You are a begining fly fisher and overwhelmed with Dry flies, stillborns, emergers, nymphs, pupa and larva. You glaze over at Rhyacophila, Dicosmoecus, Rhithogena and those are some of the more frequent ones. So my recommendation borne from some experience and some damn good fly fishers I know is go wet. Saves you many hassels of figuring out hatches and dredging the bottom. Tie or buy a simple assortment of wet flies….or ‘flymphs’/soft hackles and cast them precisely, swing them, retrieve them, jerk them back in fits and starts and you will catch fish. While you do that and have reasonable outtings you can still study and observe. But you will relieve yourself of all that thinking. Do you want the thinking? The puzzle? Then keep it simple for awhile: caddis, mayflies, golden stones, dragonflies, damselflies, baitfish or midges. Recognize the difference between a caddis and a mayfly. Recognize when to put on the Elk Hair Caddis or the Adams or small Midge. If you’re fishing subsurface with a nymph then stick to Hare’s Ears and Pheasant Tails. Keep it simple. The Latin can come later if it must. In the meantime, when you walk the shoreline before dinner or after poke that wet fly here and there. Read the water’s different verses and savor each perfect and not so perfect casts. KISS.
http://wcflies.com/blog/2008/10/soft-hackle-materials/
http://wcflies.com/blog/2008/10/pheasant-for-soft-hackles/
http://wcflies.com/blog/2008/10/soft-hackle-demonstration-starling-and-herl/
The number of times I’ve lost flies and had to resort to the “Uglies” of my collection; the rejects I couldn’t throw away (my grandson’s special parakeet feather flies – provided by his pet, the “Hair of the Dog” flies from, you guessed it- fido) and finally found their way to water, the catch rate not spectacular but the stories…
That’s what it’s all about for me now. And Parachutes. Forget the pattern, I just need to see them nowadays. Getting old is complicated.
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It is isn’t it. I was standing in The Caddis Flt Shop this morning watch a guy my age or so debating with himself whether to go neoprenes or Simms/Patagonia goretex. I finally told him one of the best purchases I have made in fly fishing is Goretex Simm’s Waders. No question…actually one of the top two (the other a clear Intermediate Line). The process of getting in and out of tight waders lets you know how old and feeble you are on a cold Winter’s day. I told the guy go for the lighter waders…..
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