It’s not really a new or innovative pattern at all. The streamer part is basically a Lefty’s Deceiver and the head is borrowed from a Dahlberg Diver. For extra buoyancy I replaced the deer hair with foam, and thought an SF Blend synthetic collar would make a nice transition from the foam head tapering down to the natural materials of bucktail and saddle hackles. Hence the name: a spongy character popular beneath the water.
kob seem to find this irresistible. Its buoyancy allows one to fish it really slowly, or even statically, and the long saddle hackles will always pulsate, adding to its appeal. Despite the rise of the DMA and the merits of Silicone Mullets, the SpongeBob still remains my number one fly for kob, and it has accounted for many fish since I started using it. It has taken kob in shallow surf and in different parts of estuaries.
The fly has everything you want from a kob fly. It has lots of up-down movement if fished correctly and the
Its appeal seems to attract other unlikely customers as well. I was fishing rolling surf at high tide for kob,
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when one of the biggest blacktail I’ve ever caught decided to chomp down on my 4/0 olive SpongeBob. Similarly, last year I was fishing this pattern on a floating line among kob sucking down mullet on the surface, when a spotted grunter decided breakfast was served. SpongeBob has proven to be a fine travel companion too. Tourette Fishing head guide Mark Murray and itinerant fly fishing lifer John Travis tell me that if you fish this pattern on a floating line for Tanzanian tigerfish, you’ll see more teeth than an