Biot Comparadun: #16 BWO

• Hook: #16 Dry Fly
• Thread: Olive UTC 70
• Tail: Dun Microfibbets
• Wing: Dun Deer Hair
• Body: Olive Turkey Biot
• Thorax: BWO Dubbing
• Head: Olive UTC Thread

Critical Thoughts: The wing is too long on some of the flies I tied, tails as well. The wing should sit more at a 45 degree angle to the rear and should maybe be a bit further towards the hook barb than in this example. Color is a decent match but the photos here do not do color any justice. I tied half with a lighter olive dubbing for the thorax and half darker. All in all I’ll venture to say they will bring a trout to surface and are a bit better option than what I currently have in my dry fly box, with that said more in a #18 and #20 are needed.

Slide Show

Fished another Sunday in Iowa, since Liz and I ended up purchasing a year license it only made sense we would use them as much as possible while the weather holds out. Arrival time: ~12:15pm, Departure Time: ~5:30pm. Airtemp was in the low fifties, the wind was calmer out of the WSW at ~10mph. The creek was a bit off on arrival but clean enough for me to spot trout hanging on redds. Trout were sipping something small on arrival, likely midge but with the recent Baetis seen Liz opted for a #18 BWO, second cast in and she was making it look easy. We hung around attempting to take a couple more on a dry fly before moving upstream but nothing was having the larger flies. I switched flies up a couple times, took a couple small Browns on a #18 Bead Head Baetis nymph I tied up for situations like this. The creek, full of weeds, full of spooky trout who bolt for cover when they see a larger or heavier nymph hit the surface are sometimes best presented something very small despite the difficulty detecting a strike. I lost three or four easily to late hooksets. I also fished the “safety” of the #16 Pink Squirrel for a while and took a handful of fish ranging from 10-13inches. Something about the fact that the trout just can’t help but hit that thing makes me want to fish it less, like it’s laced with some kind of trout chum they can smell from a mile away.

Upstream scoping the riffles I watched one trout rise, then another and another. Shortly after a #18 BWO flew past, I dropped the nymph instantly and swapped to the #18 BWO pattern again. I watched the riffle for another ten minutes, four different trout in four locations rose but they didn’t lite up the way I was hoping they would. There would be no major BWO hatch for us. Thinking I could pull a couple out I made close to two dozen casts with only one botched hookset on a 6inch Brown to show for it. We moved upstream and I looked at my flies and put on one of a couple dozen newly tied #8 Sprinkle Me Baby’s. Something about fishing this fly, I have so much confidence in it and my ability to fish it well that it just made sense. Trust Your Gut.

Working the later portion of the afternoon I was roll casting to deeper faster water, swapping a split shot for none and back again, working the weed lines and the dark spaces between them, the BNT were coming to hand quickly. I managed over a dozen in the first hour with a few misses between. They smack this fly so damn fast sometimes it’s hard to set the hook and make it stick. We got upstream to find a couple nasty deep looking pools, faster current feeding the far side. My gut… my gut was telling me to hit each with a down and across approach letting my fly sink then rise at a steady rate as the line tightened up. The second pool gave up the reason why I trust my gut, a nice 18inch Brown. He hit deep and I didn’t know what I was in for until he gave me a big flying leap from below, this was the Iowa Brown I’d been looking for these last few trips.

Upstream all of a hundred yards and I see one of the biggest, gnarliest beaver dam’s I’ve come across in my Driftless career. Standing close to five feet tall just pouring trout water from a weak portion in the center. We hiked upstream and spied dark deep trout water but few fish. I was concerned that their might not be much around but if there was something it might make the last fish look puny. I dropped a couple bombs in the creek but saw nary a flash, my gut was telling me to move on. A guy can spend all day casting into the darkness and get nowhere, I’m guilty of it from time to time but the day was growing short and with it the light so we moved on. Out of the beaver dam and into one of the sexiest pieces of trout water I’ve seen in Iowa. I was concerned that after the beaver dam it would be kaput, pitiful creek, I was dead wrong. I tossed a fly down under a boulder offering some excellent habitat for any trout and landed two smaller browns that proved there were fish above the beaver dam. This was motivation to keep going, Liz was doing her own thing, figuring her cast out and working a streamer, I was content to dissect the creek for the spots I knew would hold fish.

