The Purple Flies...............

[Byron haugh]

Whatfly,
Understand that. However, it has become more widespread in dry fly tying (trout flies) in this decade, I believe. Am reminded of a recent post by Craig Mathews of Blue Ribbon Flies in West Yellowstone over some purple died feathers, as I recall.

I can tell you that back in the 70's I was fishing in a trout stream in Missouri. Another guy was catching trout on a jig. I asked him about it. He said "Use a marabou jig....any color is fine, as long as it's purple".

So, again, I'm talking more about purple bodied trout dry flies over the last 7-10 years. Seems to me that there has been a decided uptick. And, I'm wondering what the principal reason for their touted effectiveness is.

[Chuck441]

The snipe and purple is one of the basic flies if you're fishing soft hackle wets. Right up there with the partridge and orange, grouse and green, and starling and herl. Must be a reason for that, no?

Chuck

[Byron haugh]

Yes..........

[Bruce Norikane]

When you get down close and look at a trout stream, there's a lot of stuff floating down the river. Most of it is not trout food. I think trout learn to ignore stuff that's not food. They are looking for things that don't look like common debris.

I have no evidence for this, but my theory is that purple makes the fly stand out from all the rest of the flotsam. Sparkly stuff or orange hotspots have the same effect. Once the trout is focused on the purple fly, it may decide to eat it, if the fly looks like food.

[redietz]

Thanks Bruce. That makes sense.

Of course, the 800 pound gorilla in the room is why purple/near purple is attractive to them.....

If one were fishing a hatching period of, say, PMD's, would you dress a Dun in purple?? Or, is purple more effective as an attractor in non-hatch periods?

Why is attractive? Because they can see it better.

I might fish a purple dun during a PMD hatch just to see what would happen. I did quite well with a a bright pink dun during a sulfur hatch a few years back (because I'd grabbed my box of Hendricksons rather than my box of Catskill-style sulfurs by mistake before setting out.) This was an outrageously pink fly that I'd won in a raffle. I probably wouldn't have fished it even during a Hendrickson hatch, but I wanted to see what happened. (This was after a fairly frustrating hour or so of fish not taking either Compardun or parachute flies that were a more reasonable color.)

[redietz]

The snipe and purple is one of the basic flies if you're fishing soft hackle wets. Right up there with the partridge and orange, grouse and green, and starling and herl. Must be a reason for that, no?

Chuck

There's no doubt that the S&P is a great fly -- I use it a lot -- but when wet, I don't find the silk to be all that purple. It's just a dark fly. The older name for it is "Dark Snipe", which may be a better description. I suspect (but can't prove) that it uses purple thread for the same reason that Stewart's Black Spider is tying with brown thread -- black silk thread was (and still is) notoriously fragile. (It's got to do with the ding process.)

[planettrout]

This past Summer, on a certain Sierra high alpine lake, my son and I used this Purple Pattern, in #12, tied with UV2 Dyed Peacock Herl:



...and caught and released a bunch of these guys:



Back in 1987, I caught one of my largest Rainbows to date, on the East Walker River, with a Purple R.A.M. Caddis...


PT/TB

[whatfly]

Whatfly,
[snip] So, again, I'm talking more about purple bodied trout dry flies over the last 7-10 years. Seems to me that there has been a decided uptick. And, I'm wondering what the principal reason for their touted effectiveness is.

Has it? One or two new guide flies from MT in the last 10 years is a trend? Are the a number of others I'm unaware of? I'm assuming you are not merely asking about the UV craze, which has been dealt with elsewhere ad nauseam.

In some ways the question just boils down to, does a bit of flash help or not. While you may be fixating on purple because of the additive you are using, you are in fact adding purple FLASH, and it is the latter that is significant I suspect. Have you tried adding blue or green flash? Result? If you were actually adding purple natural dubbing, then this might be a different question.

As always, just depends on how much you believe in the order of importance of presentation, size, color. Question reminds me of the craze not too long ago surrounding the 'magical' qualities of blue nymphs.

[JohnScott]

Since I started fishing in January 2003, I've averaged about 125-130 days per year fly fishing for trout, almost exclusively freestone streams and rivers in the Intermountain West and the Northern Rockies.

Over the 14 year stretch through December 2016, total days fly fishing comes out to about 1800.

For each of those 1800 fly fishing days, I guesstimate that an average of 25 or so fish took the fly ( nymph, streamer, or dry ) I was offering them.

Not one time over the course of those 1,800 days did I fish a fly that incorporated any purple material.

The color purple will, for me, continue to be irrelevant.

John

[jcampbell]

Although I love Red, White and Blue, some shops are selling and guides using Purple Patriots as attractors. Not my cup of tea, but something is going on. John Scott, maybe you should try purple and see if it ups your catch rate You probably won't, but if you do, let us know the outcome.