I have been off work for a while lately with a torn shoulder, but managing to have some blissful days high on painkiller and muscle relaxant pills and beside the fire tying flies. (If only life could stay like this, but I guess I am bound to get better sometime… )
Anyway, my stable of flies is nearly complete, except for damned emergers. I have a heap of Klinks and similar, but am particularly fond of Australian Possum Emergers. These are just tied with some possum tail and green wire with a wing loop of tail fur again. My problem is that I have been taught to always test flies in a test tank and look at them as the fish sees them. While I am no entomologist I am acutely aware of how an emerging dun struggles in the surface film to free itself from the shuck, stick its unfolding wings up in the air to dry our in the sun enough for it to fly off. Hence the tail is below the surface film and the rest is not, it is above the surface film.
Here’s the problem - every stinking fly I put in the test tank (actually a fancy name for a whisky tumbler) SINKS! I know that floating flies do not sink!
I spent today trying to resolve this issue. I want the fly to sink its cute little bottom below the surface meniscus like a struggling nymph, have a “shuck” above the surface, and hopefully with a wing type arrangement of a few stray hairs or a bit of poly yarn sticking up like am unfolding wing, to enable me to see it clearly.
If I tie the fly with a “quick descent” aluminium dub abdomen and apply floatant to the head/wing area, it sinks after about 30 seconds.
If I tie some heavy wire to the abdo to get it to sink “bum down” it does so all the way top the bottom.
If I don’t apply anything the whole fly just floats on its side for a while like a dead shrimp, then, you guessed it, it sinks.
If I tie in a piece of cork with the possum tail wing folded over it, it floats, but all of it just BELOW the surface. The weight of the hook and fur seems to pull the cork down unless you use such a large piece of cork it is ridiculous and looks like it should have a bottle and a message attached.
I have tried the same with foam and am finding that that too will absorb water and sink in a short period of time, although it does start off well. Again though, if it does float, it will not do so with its head out of the water.
6 Consequently I wondered if the foam was not actually “closed cell” and tried coating with varnish etc to waterproof it, but it doesn’t make any difference. I tries a few different types of foam and paper wrap stuff.
I have not tried polystyrene balls yet (as in bean bags) as they are so “out of fashion” I would be lucky to find one even on a rubbish tip.
I have been through my tying supplies, kitchen cupboards and workshop to try to see if there is some sort of material I have missed, that will keep the “head” up above the meniscus and let the tail sink below but am now about stumped.
If the “bum” end of your fly (hook bend) sinks why not finish up with a two turn wrap of dry fly hackle just behind the eye? Just put floatant on the two hackle wraps. The bum would still sink but the front would float…perfect!
Depending on the fly size, you’ll need to find some appropriately sized hackle.
Or, if the fly is large enough, maybe some CDC behind the eye?
My only suggestion would be to go to a lighter hook, apply very thin dubbing and stay with the possum wrapped foam wing.
I don’t know what size hook you are using but if it is really small then the grease type floatants can cause it to sink and it would be best to apply a silica powder type floatant but only in the area of the wing. Up here I use Frogs Fanny, the applicator brush allows you to treat a smaller portion of the fly rather than the whole fly being shaken in a container.
Otherwise, switch to using whiskey in your tumbler rather than water and empty after each try. In a short while it won’t matter.:rolleyes:
Some “sage” advice, thanks. My wife was tempted to drink the glass of water with a dozen drowned flies in it as it rested on the kitchen window sill but managed to resist.
I did manage to get some success by whittling down a few pieces of polystyrene from a fruit box into small football shapes about 1/4 inch long, threading them on the hook, gluing, then dubbing over them. Even so, the fly still floats too low in the water for my liking.
Maybe a couple of hackle turns might help… As for CDC, I found that once it gets dunked it sinks too like everything else. I even bought the “oiler puffs” to try but they do the same too. Floatants I have tried, and frogs fanny too.
I’m thinking now that fishing emergers is often very challenging - fish seem very selective, much more so than with dries or wets. I wonder if it all relates to where they are sitting in the surface film?
Gringo
in Fly Tyer mag. there was an article on flies for picky trout. that aside, there was one fly that i think could be modified for you.
Step 1: pick your hook - a lightweight dry fly hook is critical in the size you choose
Step 2: lightly dub the back 2/3 of the fly
Step 3: this is where the standard changes - tie on your hackle first
Step 4: attach your wing - this could just be a strip of your fur instead of a loop or it could be foam trimmed to the shape of wings
this fly balances on the surface on the tip of the wing and on the bottom hackles. with the butt sticking under the surface.
on another note, don’t use wire if you want it to float. instead use a loop of your tying thread to make the ribbing.
the way you described the emerger, it sounds like it SHOULD be sinking and might look like a just starting to swim to the surface emerger.
i don’t know. i have not tyed the fly but it came from a cred. source
I was thinking about what Jerome had to say earlier, that is:
If the “bum” end of your fly (hook bend) sinks why not finish up with a two turn wrap of dry fly hackle just behind the eye? Just put floatant on the two hackle wraps. The bum would still sink but the front would float…perfect!
