l bet many of you guys have taken advantage of the low water we have seen for the White this past few days. l have enjoyed fishing the high water with both my clients and my days of pleasure fishing, but l also welcomed the low water. One can easily see why the fish have done so well during the high water generation. The shallows are literally crawling with scuds and small crayfish, not to mention the abundance of sculpins and caddis larva. Sad to say, long spells of low water and increasing water temps will cause the loss of much of this food source.
Nevertheless, Sunday saw us on the water for a day of pleasure fishing. My first love is to fish by the traditional ways that l first learned in the 50's when a fly rod became an extension of my life. By traditional, l mean wet fly fishing with a team of flies, which is the traditional way that fly fishing has been practiced in the UK for over 200 years. Now we have different equipment to use, many different fly patterns and a greater over-all knowledge of the trout we pursue.
My definition of traditional wet fly fishing is the use of 3 or 4 flies spaced 25 to 30 inches apart, the top fly 4 to 6 feet from the fly line. Couple that with a 10 or a 11 foot 5 wt. rod and 4 to 5 pound mono straight through, and we are set to fish the river in the traditional mode. But l cannot do so within the trophy zones because of the one fly limit, which very much restricts how one is able to work the flies during the techniques used to present them.
Before you think otherwise, it would be wrong to assume that by using 3 or 4 flies you would greatly increase the odds of catching fish, as this is not so. The very nature of the flies used under the given prevailing conditions, including depth of water, overhead light conditions, substrate gravel or moss beds and many other factors, all combine to make the choice of flies difficult.
There is at the end of the day nothing to beat experience and numbers of water fished, as they all differ in some way. That's strange when you think about it as the main food base for trout comprises 5 major groups of bugs; although in some systems there will have a greater abundance than others of a particular species. Trout in our river have a major food base made up of crustaceans, while other rivers may see a greater abundance of stonefly, caddis and mayfly.
This knowledge gives me reasoning as to what flies l would choose to fish. Are they, for example, generic type wet flies or those that have some semblance related to species orientation?
In the case of our rivers, both are considered, as we are dealing with both stock fish and those that have become acclimatized to some extent. And l have a particular desire to catch Brown trout more so than Bows. Historically many of the wet fly patterns l use were innovated, as at that time Bows had not been introduced into the UK. Even today you will not find many rivers that are stocked with Bows, only man made lakes and reservoirs.
Now there are some of the traditional wet fly patterns that will catch fish in any water in the world: the Invicta, its silver cousin, the Whickhams, Zulu, Alexandra, winged Hares ear to name a few. But there are also flies of a more modern era that will do the same. Many of these fly patterns are the result of new fly tying material and a different way of thought from the innovator of those fly patterns. The great interest in competitive fly fishing in the UK has also been one of the main reasons why within the past 30 years many more fly patterns have been added to the list.
In fact there are more patterns of wet flies, which would include winged, hackled and palmered versions, along with the soft and spider hackled patterns.
Many of the flies l use are those that were invented in the 1800s, and they are as good today as they were back then. There is not a trout that swims that has any idea of when a fly was created. They see the fly as an object and make a choice, either to take it or not. When fishing the wet fly, much of that also relates to how you present and fish that fly, its position on the cast, and how you work the fly by both use of rod and non-rod hand, in fact there is way more to this than many realize. Wet fly fishing is not as simple as casting downstream and stripping the flies back.
It is an art that requires high levels of skill at times.
If there is one method of fishing l would choose to use to catch a high percentage of Brown trout, it would be with the wet fly.There are many reasons why l would choose this approach, the main one being that l know how to induce a Brown trout to take flies fished by this means, which you cannot do by any other technique. There may be a few exceptions such as a shad kill, but that is unique to the White river and not general for the majority of rivers Brown trout eat minnows, that can well be imitated with wet fly patterns.
I may determine that either a dry line or an intermediate, and at times a full sinking line is the best method to fish the flies. By and large it is a method l choose to use with a dry or an intermediate line as that allows for me to work the flies and induce a fish to take them.
It is as deadly a technique when fish are surface feeding as it is to pull a trout from his lie when he sees the flies worked over his head. Brown trout often favor to lay in very shallow water, tucked up close to bank-side vegetation with expectations of terrestrial bugs falling foul of the water surface, often at times some very large fish. For the most part l use flies in sizes of 12 to 14.
One of my favorites is my MD, muddler daddy. If there is any one fly l have great faith in to nail a trophy Brown, it would be this fly. The story goes like this. Many years ago while fishing Bewl reservoir with a regular fishing friend, on a day when the wind blew and the lake rolled with white caps, surface fishing in a controlled manner was out of the question. I had only with me that day top water flies, some of which were crane flies; we call them daddy long legs in the UK. I also had with me that day a Gladding Aquasink fly line. For what reason l do not know, l changed lines and added to the leader one of those dry daddy flies and cast it out. As the line sank and the fly was pulled down below the wave trough l was rewarded with a solid thump as a big Bow nailed the fly. Soon after, 5 more followed to complete my daily limit of fish. All fish caught here had to be killed, as catch and release at that time was not practiced in the UK.
From that day on, the daddy fly has always intrigued me, and for good reason. I've caught 1000s of fish over the years with its many guises, some of which l choose to use for fishing the White and Norfork rivers.
When Dan Gapen developed the muddler minnow, he opened up a whole new way of thought for the fly tier. No doubt at all that a spun deer hair head can add great value to a fly, and for that very reason l also chose to add that to my daddy fly. At a later point in time l dispensed with the wings.
The muddler daddy (click here for recipe) was born. My original concept was for a fly to use when fishing lakes and still waters. Later is also became apparent that this fly was a killer when used on moving water systems, and it certainly became so when l started to use it here on the Arkansas and MO river systems.