I got to a riffle with a bunch of overhanging branches, took one look and knew there had to be something tasty laying in wait. The first cast was too far up the riffle and got stuck on a rock, my fly came back covered in creek sludge. After a quick clean up I made a second attempt and planted my fly on the smallest of the overhanging branches, the sun was going down and I didn’t see it until it was too late. Something was on my side, my SMB popped off the branch instantly. My gut said one more… it was right again. By now I’m thinking, damn I should be telling Liz where to put her fly but I didn’t want to stand over her shoulder being overbearing. I landed the brown and sent him back to the creek with just enough daylight to work upstream another couple hundred feet. The sun was gone, the sky was lighting up with pink and orange colors. I saw one last spot that just screamed for a fly, first cast and a fat, I mean gutty fat holdover Rainbow came out. The picture doesn’t do the gut justice but damn I was taken back a bit. By this point the ground was looking black, I left the headlamp somewhere not in my gear and we were forced to hike over a mile back as the very last of the light left us.

Additional Notes:

• Watched a Bald Eagle fly overhead at less than a hundred yards.
• Observed a noticeable change in the creek vegetation above and below the beaver dam.
• Spent fifteen minutes chasing down an evening Caddisfly.
• Watched over a dozen deer silouetted by the sky chase through a herd of cattle down a bluff side.

Slide Show

Liz and I hit Iowa on Saturday and came across a spectacular emergence of fall Baetis. We parked the car at ~12noon and observed consistent rising almost immediately. The creek was running clear and maybe just a hair low, the air temp was in the low 50′s but a strong sustained wind of 20+mph was felt the entire time we were on the water. Despite the wind we opted to take advantage of the rising trout and put on dry flies knowing full well that casting a tiny dry in high winds can be a potential recipe for disaster. On a whim I stuck on a #12 Stimulator simply because it happened to be right at my fingertips, the second cast produced a ~13inch brown that sipped my fly. Convinced that as long as we could battle the wind, dry flies would be the best way to fish the afternoon. Several #18 BWO’s were seen drifting from the riffles many of which became trout lunch before they could take flight.

Liz needing to work on her backcast and dry fly presentation took the challenge of the wind in stride and opted to fish a #14 Adams at first. We chose that fly simply because it was a bit bigger and easier for her to see, it became painfully obvious after a dozen or more good presentations that the trout were not having the larger dry flies. We followed the dry fly creed and downsized the fly and went darker with a #18 BWO’s I tied in my fishing infancy. Most of the #18 BWO’s in my dry fly box looked pitiful and would not pass any sort of test, however, I did manage to find a couple that were worthy of placing in front of trout and it became clear after only a few presentations that the trout would accept these imitations.

Many of the rises we observed were in slower slackwater areas that posed a greater challenge with respect to dry fly presentation, we scanned the creek as we hiked upstream looking for a section of faster broken water with trout steadily rising to concentrate on. As we hiked I looked for specimens to document when I bent down near a small patch of water cress. When I knelt down became clear that we had arrived at the tail end of the hatch, looking at a one square foot section of watercress just downstream from a riffle I observed over fifty male and female Baetis duns sitting in the safety of the cress. The trout continued to rise and I sent Liz upstream to fish while I hung back to document as many Baetis mayflies as I could.

Moving upstream I saw exactly the spot I was looking for. After watching a faster broken run for a couple minutes I witnessed several rises in multiple spots, off to both sides of the seam, in the tail end of the run as well as splashy excited rises coming from the head of the run in the fastest water. I knew if she could get her fly up far enough without spooking the trout they would crush her imitation. I sat back and observed, she almost got hung up in a tree but working a side arm cast we avoided the first challenge. The second issue became the largest to overcome, the 20+mph wind. Despite her best efforts to produce a decent backcast the wind would blow hard and rather than allow a tight loop to form used to propel her line forward the wind caused the line to blow back at her taking all the energy out of line and rod. She kept getting her fly blown into her rod, tangled on the tip or at the fly line/leader connection. Frustration was mounting. I continued to assist her any way I could, often just untangling her line quickly so she could attempt another cast. After ~30minutes she hadn’t gotten a decent cast and thus presentation to the trout, she was stubborn and determined to sit there as long as the trout were rising. A few minutes later a colorful brown rose for her fly but a lack of line management failed to produce a good hookset and the trout was “quick-released”.

