. I normally only come across the nickel, aluminium, or steel varieties. For glamor, there are even coated and plastic chain, but this is the first time I've come across copper in a store. I have a few sources online that sell copper, black, and other anodized colors, but shipping is always expensive, and it's hard to discern through a monitor whether or not an online store is legit or a fly by night cloud operation just scamming to get your money. You know what I'm talking about; some of those online store fronts are so ghetto and generic looking.


I also picked up some elastic for use as scud backing. Much like the material used for those clear bra straps, this stuff is a little thick; I'll have to see how it ties. Heavy duty fo' sho.

I grabbed some glitter glue sticks for making heads on some nymph/streamer patterns. Epoxy is used on heads for many fly patterns, and I've seen hot glue used for egg patterns. I'm gonna experiment by using the glue to encase some bead chain. If it's a bust, at least the kids have some new crafts to play with.




These teeny ass pompons should make for some nice egg patterns. Everyone always fishes eggs for salmonids; I'm gonna turn the table on this one. I'm gonna try my hand at fishing eggs to suckers. I've heard of people catching suckers on egg patterns intended for trout. Where this gets fun is that I'll be sticking one to the man. Those little yellow numbers are just about the same size and color as a walleye egg. All those one dimensional meatheads can eat their hearts out as I fish the roe of their beloved State Fish to other lowly bottom feeders.

Nooch.