Fly of the Week - Week 2 Feb. 13 - Feb. 19

[DUB]

Sorry I have to start the Fly of the Week thread a day early, but I will not have access to the internet tomorrow.

I was torn between making a Baetis Emerger or a Stone Nymph as the FOTW. The Baetis will start making their presence known in a very short time, but the Little Winter Stones are making their presence known now. Yesterday, I had a great day of fishing on the Roaring Fork River here in my neck of Colorado. My most productive pattern was a basic little Stone Nymph, so I decided on a FOTW

FOTW:
Your favorite Stone Nymph imitation. Anything from Yellow Sallies to the Giant Salmonfly nymphs (Pteronarcys californica).



Heres the base pattern for my Little Winter Stone (Black Prince without wings). Every pattern after this had something added to it.

Hook - Mustad 3906 size 12
Thread- 8/0 Uni Black
Tail- Black Goose Biots
Rib- Gold wire (x fine)
Body- Course Black dubbing that mysteriously appears in your inventory.
Collar- Dark Furnace Hen Hackle (I am out of Black)





I dredged these flys under an indicator (BOBBER), with a Baetis Nymph attatched as a dropper. Most fish took the Stone.

One other comment. I rarely tie a fly with a bead. Yesterday, as I have for years, I slipped a bead on the tippet above the Stone Nymphs, and let it fall back on to the pattern.

Lets see your "Go To Patterns."

[pittendrigh]

These I already have tied:

Goldmine:
body: snipped from a bass tube
ribbing: brown flat waxed nylon
legs: light tan spanflex, sewn into the body with a wide-eyed rubberleg needle^A
hook: #12-14 DaiRiki 135
glue: ca glue

I like to fish these with weight on the leader and not on the fly. But you can add weight as a bead to the front of the hook, or as flattened lead on the back side of the shank.

^A....you have to make your own rubberleg needles. Start with a thin-shank big eye sewing needle. Heat the eye up to cherry red with a cigarette lighter. Use needle nose to jam the red-hot eye down onto the point of another needle. Now you can sew all sorts of stuff into foam or soft plastic--bundles of Crystal Flash, rubberlegs, synthetic hair, etc. To sew in hair bundles you need to start by loading the rubberleg needle (with the hair) using a bobbin threader.



Marshmallow Nymph (Fly Fisherman 1992)
http://montana-riverboats.com/index....llow-Nymph.htm

body: brown (rit) dyed open cell polyurethane mattress foam
legs: dark brown spanflex
thorax: flattened lead with yellow dubbing, sandwiched between a slit in the foam

It's tied on a horizontal beading needle. This is (perhaps) the best fly I've ever made. At least if you measure success by numbers of big fish caught over the past 20+ years (I first published this in 1992, in Fly Fisherman, but I'd been making it a good 3 or 4 years prior to that). The important thing about Marshmallows is not appearance so much as texture. Fish bite these flies and don't let go. I couldn't even begin to remember the number of times I drifted one of these without detecting a strike. But then, when I lifted the rod in preparation for another cast, I found a throbbing fish on the end of the line...a fish that had taken moments before, undetected, who was still chewing.

This is obviously not a spring creek or tailwater fly. But for big early-season freestone western rivers like the Gallatin, Madison, Yellowstone and Big Hole in Montana, the Marshmallow Nymph is a fish catching machine for me. The best time of all is generally the last few days before the Salmon Fly hatch, when the big nymphs gather at clumps of willow roots along the river's edges. Interestingly too--something I only discovered just a few years ago--these flies are deadly even during high brown run off water. At least in the week before and during the Salmon Fly hatch. When the river is brown and ragingly high you do have to fish them no more than 6" off the bank, which can be tricky when the water is that high. You'll often see brown trout backs flush with the surface, huddled between willow shoots. When you drift a nymph two -- three inches out past the willows the fish have to swim out from between the branches to intercept the nymph. When you have to reach out between the branches with your rod, sometimes a 10 or 12' flick of the rod tip is all you can manage. Just this past June I hooked several large brown trout within 4 feet of my rod tip, with Marshmallow Nymphs, in raging brown water.

[JohnScott]

http://www.flyanglersonline.com/fotw...tw20100524.php

[pittendrigh]

John.....that rubberleg stonefly (aka the brown girdle bug) is a hell of a fly. Simple. Fast. Effective. That's hard to beat.
All of which reminded me of an under-appreciated article on how to fish girdle bugs, written by Tom Morgan: using the Morgan Twitch. Tom's technique isn't limited to girdle bugs. He (and you) can fish all manner of wet flies that way (Weasels, Thunder Creek Minnows,etc). But I do know Tom fished girdle bugs a lot.

The twitching technique is interesting. And well worth working on. Years ago I grew so accustomed to the double haul I now do it instinctively, no matter what. Even on short casts. I'm starting to get that way with the Morgan Twitch too.
http://www.troutrods.com/morgantwitch.html

[JohnScott]

Sandy -

That is a very interesting read. I haven't done much streamer fishing lately, and when I do I don't use the rubber legs / girdle bug. My presentation of the rubbers legs is upstream or up and across dead drifted under an indicator, either one fly or a tandem of either two rubber legs or a rubber legs and smaller trailing nymph.

It might be interesting if you started a thread on the Morgan Twitch on the FAOL Forum. Could, probably would, lead to an interesting exchange of ideas / information on streamer fishing.

John

[Byron haugh]

This Red Fox Squirrel is my favorite nymph pattern. Did not do justice to it this morning, but will post a previous tie later that is a bit better.
Like I said before, Dub, "what a lucky guy"

[rainbowchaser]

In the winter I tie fairly complicated stoneflies for the fun of it. If I need more in the spring steelhead run it will be a soft hackle type. I ran into some black turkey biots in the box today and tied this instead of the one I had in mind.

[pittendrigh]

Two useful models.....the photos below do obscure the relative size and lengths. The brown pteronarcys average 1-7/8" long at maturity.
The goldens seldom get more than an inch long. Interesting to note too the goldens are nimble and active carnivores while the pteronarcys nymphs are slow-crawling vegetarian detritus eaters. I just now noticed the golden below has lost a left front leg. I'm going to have to get some better photos as soon as it's warm enough. I might add a measuring stick to the bottom of each photo. Then I could use photoshop to make each 1" section of the measure take up the same left-to-right photo distance. Then I could crop out the measuring stick.

[ScottP]

Sanchez Biot Bug:




Don't fish nymphs much during yellow sally season, but this one has caught some fish.

• Hook: Mustad 9671 #16
• Thread: Uni Thread 8/0 Brown
• Rib: Copper Ultra-Wire, Small
• Abdomen: Yellow Uni-stretch
• Sides/Tails: Brown Goose Biots
• Thorax: Hare's Ear Plus
• Hackle: India Hen Back
• Head: Brass Bead 3/32"

Ostrich-body Prince



Threw this one up here because it hooked the biggest freshwater fish I have ever had on the line, a chinook from the Salmon River (NY) back in '96; got about 3 nice jumps from it (saw that it was fair-hooked) and then it came off (btw, that's a #14 hook).

Regards,
Scott

[lastchance]

http://www.flyanglersonline.com/fotw...tw20100524.php

Now that's service. Thanks, John, we can always count on you.
Bruce