Don?t throw away that mistake Fish it!

Don?t throw away that mistake Fish it!

If I screw up a fly, I rarely throw it away or salvage it out, i.e., save the hook, etc., instead I use it to fish those places that require the perfect cast or approach to avoid the brush or logs on the far bank that always seem to hold all the fish. Having a few flies in your fly box that you don?t mind losing sometimes emboldens you to try to cast to those almost impossible lies and possibly improving your casting. Additionally it just may catch fish.
One of my biggest mistakes was an effort to tie an Elk Hair Caddis for my first ever trip out west. I used the wrong hair, it flared badly on me, and an oversized hook and in general it had a poor Elk Hair Caddis silhouette.
This fly turned out to be my most productive fly on this trip. Why, because I had not tied any Hoppers, just the ninety patterns that all my friends recommended, another story another time, and Hoppers were the fly that were most productive.
In desperation to get in on the good ?Hopper? fishing I looked for the closest fly resembling a Hopper and it was ?My Mistake?. It worked and worked well.
The pattern is now a standard in my fly box, tied the same way as the original, the only difference is I gave it a more honorable name, instead of ?Mistake? I have named it the ?HopCad?.

aha! i havnt thrown away a crappy mistake fly for a while ! i use them on the dumb bluegills at my local lake

Every fly I tie is a "Mistake". :lol:

If I threw away all my crappie ties, I wouldnt have any flies!

Seriously, good advice.

Most of my flies I used to fish were rejects. Now there are few of them and I mostly fish new ideas or am testing flies that our tiers send to make sure they hold up and work like they should.
Joe Fox

I like it. Last spring I headed up to a local lake that my uncle was camped at, I had talked to him the day before and he was heading home for two days but was going to leave his trailer and all his gear there, and when I got there I was to take a couple flies from the "green" fly box in his trailer. So I did and headed out for the evening, It was the best 3 hours fishing I've had in a long time. upon his return 2 days later I showed him the flies I had taken from his box and went on and on about all the fish I had caught, when I finally ran out of breath he grabbed they GRAY fly box from his trailer and showed me the flies I was supposed to be using, I guess I grabbed a handful of his flies that he considered no good and were to be re-tied at a later date. Goes to show you one man's trash is another man's treasure :D