It has puzzled me all day, then I had to rush home and try this out. Why does the bleeding obvious have to be so difficult to see? Thank you from the bottom of my heart Jerome and Jordan, you have solved the problem and assisted in the creation of one mighty emerger which will doubtless be the undoing of trout down under.
I dropped the wire rib because it seemed to add too much weight instead of just making it bum heavy, and added three turns of furnace hackle sort of behind the wing like a dumbed down Humpy.
Man this fly rocks - it sits PERFECT in the surface film, just like the real thing. Hot hot hot I am so chuffed now, thanks guys. Can’t wait to fish it. Look out you trouties! :mrgreen:
Happy to if people would like to see it. Funny though the more I modify it the more it starts to look like a Klink. It is kinda owned by the folk in the R & D dept at FAOL though.
On the down side, I’d hate to think I was responsible for the extinction of trout in North America. Not yet anyway, I’m still working on New Zealand.
I read this thread just before retiring for the night and it was the first thing I thought of this morning - because I am puzzled by the lack of success your are having. I have great success fishing emergers and seldom use true dry flies anymore (did the fish ever think our dry flies were duns or since they often have the bodies and tails in the film were they always perceived as emergers anyway?). The more emerger
patterns I see the more I think mayfly and caddis emergers look the same to the fish.
Most of the time I use a Usual – which can be pulled under and pops up to the surface again - but have also had success with a Vulnerable Caddis. - I really prefer rabbit foot to most other materials for wings, polypro works less well than rabbit foot for me (for the same amount of material).
I find the emergers tied with foam wing cases lack movement and don’t float well - although it is good for wing posts on parachutes. The CDC and Elk (or rabbit) looks like a good emerger, but I haven’t had success myself. CDC would look good for the legs/hackle on a Vulnerable Caddis or a Quigley Cripple
The trick I think is to apply floatant to the wing material and put saliva on the butt. The result is a perfect float on the first cast.
Woops - a bit large, sorry guys, don’t know how to reduce that.
Anyway the main key to this fly is (to quote Neil Grose) “it just exudes mayflyness” and my modest modifications to it are not so it looks nice but floats exactly like an emerging dun, first cast, and for a while when dunked. That is, bum below the surface at 45 degrees.
Tail is a small bunch of crinkly possum hairs from the base of the tail; abdo is Tiewell Super Possum (dark brown;) thorax is a tiny polystyrene bead with the same dubbing wound and glued over the top; wingcase is another generous clump of darker possum fur stretched over the top with the ends facing forward and then a brown or furnace hackle tied in “humpy” style. Thread was 8/0 camel.
a paranymph maybe the ticket. The Deer hair post/wing case, plus the hackle floats the top half of the bug while soft tail fibers and wire drop the bum below the waters surface. The deer post is at about 45 degrees from vertical so the body, when is resting on the hackle ,will be at an angle below the surface.
Ron, yes, perfectly; had to drop the copper rib though. Now it is awsome, the footprint on the water is fabulous, just like real wing material. The tail mimics a shred of discarded husk and the “hump” and hackle with the wing are great as emerging wingbuds. It floats forever at 45 degrees angle with the back of the hump submerged and the rest of it “struggling” in the surface tension.
Greg H, sorry to have overlooked your contribution but I appreciated your input. I had a look at your links, all but a couple I could not access (the keep tying ones.) I am familiar with most of those flies and yes, my end result is I think much like the Quigley Cripple you mentioned. My problem with most of those is not the way they look but the way they actually float - try some in a test tank and you will see what I mean I am sure.
Harry - that looks like a nice fly too, I’d love to give it a float.
For some reason I have always had trouble catching trout that are taking emergers, and these should be the easiest shouldn’t they? A nondescript fly that doesn’t have to be an exact replication of anything really as the colours are as drab as my bank balance; the tail, shuck and wings can be almost anything as the real thing will always present differently on the water; and trout love to grab them while they are stuck there drying. Should be easy.
I tried all the CDC duns and deer hairs, shaving brushes and so on, but I miss as many fish as I get. Why? The only reason I can possibly think of is the way they float, and many of the emergers I have been fishing float wrong - just plain ol’ wrong! Get down in the water and have a real close look and behold - they float too low, too high, on the side, wrong angle, whatever.
I can’t fish right now because it is winter here, but the dozen or so flies that have been bobbing around in my kitchen test tank for the last day or two are still doing the perfect emerger thing - maybe one will even hatch soon!
—sagefisher—