Her frustration continued and mine was building, I knew if we could just get one trout to hand she would relax and things would move along more smoothly. It took another ten minutes of trying and one more poor hookset before she nailed the first of a handful of nicer sized browns with the #18 BWO. After the first came to hand the second, third and fourth followed steady suit, all the while I sat back and sipped my coffee. We continued fishing to those rising trout until she had moved up the entire length of the run and either caught or put down every trout showing it’s face. Frustration turned into accomplishment, working a small dry fly in the strong wind was a good test of reslove. It should also be noted that even a 6inch fish would have been enjoyed but she managed to take two trout over 13inches with one pushing 14 and a half. I watched as it rose quickly thinking it was smaller than it actually was, not until it lept from the creek and came down with a deep smack did I have any idea it was as nice a fish as it was.

By this point the BWO’s had run their course, the trout ceased rising and we moved upstream. I stuck on a #8 Hairball and we proceeded to search close to a mile of new uncharted trout water. We never lingered long at any one spot but made a cast to almost every place that looked worthy of attention. I picked up a dozen browns and two rainbows within the first quarter mile of creek. We observed a dogger chase down my fly only to spook near the surface before it committed. We fished upstream until ~5:30pm then turned to hike out, I made a handful of casts as we did so but felt the day was a resounding success and as such I was content to enjoy another beautiful fall sunset rather than continue tempting trout.

Slide Show

I love tossing them. I love the rise. I’ve been caught in the “I want a fish and I’ll just stick to my streamers or nymphs” rut to make sure I get my fix in and as such I’ve been trying to force myself to fish dry flies a bit more when there isn’t a hatch occurring to guide me to them. Tossing a #14 CDC and Elk (Olive Body/Grey Wing) I crushed close to twenty tiny browns from a single run. I took my time and worked the run slowly and managed to keep the fish rising for my fly without disturbing them as I kept pulling their friends out on after the other. The low flows, humid weather, tall weeds, standing in the creek…all made things difficult but the rise for a dry fly made it worthwhile. P.S. 1pm in July is not the best time to fish, with that said I take it when I can get it even if it’s 90 degrees and humid.

Slide Show

I woke at 5am, assessed the estimated rainfall totals for the night before and made coffee. I wasn’t in a hurry, thought I might find chocolate milk and not in the fridge if you know what I mean. I drove by my initial location but the creek was up and blown, un-fishable. I made a decision at that moment to burn more time to the road but perhaps spend less time driving from creek to creek to maybe get lucky and find one fishable spot, instead I drove to the safe bet, to gin-clear water. By ~9am the air temp was above 60°F and would be pushing a predicted 80°F for a high later, first time this year I’ve wet waded. The first hour saw a mixed bag of random rises, likely to emerging Beatis or midge that had been hatching prior to my arrival. A handful of caddis were around but no steadily rising trout so I opted for a #8 Brown SMB, I missed two then landed a nicer 16inch brown that jumped more than any fish this season. I pushed on but dropped the SMB, some would have hit it but I would have been force feeding it, the trout didn’t want it, too big…they had smaller fare in large quantities coming. I’m glad I switched up when I did. Slapped on a #16 Olive Thin Nymph and took a handful of nice looking healthy browns.

By 10am it was clear the caddis were coming. The signature rise for pupa was beginning to occur in larger quantities, smaller trout could be seen airing out in the sun as they did back flips grabbing caddis pupa on the way out of the creek. Honestly, I wasn’t prepared for this. I was expecting Beatis and rifling through my dry fly box it dawned on me that I hadn’t thought to load the box with more Grey Caddis dries after last year… I only had two #18 Grey Caddis dry flies with me and the fish were already beginning to rise in rhythm. A bit of 5x tippet with one of two flies and I got to work on a single run that I landed ~10 trout from before the rising calmed and I swapped back to the #16 Olive Thin Nymph, took a handful more from the same run then waited and sure enough the hatch kicked in again, Grey Caddis ranging from some close to #20 to the larger #16. I fished faster broken water and took a bunch under 12inches with a couple over.

By 12:30pm the hatch was so thick that the fish almost shut down, it became difficult to discern my imitation from the rest so I stopped and watched the event unfold in front of me. A splash loud enough to be heard over the riffle I was standing closer to drew my attention upstream to a longer slow section of creek, larger fish were surfacing. With the slower water and the amount of bugs I opted to add a couple feet to my leader in an effort to fool those fish that would be more critical in the slower water. Longer casts standing in the middle of the creek were required. For close to an hour I stood on the same rock past my knees in cold trout water casting to each fish that showed its face. I missed a handful but smooth casting over 60ft allowed me to take several of the larger fish over 13inches with one over 14. Setting the hook from 50ft out and fighting those fish in…I’ve been waiting for this. My time frame dictated I leave by 1pm but the bugs, the trout, they dictated I stay just a little longer. I landed a couple more and took off almost thirty minutes late. I was later forgiven by the lady of the house, this video explained my reasoning and she was forgiving.

