Some of my first attempts to catch brook trout on a fly rod were in a spring fed lake chock full of scuds in Upper Michigan. I caught fish on a size 16 wooly worm and an extremely sparse small squirrel tail streamer. My scud imataions were too stiff and lifeless and a complete failure even by brook trout standards, even though most of the fish I caught had scuds in their mouths when i landed them. It was not very satisfying to a newbee fly angler to catch fish on other flies when the fish seemed to be always eating scuds.

The trout tailwaters in Oklahoma and Arkansas are dominated by midge, scuds, sowbugs and aquatic worms. One of the streams adds caddis and mayflies to the mix and most have populations of minnows or sculpin

These foods are not very glorious in most flyfishers eyes but if thats what is is in the water you had better learn how to fish them

I appreciate the article on the lowly scud & even lower aquatic worm most of us need to broaden our horizons