Standing ankle deep in the riffles below my favorite run on the Tulpehocken, I was half observing the water, and half relishing the warm air and the beginning of another season. Having been afforded a few hours on a thankfully dry spring day, I was trying hard to keep my pace slow and not get too anxious over getting started.

I have always enjoyed the Loons for their company, especially early in the mornings when only they and I are out on the lake. They are a protected bird and I hope they will always be there to greet me when I travel to the high country lakes that I love.

Two weeks ago I showed some images taken on the Yellowstone River just south of Livingston, Montana. Since I posted that piece the run-off has started, but slowly. The Mother's Day caddis hatch start the week after Mother's Day but the river became discolored shortly after the hatch really got going so there was only a very short period of time before the hatch was unfishable.

Of all the folks I've had the pleasure of knowing over the years, fly fishers just strike me as being for the most part so much more optimistic than 'normal' society. That is a good thing because it means most conversations are so much more uplifting and fun than the doom and gloom stuff we so often see on TV or in our newspapers.

Today I got to go out to a pond. Several of the places that I would like to go to still have too much water in the low places. I would rather fish than wait to get pulled out. Of all the folks I've had the pleasure of knowing over the years, fly fishers just strike me as being for the most part so much more optimistic than 'normal' society. That is a good thing because it means most conversations are so much more uplifting and fun than the doom and gloom stuff we so often see on TV or in our newspapers.

Recently I have been reading and reviewing some material on fly fishing when it suddenly occurred to me that many aficionados of the sport do not realize that there are two distinct and separate philosophy's of fly fishing. While most fly fishers understand that some people attempt to match the hatch while others just pick out something that looks edible I don't believe that most anglers realize that a far deeper divide exists within fly fishing, and it is this divide that explains many of the discussions that develop when anglers start talking about fly fishing.

I was first showed this fly by a fisherman at Bennet Spring in Missouri. He was simply fishing circles around everyone else. I worked up the nerve to ask him what he was using and he had the kindness to show me. I wish I could remember his name so I could give him the credit for it, but it escapes me now. When he opened his fly box to give me a few I noticed he had them tied in several different sizes and colors; green, tan, and red.  It is a very easy and effective fly.

As is often said regarding fly patterns, very little is original nowadays. This pattern is very similar to most scud-type flies being tied today, with perhaps the major difference being the use of Krystal Flash for the ribbing, as well as custom blended dubbing to match the colors of the natural scuds in my home-water spring creek. One of the challenges when tying flies that are fished sub-surface is that of getting the color of the dry dubbing blend correct so that when it gets wet the color change that occurs fits the true bug being imitated.