Marabou Spawn Sac
The nymph is no different than any other type fly - presentation
is still more important than pattern choice. The nymph, for optimum
effect, has to drift at the eye level of the trout. When fish are feeding
on items near the bottom, a drift a few inches over their heads makes
the best looking fly mediocre and a drift a foot over their heads makes
the best looking fly worthless.
It is easy to imagine insects, scuds, worms and eggs in the currents,
filling the water column top to bottom. In reality objects caught in the
flow concentrate in a narrow mixing zone. Entomologists estimate that
70 to 80 percent of free-drifting life forms move at any given moment
in an interface between the dead water of the rocks and the unobstructed
water of the open flow. This turbulent band, with its circling eddies,
tenaciously holds organisms until they reach an area where the flows are
slow enough for them to settle to the bottom.
The nymph fisherman, whether he realizes it or not, searches for the best
way to keep his fly in this mixing zone. He chooses a method of weighting,
wrapping lead on the fly, applying lead to the leader, or using a sinking line.
My weighting technique for the Marabou Spawn Sac is different than my
normal nymphing strategy. Why? Fish eggs drift differently than insects.
The eggs are dense, sinking rapidly - they have to, or else they would wash
downstream and not settle into the gravel for incubation.
My favorite approach with most of my other flies is to put the lead on
the leader (Outrigger Method) - wire is wrapped at the first blood knot,
18 inches up from the fly; at the second blood knot; 30 inches up from
the fly; and if necessary the third blood knot, 42 inches up from the fly.
This rig drags the leader down to the bottom in a riffle, the wire tapping
on the rocks, but it allows the unweighted or lightly weighted fly to ride
freely in the mixing zone.
My goal with the Marabou Spawn Sac is to make it, not the leader,
bounce the bottom. The fly is heavily weighted so that it drops through
the mixing zone - the countering effect with any weighted fly is the is
the unweighted leader, the monofilament pulled and tugged so
much by the upper, faster currents that it tends to lift the heavy pattern
back up into the interface. This nymphing technique mimics the natural
drift of the real fish eggs better than the Outrigger Method.
Materials
Hook: Size 8 (up-eye, Atlantic salmon, TMC 7989).
Weight: Lead wire.
Egg Sacs: Marabou fibers.
Body: Pink sparkle yarn.
Hackle: Scarlet rooster.
Note: You can change the color of the egg sac, (but not the body) pink, purple, white, red
chartreuse, and burnt orange are effective variations.
Originally published October 30, 2000 on Fly Anglers Online by Gary LaFontiane.