I’ve been doing a little soul searching tonight as I’m getting ready for a fishing trip on Friday. I’m taking the flies from my fly patch that I used from the previous trip and deciding whether or not to return them to my fly boxes. Some are almost like new and, of course, go back to the box without much thought. Others are really beat up and even with a lot of grooming are going to look pretty ragged. My dilemma concerns these flies. Use them until they deteriorate further or chuck them? Being a fairly proficient tier, I’m often tempted to throw out beat up flies before they are fully used up. What do you guys do-----fish the flies as long as there are a few molecules of hackle and dubbing left or toss them as soon as there’s a hackle out of place? Does tying your own flies or not tying your own flies influence this choice. Just wondering? 8T
I keep fishing a fly as long as it floats, for a dry, and as long as it closely resembles the original pattern as I tied it. I’ve had any number of flies that I have fished on multiple outings before I sent them to salvage. By that, I mean I don’t throw the fly away as long as the hook is good - a quick slice or two with a sharp razor blade and I’m ready to replace the fly with the same hook. The exception would be hooks that have been heavily weighted. I usually do just throw those out when the fly is no longer fishable.
The fact that I tie my own flies influences both the length of time I’ll fish a given fly and how I approach salvaging hooks. Scottish in all things fly tying.
I have no real connection to flies and fish them to the point of nothing left. This can and does have draw backs. I fished one particular steelhead fly for seveal years and caught a few fish on it. It was pretty beat up but still fished. The last fish I hooked on it was a decent 10 or 12 pound steelhead. After getting the fish up close both my fishing partner and I were trying to see if it was a hatchery fish and if so I would keep it. Before we could make that determination the fish got loose and swam thru my fishing partner’s legs, back into the river. I always check my flies and tippet after hooking a fish and when I looked at this fly I seen that the fish didn’t get off the hook but the hook had broken. I had never seen this before with this particular brand of hooks and kept the fly for further investigation as to why it broke. Later that day I took the fly out and removed what was left of the materials on it and found that the hook had not broke as much as it had rusted through. After getting wet numerous times and put back in the box without complete drying it rusted. I now dry my used flies before returning to the box.
I have fished flies that had hackle stems trailing along the side, wings that were badly beat up, missing tails and the darn things still caught fish. I don’t really care what other fisherman think, those fish seem to like them a bit beat up. Yes, I do tie my own, and mostly fish the flies I don’t think are good enough to give to friends.
If I am fishing nymphs, then that means the fly has been dragging across the bottom (if you are fishing it right), hanging up on rocks, sticks, fish, whatever. Why reuse the fly another day and possibly loose a good fish because the point was a little dull or maybe stressed and will break.
Dry flying, well fewer rocks unless they are behind me on the shore and I don’t realize I flicked the fly off one of them, or hanging up on a limb, fish, whatever.
I start every fishing day with a fresh leader and tippet, for that same reason. Why risk it? When you consider how much we pay for our fishing experiences, even if it is just the price of fuel to drive a couple hundred miles, why not give your fishing experience the best chance for a great day. New leader, new tippet, new flies.
The hackle completely came loose on this parachute. It was the 1st para dry fly I ever tied (and a very poorly tied one, I must say). I could not believe it but I caught several other tiny rainbows on this fly even after the hackle came loose and it would not float upright. I know these little fish were hungry and this would not work in a technical or pressured stream, but sure was fun catching these little guys on that tore up fly!
Here is a close up of how bad it really was:
The success that we have with old, beat-up, absolutely mangled flies makes you wonder why we agonize so over the tying process. Proportion, stray hackle, missing components and loose ends don’t seem to make much difference.
John,
I absolutely hate scraping flies down to the bare hook. Even when I’m careful, the finish always seems to be damaged and the new flies are highly prone to rust. 8T
I just started tying parachutes, and the second or third time I was out, about 4 of my flies de-hackled after just 1 or 2 fish! So I just put them in a pocket and took em home. Once they were dried out, I just started the thread on them, re-hackled, and secured with a drop of head cement (I normally just trust the whip finish). Have repaired about 10 flies like that, and haven’t had a single one of the repair jobs come undone before I could donate it to a tree.
When I tie them, I also find it makes a neater and sturdier fly when I tie in and tie off the hackle as well as do my whip finish all around the post rather than the hook shank. YMMV of course, but it really helped me. Whip finishing in the vertical was really unnatural to me, but after a little practice on a vertical hook shank (and literally tilting my head 90 degrees a few times!), I got the hang of it and now tie all my parachutes like this.
Since I’m continually learning and improving my tying techniques I usually dump the flies I use when they begin to get beat up (unless I’m having an exceptional day with them). It gives me an excuse to “cull” the questionable ties from my first attempts and replace them with “better” versions.
If I don’t toss them I give them to my fishing buddy - sucks to be him!
The reason most flies are beaten up is because fish have been taken with them. That tells me I did something right with it and will keep using it until it no longer works. Some of my flies that brush beat up are discarded early because they have no mojo and prefer green leaves rather than water. I tie most of my flies during the winter and I do remember the time taken to tie them…so I fish them as long as I can.
Seasoned Fisherman’s Lament: "Somebody tied me with a half hitch instead of a good whip.
When I was younger I treated all my flies like gold. They all got returned to the poke regardless of the condition.
Later on, I developed some confidence in a few flies and would fish the be-jeezes out of 'em. The ones I fished either got lost, or out of respect for a hard days work, got hooked to the crown of my hat where they retired till the hat wore out.
Today I can’t fish as hard and have to consider returning them to the fly box because they have low mileage and are still in show condition. They can be fished again.
Now what of the worn fisherman: the hat or the box? (with due ceremony of course).
I fish’em until they stop producing, I judge that in the way of if I’m fishing a fly and its getting no attention, and then I change it out with a fly of its exact kind and it starts getting attention right away, thats how I decide its time for it to go…
Can’t recall ever having a hook break because of rust, or throwing out more than a handful because they were rusted. Must be something in the water out your way - and I don’t mean the fishies.
I’ve got one old wet fly of unnamable pattern (bright yellow floss, wings, and hackle, with red tail and silver ribbing) that I’ve had since I was 12 (I’m now 54). This thing, which I bought at a Roses discount department store in the 1967 (along with a Martin 60-something, Perrine shirt-pocket box with coil spring fly rows, and Air Cell level 4wt line), has caught innumerable fish, been retrieved from trees countless times, never rusted, is still holding together (more or less), and has rarely been sharpened. I carry it and still fish it once in a while. I’ve begun to think my fishing karma is tied up in that ridiculous old fly–it will go when I’ve cast my last line. As to the original question, I fish flies until the fish stop taking them, the more chewed up the better, then re-use the hooks.
-CC
—sagefisher—
