Fly Fishing

Big Flies - Big Fish

Fly fishing, perhaps more than any other angling sport,
is based on traditions and truism that have not, often
enough, been tested. Typical is the trend towards ever
smaller fishing flies, because everyone “knows” that trout
learn to recognize patterns tied in larger sizes. But
in-the-field-testing reveals this to be just another
angling myth.

It’s a truism among conventional anglers. Big baits take big fish. For some reason this axiom never filtered down to fly fishermen.

By and large, the watchword among fly anglers is “small.” When I first got involved in fly fishing, 35 years ago, a #16 fly was typically a small fly. Nowadays, #20s are fairly common. And many anglers fish tiny balls of fluff tied on #24 and even #28 hooks. Even out west things have changed, and a #14 is thought of as large, even on their big, brawling waters.

Part of this is that we like to match the hatch when fly fishing. Or match what we think the hatch would be if one was coming off. Typical is when Troy Harrington and I hit Indian Creek in the winter. Rarely is there any surface activity. But there are always midge nymphs around. So we match that non-hatch, using #22 midge imitations.

Often enough we’re successful with that approach. But just as often the action is slow, while the guy fly fishing around the bend is burning them up on large streamers.

You’d think I’d know by now. There have been more than enough lessons.

My first lesson in this regard took place in the Mt. Washington Valley several years back. Friend Wife and I spent a few days up there unexpectedly, and decided to fish for the local brook trout on some of the streams.

“Try big nymphs,” the guy in the fly shop told us. “How big are we talking?” I asked. “Eights and tens?”

“No,” he responded. “I mean big. #4s. And dark is better.”

I bought a few large nymphs from him (information should be paid for, don’t you think). And we had some still from our last trip to Montana. I didn’t quite buy the idea, but it wouldn’t hurt anything to try.

Using an across and downstream presentation we were quickly into fish. And not just any fish. Brookies running to fourteen inches jumped all over those flies. And a 14-inch brook trout is a nice fish anywhere in the east.

Sometimes we’re just slow learners, though. I kept the big-nymph idea in the back of my mind, using it as a last-chance short of thing, when nothing else worked. Very often it did work, when nothing else would.

Bill Tapply, son of H.G. Tapply of “Taps Tips” fame, tells about a similar instance on Henry’s Fork. Maybe some background is in order. Henry’s Fork of the Snake River has, with some justification, been called the world’s largest spring creek. Although physically big, in all other respects it’s just like a spring creek; crystal clear, fertile, and filled with very selective trout. Henry’s Fork is where the big boys play. And they do it, mostly, by fly fishing very fine and very far off, with very small, hatch-matching flies.

But, under their guide’s instruction, Bill and his partner started throwing large deer-hair beetles. Not as large as my nymphs, by any means. But when the fish are sipping size 28 dry flies, a #14 beetle is gigantean. And again, big flies, under conditions that didn’t seem appropriate, produced. They were into fish all day.

Fish aren’t really smart. How could anything with a brain the size of a pea actually be smart? But they do behave instinctively. And one of those instincts says that you have to recoup more energy from a food source than you spent chasing it. So a big mouthful makes more sense than a tiny taste.

It’s true that fish, particularly trout, sometimes do become selective; keying in on one particular food source. This most often happens during a major hatch of aquatic insects. But even then, selectivity doesn’t happen nearly as often as we’ve convinced ourselves it does. I have experimented fly fishing with throwing big, off-colored nymphs during the height of a surface-feeding frenzy, and caught just as many (and probably larger) fish as I would have with a dry fly that matched the hatch.

Like I say, I’m thick headed. But eventually the lessons do sink in.

Even closer to home there are lessons to be learned. Parch Corn Creek is one of my favorite trout steams here in Kentucky. I like it for several reasons. First off, it’s one of our few streams with a naturally reproducing brook trout population. It’s also fairly inaccessible. From the nearest parking lot there’s a 600 foot change in elevation, on the aptly named Rough Trail, to reach the stream. And there’s that 600 feet climb back out when you finished. Not too many make that climb.

A typical headwaters stream, you can cross Parched Corn in two or three steps anywhere along its length. And most of it never gets much more than calf deep.

Not the place for big flies, you would think. And you would be wrong. Day in and day out, particularly during the winter months, a fairly large cricket imitation, on a #8 hook, does the job.

There are no live crickets around that time of year. Nothing, in fact, even remotely resembling them. But the brookies don’t see “cricket.” They see food; quite a bit of food. Food well worth the energy it will take to capture. And so they hit those huge flies.

Next time you’re on stream during a non-hatch situation take the time to watch rising trout. They’ll hit anything that has the illusion of life---the occasional aquatic fly, terrestrials, and even twigs and bits of flotsam that the current causes to twitch just so.

If they’re not hitting your tiny imitations, try switching to a really big one. You’ve got nothing to lose, and may gain something in the bargain.