Gary Bulla’s kayak fishing journey started with a whippy stick. He wanted to wave his fly rod at saltwater fish, especially those he couldn’t reach from the beach. “I knew if I had a kayak I could get out there more often, get into places boats couldn’t take me,” Bulla recalls. It was the mid-‘80s, long before the birth of the contemporary kayak fishing movement. “My first kayak was an old Prism. It’s not made anymore,” Bulla says. Bulla fished Santa Barbara harbor a lot in those days, catching calicos in the kelp beds. He loved the freedom of the self-powered. After a while, his hobby grew into a vocation and he hung up his guide shingle. Since 1992 he’s run Gary Bulla’s Fly Fishing Adventures. He ushers small groups to Baja’s
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KAYAK FLY-FISHING PIONEER
BULLA GARY
remote and pristine special places such as San Jose and Cerralvo Islands. “It’s the best environment in Baja. We go in spring and fall when there are lots of fish around,” Bulla says. Bulla’s brand of kayak fishing keeps things simple. There are no rod holders to snag a line, his
eyes and hand-tied flies are his fishfinders, and there’s no need for a noisy bait tank. A rod, small dry bag, box of flies and a PFD complete his ensemble. “Every trip is different. One year we had yellowfin exploding, another year yellowtail, big rooster,
snook and golden trevally. It’s pretty unique to catch snook in the Sea of Cortez,” Bulla adds. He has a special affection for black skipjack, a humble fish eschewed by many sport anglers. “We love them. They tow us around; in a kayak they’re just a blast,” Bulla says, his words tumbling out in remembered excitement. —Paul Lebowitz
Within a month of deciding he was going to fish from a kayak, Jeff Little found himself temporarily pinned under a submerged log after tumbling from his kayak in the Upper Potomac River. He surfaced downstream of the strainer without his eyeglasses, camera and tackle box and thought, “Man, I really need to take a class!” Since then, the Maryland-based angler
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SMALLMOUTH MASTER
and owner of Blue Ridge Kayak Fishing has learned everything he could about paddling rivers, earning ACA (American Canoe Association) certification to teach basic river kayaking. In 2000, he started guiding for smallmouth on several mid-Atlantic rivers including the Shenandoah, Rappahannock and Susquehanna. Writing about those experiences for websites grew into his first book, In Pursuit of Trophy Smallmouth Bass: My Life in a Kayak. Little explains, “Each time I had a breakthrough on the water for an important concept to teach my students, I felt compelled to write about it. This process helped strengthen my class and ultimately my book. I didn’t know it at the time, but those articles were my first few chapters.” He also credits the Potomac River Smallmouth Club with really accelerating his learning curve
and helping him build a solid foundation for his pursuit of the bronzeback: “Going on every club trip I could for the first few years afforded me opportunities to learn from many different anglers on a variety of rivers from southeast Virginia to the Pennsylvania/New York border.” Lately, Little has been matching wits with trophy fish in still-water reservoirs, acknowledging
that these fish are “a different species” requiring entirely new tactics—which sounds like it could be the preface to his next book. —Chad Hoover
JASON STOCK
A GOOD GUIDE NEVER SLEEPS It’s noon and Jason Stock has been working schools of southbound tarpon since 5 a.m. Sweat soaks everything not already wet from the periodic splashes of the leaping silver king and it’s time to get out of the sun. But Stock has other ideas. “I think I’m going to hit that afternoon outgoing tide at Honeymoon Island and try to get on those snook,” he says, loading his Tarpon 140 back on his white Ford Ranger. Paddling the beach for a morning tarpon bite,
followed by an afternoon paddle in the backcountry for snook or redfish is all in a day’s work—and play— for the sandy-haired 22-year-old from Pinellas County, Florida. And there’s always night fishing. “When the bite is on, I’m there,” says Stock, who
grew up with a paddle in one hand and a fishing rod in the other. His uncle owns the local paddling shop, Canoe Country Outfitters, and his brother Jeremy is the shop’s manager. Last year, Stock walked away from slinging kayaks and canoes for his uncle to commit all of his time to his guiding business. As a pro staffer for Wilderness Systems, Accent
Paddles and a handful of tackle companies, if Stock isn’t running a charter or winning a tournament, he’s on the water pushing his gear (and the fish) to new limits. In the last year, Stock has fished over 250 days and caught tarpon over 100 pounds, as well as big sharks, cobia and even a few deep-water species like grouper and snapper. His favorite pursuit, however, is plying the skinny water for the “big three”—snook, redfish and trout. “I’m always ready to go,” says the perpetually- raccoon-eyed Stock. “You have to stay on the fish if you want to be a good guide.” —Jon West
www.kayakanglermag.com… 33
PHOTO: JON WEST
PHOTO: GARY BULLA
PHOTO: JEFF LITTLE
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