Eaustin,

Why should we generalize the matter in black or white terms?

First, the usefulness of (un)matching the hatch may depend on the water types you are fishing in.

If trout are feeding in a freestone cafe, they will have to make a quick decision either to take or to pass a food item. Here, any acceptable imitation would work as there are not abundant enough food items. Sometimes, oversized fly patterns work better because they give trout better visibility in a foamy freestone stream.

On the other hand, if trout are eating in a spring creek cafe, then, they will have the ample time to inspect food items before they take them. Matching the hatch would be better here as spring creek trout are more likely to be locked in certain key triggering characteristics of food items. However, even in this situation, breaking the hatch with a royal wulff, a beetle, or an ant still works as it may get more attention from trout compared to hundreds of tiny insects carpeting the surface.

Second, would you like to define matching the hatch broadly or narrowly?

While attractor or fancy flies do not look like any naturals at all, I believe that thought precesses behind their creation are still linked - very broadly - to observing actual natural creatures and their visible characteristics. While overstretching the concept of matching the hatch this way to include attractor flies may be debatable, I think trout take them just because those flies belong to the range of acceptable food items and are recognized as such. Even fancy flies, I think, have triggering characteristics in a similar way. At the end of the day, fly fishing is doing a stimulus-response thing to trout at its core.

Lastly, there are simultaneously different ways to catching the same finicky trout, so someone else's success with a big fancy fly does not invalidate your own way of trouting. Does Rene Harrop have to care about Harrison Steeves terrorizing Idaho spring creek trout with his foam beetle or Scott Sanchez fishing a huge double bunny? I don't think so.

I am sorry for a boat load of words to say what you already have known.



[This message has been edited by adso4 (edited 05 November 2005).]