FEB Salmonfly

[JohnScott]

As in February and as in FEB Salmonfly. This one is in orange, because I had some orange foam laying around.

So I went here, in Northern Idaho, trekked through some snow in 38*F

And caught a whole bunch of west slope cutthroat trouts - like 20 plus in a few hours

Which says a whole lot about not fishing dry flies on freestone creeks in the middle of winter in the Northern Rockies and about the importance of color, or lack thereof, in putting together successful fly patterns.

Today was the third day this week that proved well worth the trip and hanging around in high 30’s temps for hours at a time to tally somewhere around 50-60 fishies for the week.

John

The fish are always right.

[Geoff_Roznak]

Cool fly…and not one that I’d expect trout or salmon to take.

[Rick_Z]

Nice looking fly and fish. A little green with envy. Water still frozen here.
Rick

[Pipes]

Looks like an easy tie. My kind if fly. Nice fish. Thank you for sharing.

[JohnScott]

Geoff -

All of my fishing is for trout. This fly was designed for trout and has taken trout everywhere it has been fished, primarily on freestone creeks and rivers with a few still water locations thrown in.

The basic furled extended body pattern, sized and with appropriate color variations for salmonflies, golden stones, hoppers, skwalas and October caddis has taken rainbows, browns, west slope and yellow stone cutthroat, and cuttbows, to include a few steelhead / west slope cutthroat hybrids, which are really, really rare, bull trout and my only mature grayling, along with a few mountain white fish, which don’t usually take dry flies.

And, since the summer of 2009 it has accounted for trout every month of the year, albeit only once in January and a few times in February, on a northern Idaho freestone which gets loads of snow and some years completely freezes over in early winter and is inaccessible and unfishable for months on end.

John

This fish are always right.

[JohnScott]

Rick -

This is a La Nina winter which normally means colder and wetter weather in the Pacific North West, to include northern Idaho and Montana. But this is not a normal La Nina winter. Snowfall and snow pack is way down and temps have been unusually high all “winter”.

Normally, I wouldn’t be able to fish this river in January and February because the road that approaches it is only plowed to clear the travel lanes and just a few places where one can get off the highway to safely park. And in those places plowed to provide some parking, the snow berm is typically so high, like 4-6 feet, and the snow is so deep if you get past the berm it is still quite difficult to get to the river. And if you get there, there will typically be one heck of an ice shelf, ice floes mostly covering any open water you find, or at worst, a completely frozen over river with feet of snow on top of the ice.

So getting to fish it three days last week was a real treat, and may prove to be unique to my fishing experience on this river, my home water since 2009.

John

The fish are always right.

[JohnScott]

JB -

If you go to the old FAOL website, and go to the FOTW on the menu, and go to year 2009, and go to August 10, you will find a step by step for the FEB Hopper. That is the best representation on how I tie the whole range of FEB flies, to include skwalas, salmonflies, golden stones, hoppers, and October caddis, varying only hook size and color combinations. One change that has proven very positive is switching out deer hair for the wing to elk rump patch, which is much coarser and tougher, and lighter in color.

John

The fish are always right/

[Rick_Z]

I have caught bluegill, crappie and bass on this type of fly.

[Betty_Hiner]

I remember this fly quite well from it’s earlier days. I continue to fish it with excellent results, all these years later. Thanks, John.

[hencape]

The FEB hopper and technique works very well.

[JohnScott]

Yellowstone cutthroat with FEB Hopper from a few years ago on a Northern Montana freestone.

One of only two 20” cutts I’ve caught - the other one was a West Slope cutthroat, also on the FEB Hopper.

John

The fish are always right.

[rainbowchaser]

I have mixed feelings about foam flies. I admit to tying and using them but I also know that the foam is basically non-biodegradable. In a perfect world I’d never lose any flies, but of course I do, so I’m leaving little bits of foam in or near the stream.

[JohnScott]

I’m a numbers guy. So I ran some numbers based on the average cfs ( cubic feet per second ) on the river I have been fishing for the months that I fish foam dry flies. The average, over the course of a season, is somewhere around 1000 cfs, some years a bit more, some years a bit less.

I measured the amount of foam that goes into the salmonfly subject of this thread. It is equal to 1/2 inch by 1/4 inch by 1/4 inch. ( There would be somewhat smaller dimensions for the skwala, golden stone, hopper and October caddis patterns. )

So, the volume of foam in one fly is .5 x .25 x .25, or .03125 cubic inches. ( It surprised me, to say the least, that with absolute precision and following the measurements indicated, that I could get over 55,000 flies out of a one cubic foot block of foam ! )

Anyway, a cubic foot of water is 1728 cubic inches, so 1000 cfs equals 1,728,000 cubic inches of water flowing by me every second.

One fly with a cubic volume of .03125 cubic inches divided into 1,728,000 cubic inches of water equals one fly for 55,296,000 units of streamflow.

Now, if I fish that one .03125 volume of foam for one minute, I can multiply 55,296,000 units of stream flow by 60, which means my little old fly will have occupied 3,317,760,000 cubic units of streamflow.

So, by the numbers, I have zero concern about somehow polluting my river on that rare occasion when I lose one fly over many hours of fishing.

If you want to be concerned and feel guilty about fishing and maybe losing foam flies, maybe you should run the numbers for the waters you fish to see if your concern and guilt are reasonable.

John

The fish are always right.

[JohnScott]

Mature grayling with FEB Hopper on a Southwest Montana spring creek.

John

The fish are always right.

[JohnScott]

My original FEB October caddis was built with a deer hair bullet head rather than foam. It was a really neat fly and did well as long as it lasted, which was not very long. The original showing wear on a backcountry Montana freestone - note the frayed bullet head -

Either I never found a deer hair that worked for me to last more than a handful of hook ups or my fly tying skills were so poor that I just couldn’t do what was necessary to build a longer lasting fly with the material I had. So I went to the foam version. The deer hair version is in the old FAOL FOTW archives, for anybody fancying tying that one.

John

The fish are always right.

[JohnScott]

The original FEB skwala was also a bullet head version, but even using a different ( and dark ) deer hair, it had the same problem as the caddis - a short lived frayed head. This one doesn’t show the fraying, but they all started coming apart relatively quickly.

Again, I really liked this version but not liking to tie flies, I decided to go with the long lasting foam version. The original bullet head version is also in the old FAOL FOTW archives for anyone interested in giving that one a go.

John

The fish are always right.