Certain folks on this board are very skilled at getting a lively discussion going. So, Marco, I hope this one works as well as yours always do!

My buddy Ralph and I noticed this phenomenon last summer. We always drop by the local fly shop when we get near our destination, and always buy something -- usually some of the flies recommended on the chalkboard.

Sometimes they work great on the river. But often we can't get even a nibble, even when fishing them the recommended way. So, I always then tie on an old favorite -- adams, skeeter, renegade for dries, green scud, beadhead pheasant or copper john for nymphs, muddler or chartreuse wooly bugger for streamers.
BAM -- always a fish, every time.

This happened to us again on the Miricle Mile, Wyo last summer. Every fly shop website was raving about a san juan worm with a red scud dropper on the Mile, I fished them the recommended way, and got nothing. Tied on the wooly bugger, and POW....fish after fish.

I'm chalking it up to confidence level. If there's a fish in that seam behind the boulder, I know *exactly* how to present that wooly bugger to get his attention, since I've caught so many fish on that fly. Maybe I'm doing something just slightly wrong in my presentation with the new-fangled fly I've never tried before. But I chalk it up to confidence. I *know* this fly catches fish, and so it does.

How 'bout it folks? Any other opinions?
DANBOB