Slide Show

I woke yesterday with options. I saw Liz out the door and off to work. I had the choice to fish but the strong winds and already pretty cold air temp of ~4degrees by 8am made up my mind for me. I have my limits you know. So what to do with the morning off but brew coffee and tie flies. The question…what to tie? I’ve been watching this video again and again and it’s getting to me. The only problem here is the standard dry fly, I suck at tying these damn things and I’ve got a mental thing going on that has allowed me to avoid them. I spent the first hour of daylight sipping coffee and sucking it up. I whipped out 1/2 dozen in a reasonable time of ~40minutes and was actually a bit surprised. I think they will do the job and they don’t look all bad. The hardest aspect of this fly for me is getting the wings positioned properly. I have to admit I kind of enjoyed tying them and will be at it again soon, as I ‘ve been told practice makes perfect…

With the remaining portion of my morning I took care of business. I cleaned the kitchen. The stove, microwave, counter tops, vacuumed and even did a bit of laundry. My home is primarily heated with a wood pellet stove of which it consumes a few hundred lbs of hardwood pellets every week, especially when it’s cold enough to keep me home tying flies rather than fishing. I finished the morning by hauling 400lbs from the barn to the porch. Gotta keep the lady of the manor pleased with me, she after all allows me to fish like a non-stop fool, attends TU meetings, fixes my clothes and puts up with trout talk all the time. She deserves it for sure. Next thing she is getting is a pair of breathable waders though. Not a bad morning save the lack of trout smell on my hands.

Slide Show

I am the oldest of three, recently I took my younger brother fly fishing for trout. We discussed the idea of him spin fishing but after explaining the challenge of fly fishing and accepting that a first day on the fly might result in few fish if any (for either of us) Jake decided that he just wanted to see what it was all about first hand. He arrived the night before and we enjoyed a few beers and some local food then hit the hay. 5am the alarm goes off. I gathered a bit of my gear from when I first started fly fishing; a pair of my hippers, a vest, my old rod/reel. The thermos was filled to the brim with strong black coffee. I left Jake sleep until just before it was time to take off. Knowing the amount of rain we’ve received hasn’t been a ton but hearing whispers of high muddy water to the south I chose a spot that I knew we would run across other traffic but offered a nice cow pasture to practice casting. My other motive for choosing this spot, stocked rainbow trout, they are easier to catch, perhaps larger and usually eager to smack the SMB.

I’m no guide, not a casting instructor, and had no instruction from any “professionals”. I learned to cast on my own with some advice from the Internet and my friends and I figure if it can work for me, it can anyone. Now consider this, my brother has spent time spin fishing for other specie on lakes but had never touched a trout, never touched a fly rod that is until 6:15am on the 15th. I stuck SMB’s on both our rods and figured that in the past a down/across approach would pull a rainbow up and out basically doing most of the work for you. It would have been nice to get him a trout on the fly but being very realistic we both knew the day might end up just talking through fly fishing, reading water, explaining bugs, the trout, behaviour, anatomy, everything.

Jake started swinging a streamer and I sat behind sipping coffee (remember that thermos) trying to give advice without sounding like an overbearing ass. Careful to keep the rod tip up, watch your wrist, come to a stop on the backcast. These were the phrases that I remember using to help Jake approach casting. I did no overhand anything, I showed him how I do it a few times and sat back. I set him on a foamy run and explained that foam is home, something I was taught by a good friend. With a target and some patience he was going to do just fine that and perfect low wind day really helped.

We worked through a few spots taking our time, enjoying the sun. Love the morning sun as everything grows around me. Nothing was smacking the streamer and I knew that to get him a trout a nymph rig was necessary. I could have set him up with a single fly, made it simple but he wanted to do it the way I would have, I explained that this might result in many knots and that more care was needed with the cast. I hooked him up with a #16 PT, rocks were showing many Ephemerella Invaria nymphs, and a #16 Peacock and Partridge thinking to my recent success with that pattern. Two flies, a sinker and an indicator later, he was swinging up into the riffle so that the flies could sink in time to be deeper in the run, concepts innately ingrained in my mind. He was doing well, his cast was opening up and of course a few snags/knots were bound to occur but I spent my time watching and helping him to understand basic tactics I use to keep my self casting and not fiddling with my line. One big thing that I advocate is patience and halting when ANY sign of trouble arises be it a snag from behind or a mess of line from a bad cast, just stop and deal with it, don’t keep swinging. It seems simple but I learned this rule the hard way early in my career fly fishing and seem to revisit learning it from time to time.

