Fishing during the early part of this year’s trout season may be particularly challenging, both because angling in some counties is now prohibited (see “The Good Fight” column) and because California’s shelter-in-place order makes travel to our waters problematic.
But we can at least prepare to go fishing, and what better ways to do so than either to tie up a mess of flies or place an order with a California fly shop?
To create ideas for you, we asked a number of fly fishers involved with the sport in our state this question: If you were to focus on tying one fly pattern during this stay-at-home period, which fly would it be? We also requested that tying instructions should be available on the Web or through other media. Here are the recommendations.
Rick Anderson, Fly Fishing Specialties
Bird of Prey, sizes 6 through 18. It’s five-plus different flies just by changing out the dubbing. It’s a great all-around pattern for trout and steelhead everywhere.
Lance Gray, Lance Gray and Company
The Adams Parachute, an excellent all-around pattern. It imitates all mayflies, has a great profile, floats high, and can be tied from size 8 to 20.
Ken Hanley, Pacific Extremes
I would recommend Cal Bird’s Bird’s Nest Nymph as a go-to pattern. It’s easy to craft and highly versatile. Most of all, it catches fish! Here’s a link to Andy Burk tying the pattern: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFFm2lEvj9Y.
Ryan Johnston, Cast Hope and RJ’s Fishing Trips
The beadhead 20 Incher Stonefly Nymph is a pattern that has been around a long time, but has been forgotten and is hard to find in most local fly shops. This is a great stonefly pattern for rainbow trout on the lower Sacramento, upper Sacramento, Pit River, and McCloud River, and fall steelhead love it on the Trinity.
Jason Kash, Wild Waters Fly Fishing
I would have to say my stonefly pattern, heavily weighted to serve as a point fly. It works year-round and on most every river I’ve tried it on. It’s tied on a Mustad R73-9671 size 4 hook. I also tie it down to a size 8. It has a 3/16-inch tungsten nymph eye bead, and around the shank are 23 wraps of 0.35-inch lead wire. Brown goose biots form the tails and antennae, brown D-Rib in “nymph” size forms the body, the thorax is natural rabbit, Thin Skin forms the shellback, and I use pumpkin-colored legs.
Robert Ketley, Cal Fly Fisher columnist
These days, I’m fishing local beaches for food. Hud’s Bushwhacker tied with a lot of Flashabou is a great fly for extracting rockfish and halibut from near-shore kelp beds.
Dennis P. Lee, fishery scientist
The Monofilament Shad Fly is an updated version of an old standby shad fly pattern tied with a silver tinsel underbody and colored monofilament body wrap. Use size 8 or 10 size short-shank saltwater hooks with a touch of superglue to create a durable and effective pattern. There’s a tying recipe at www.dennisplee. com blog.
Michael Malekos, The Casting A Rise Foundation
The Pheasant Tail is a poplar nymph pattern used to mimic a large variety of aquatic insect larvae that trout feed upon. The design I fish has a curved shank and a pearl Mylar flashback. Because I have found this pattern productive even when trout do not appear to be feeding, I fish it frequently throughout the season, especially when I’m exploring new water.
Geoff Malloway, Central Coast Fly Fishing
Fly: Rattlin’ Red Squirrel, for surfperch. I get bored tying the usual perch patterns because they’re boring. The Rattlin’ Red Squirrel is a twist on the Red Squirrel Clouser, incorporating a rattle, Mylar tubing, and Crazy Legs.
Mike Mercer, The Fly Shop
My fly would be the Missing Link dry. Tied in a variety of sizes and colors, it will match almost any stage of emergence of almost any mayfly or caddis or small adult stonefly. I use this dry for the vast majority of all my dry-fly fishing, regardless of whether the situation calls for emergers, duns/adults, spinners, spent adults, or egg layers.
Seth Norman, Master of Meander
A dragonfly nymph. Dragonflies emerge early in the season, or earlyish, from long torpedo-shaped nymphs in lakes, which migrate to weedy, woody banks; and in streams, from short, fat mouthfuls that crawl ashore through riffles. They come in colors common to pheasant feathers — olive, green, amber brown and reddish.
Chip O’Brien, fly-fishing educator
I’d tie the Thread Frenchie and add a black nail polish wing case just for fun. I’m using this down time to try mastering new materials while filling up fly boxes.
Frank Pisciotta, Thy Rod and Staff
The classic San Juan Worm is a simple, quick tie and a consistently productive pattern — in my case, a specifically colored “Flesh Juan.” When Seth Norman was visiting and we were brainstorming my chapter on the Truckee River in his seminal book, Fly Fisher’s Guide to Northern California, upon seining the river, he asked if I used aquatic annelids. I hadn’t at the time; since, always.
Trent Robert Pridemore, Cal Fly Fisher columnist
I’m a top-water bass nut. In a major overhaul of my fly tying room, I uncovered an unread book, Steven B. Schweitzer’s Designing Poppers, Sliders and Divers. It is the best how-to fly-tying book I’ve ever read. He takes this fly-tying specialty to a stratospheric level and has motivated me to hit the vise. Sliders are my favorite.
Peter Pumphrey, Eastern Sierra fly-fishing enthusiast
I would say a Cutter’s Perfect Ant. It is steady producer on all sorts of waters, especially in the backcountry, so a lot of them would come in handy when we can get back out on the streams. It is easy to tie, so I can whip them up now and then when I need a few minutes to myself.
Al Quattrocchi, saltwater fly-fishing enthusiast
As we enter late spring, the jacarandas begin to bloom, with their magnificent purple flowers, marking for me the beginning of our shallow-water corbina sight fishery in Southern California. I tie my Holy Moley sand crabs like a madman in pink, gray, and in various hook sizes and weights in anticipation of long, quiet walks with good friends on the beach.
John Rickard, Wild Waters Fly Fishing
My personal favorite would be the sparse Yellow Humpy. Getting it just right is a lesson in moderation.
Gary Sanpei, The Fly Shop
I have a go-to pattern that is probably a unique choice among fly fishers. It’s Sylvester Nemes’s Mother’s Day Caddis. Early on, I came across Nemes’s books on soft-hackle flies and became enamored of these classic patterns. This fly became my ace-in-thehole searching pattern.
Brian Slusser, Four Seasons Fly Fishing
I am trying to stock up on the patterns I use the most during the year. It couldn’t be just one — I would go nuts. But since those are the rules, I would go with a Bird’s Nest in size 14 and 16 and in tan and olive.
Al Smatsky, Al’s Excellent Adventures
Since shad fishing is my first love and just around the corner, it would have to be the Wet Pinky — my number one go-to fly.
Chris Smith, Bay Area Fly Fishers
Because I have more Clousers in various sizes and colors for bass than I will ever need, I’m spending time tying the purple soft-hackle flies that I write about in this issue of California Fly Fisher.
Jack Trout, Jack Trout Fly Fishing
I have been tying salmon flies with multicolored elk and deer hair on the back, superbushy for the stonefly hatch on the Klamath River come June. I always tie them one size larger, because the stones on the Klamath are larger than the Rogue Foam Stone dries, and trout prefer them in size mondo.
Jim Zech, Fly Fishing Specialties
It’s easy to forget in this calamitous time of doorstop-weight beaded jig nymphs wrapped in tungsten ribbing that fly fishing is first and foremost a casting sport. My shelter-almost-in-placesome-of-the-time fly is a piece of casting yarn. If you feel you can’t or shouldn’t go fishing, go out to your lawn or pool and practice your casting.
