old flies

[Steven]

Does anyone else still fish them? My box for opening weekend will include some adams (upright and spent wing), Borcher's drake, dark cahill wet fly, picket pin, and royal coachman wet as well as some soft hackle wets .

I carry some Borcher's Specials. Is that the some as the Drake?

I don't use them much, but it's a midwest fly so I've tied a few and have them around.

[rainbowchaser]

Steven, they are the same thing. It was first tied by Ernie Borcher who guided on the Au Sable at the start of the twentieth century. I've read that the earliest version used condor quill rather than the pheasant or turkey tail now used.

[Steven]

Steven, they are the same thing. It was first tied by Ernie Borcher who guided on the Au Sable at the start of the twentieth century. I've read that the earliest version used condor quill rather than the pheasant or turkey tail now used.

Hell, I'm all out of condor.

I first saw it mentioned in The Longest Silence and tied some up after reading an article by Dennis Potter in the late and lamented Midwest Fly Fishing mag. It could certainly substitute for any of a number of dark mayflies.

[Panman]

I have used the picket pin and the Alexandra, among others, for more years than I can remember. The picket pin is an easy tie and crappie like it as do trout.

Tim

[TyroneFly]

I use the old flies. Mainly the Adam, Bear's Paw, Griffith Gnat, Bird's Nest, and Woolly Bugger.

[bobbyg]

I still use the ole standby attractor patterns I've used all these many years:


Adams
Parachute Adams
Royal Wulff
Gray Wulff
Blonde Wulff
Humpys
Stimulators
Elk Hair Caddis
Bivisibles

Gold ribbed hares ear
Zugbug
Pheasant tails
Prince

I also carry several emerger and more specific dry fly patterns for the selective fish of the tailwaters I fish.
They all serve me well.

Like most, I'm always tempted by a new hot fly....well, sometimes.

[Gandolf]

Hi all,

I too tend to like older patterns, although am beginning to tie a few relatively new (well if 20 years old is relabively new) patterns. The older patterns I use are several different Wulffs, elk hair caddis, stimulators, pheasant tails, gold ribbed hare's ears, a few partridge and orange (green, yellow, etc.), and a small number of classic wet flies such as the McGinty Bee and others.

Strangely, these flies still seem to catch fish. I am sure that the fish I catch are much younger than the age of the fly patterns I use. Thus, even young fish can still be caught on these old fly patterns. (I am very fond of the old patterns.)

Regards,

Gandolf

[Darryl]

I still use many of the older flies too. The Adams (with upright, hackle-tip wings) is one of my favorites. The Pheasant Tail is my "go-to" nymph, although I do have to admit a preference for the "newer" flashback version. And I am an absolute soft-hackle addict. I love the partridge & orange, peacock & starling, purple & snipe and my all time favorite soft hackle, the Tupp's Indispensable, although unlike the original pattern which consists of urine stained dubbing from a goat's testicles, I prefer to tie mine with some much more easily available (and less offensive) pink superfine dubbing.

[clarkman23]

The Renegade is one of my goto patterns for sipping trout. I'll fishing it dry, wet, swung, dead drifted...it just plain works, so I fish it.

[gadabout]

I would say 90% of the flies I use are what you would consider "old flies". The flies that I would read about when I was a kid when and dreamt about fly fishing some day are still a definitive part of the sport for me. I consider most everything else to be yuppie flies. I use them because traditions are important to me, also because they still @#$%*ing work!