The late Bob Popovics, legendary saltwater fly tier, will be honored at the Fly Fishing Show when it comes to Edison, New Jersey on Jan. 24 – 26. The American Museum of Fly Fishing will honor Popovics with the 2025 Izaak Walton Award posthumously on Saturday, Jan. 25. The event is scheduled to start at 5 p.m., and will also feature a tribute film and a few guest speakers.
Popovics was a renowned striped bass angler and fly tier, and lived in New Jersey. He was injured in a hit-and-run in late 2024, and ultimately died from injuries sustained during that event. He was 75 years old.
As Lynn Burkhead wrote in Fly Fisherman Magazine upon Popovics’ passing, “To call Popovics a legend would be an understatement, especially if your world of fly fishing involves the taste of salt in the air, a freshening breeze rolling inland off the surf, and the sight of baitfish panicking and fleeing by the millions as wave after wave of hungry striped bass slash into the melee and seagulls wheel about and cry noisily overhead as they search for leftovers.
“That was the sandy turf that Popovics prowled better than just about anyone did for decades, a talent generated by many hours of roaming a remote stretch of Jersey shoreline not too many miles south of New York City’s big sprawl.”
Popovics pioneered the use of epoxy and silicone in baitfish imitations, a practice that has no doubt bled over into every other fly fishing niche since. He wrote books and contributed frequently to Fly Fisherman Magazine, and invented the Surf Candy, Bob’s Banger, Cotton Candy, and many more famous saltwater flies.
You can read more about Popovics here.
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