So no fish, water was stained, neither streamers or the nymph rig was working and Jake was doing everything correctly, still no trout. We discussed the concept of the drift and how to approach a spot so as to get a good presentation with a good drift. I would occasionally step in and give it a go to see if I could pull one out with what he was fishing but nothing for either of us. Cattle were about and the rain from the last week was contributing to the stained water which I figured would benefit us but by 10:30am we had done nothing but practice casting. I decided we needed to bust out and try a second location but before we could get into the truck I noticed a few rises, then…a few more. Splashy, nasty Caddis fly rises. I figured why fight it and stuck on a #16 Grey Caddis imitation and swung it twice to see if anything was interested, first fish of the day came up for the fly as I drug it down and across through the pool, just as I was going to have Jake do the next cast. Casting a dry fly was a bit more challenging and after thirty or so minutes attempting to take a fish none were cooperating and we blew out.

Local 2, cleaner water, running 52 degrees on arrival. I wasn’t sure what to expect but I knew of a run that I had been to recently that was packed full of hungry trout. Figured if he could get a nymph rig in there he would hook into at least one trout. His rod was still rigged with the #16 EHC and as we stepped up to a run I’ve nicknamed the Double Stump Jake noticed the rising. As I was rigging a single nymph rig on my rod (incase the # 16 EHC produced nothing) Jake set loose on the trout. I was standing a good ways back, and not paying attention to how close he was getting to the good part of the run, I look up thinking he was getting too close when he tightened the line and took his first trout on a dry fly. Wow. I dropped everything and busted over to get a crappy shot of him handling his first trout but before any real photography could begin he slipped and the trout went swimming. Well, awesome he got a fish, the day was not a loss but I was hoping for a fish worthy of a photo.

To my brother’s credit he stuck with it and listened well as I let him know when he was getting close to catching tree limbs or if he was getting to anxious and letting his rod tip slip too far on his backcast. He continued to do well and the trout continued to come up for his caddis fly. During this time Jake lost several fish to late hooksets and sloppy line management but was learning how to land a fish by himself. He learned to wet his hands before touching the trout so as to keep the slime coat in tact and not to play the trout to exhaustion. By 1:15pm he had caught and landed several fish all on the first run we were fishing. We moved upstream to a second location and after assessing his fly I decided though sparse if it was still taking trout it could stay on.

I took a few bug photo’s and assessed the water temp as I left Jake alone with the trout. He continued to do well landing a few more small brown trout to add to his count for the day and still had yet to loose his fly despite a couple of very sharp hooksets that left me asking if he had anything left on the end of his line. Despite the rising trout I found few adult Grey Caddisflies, one or two could be seen here and yet the trout were readily rising and Jake was doing well not to put them down, each fish landed was another good photo and a bigger smile. Was he was actually getting good at this?? I mean this blew my expectations completely out of the water, now the day was not without it’s mistakes, bad casts, knots ect. but for never having fished a stream or held a fly rod Jake was doing very well.

To round the day out Jake wanted us to both fish at the same time. We hiked upstream a bit to a spot where Wendy B. and I whacked many fish from weeks earlier. I left him to start and I rigged my rod with a single #14 Red Peacock and Partridge. I deep nymphed the tail of the run while Jake was fishing the head of it where the trout were rising. I lost two strikes then landed the third, 11 inches, the dinner fish. Jake wanted to learn how to clean a trout, I obliged knowing that I could send him home with it and a couple of others I had in the freezer to try for himself, an opportunity to experience the day again at a later time as he cooks trout for him and his daughter, sweet. I was cleaning up and Jake went back to the fish, still swinging the #16 EHC. The day was now complete, or was it? Just as I was missing a strike Jake caught another trout, he says, “I think it’s a bit bigger.” I look over and just grin from ear to ear, I could see the bright body deep below. He got a good fight and I helped him land it in the riffle, 15inches on the dot. He wanted to keep it but I explained that this fish had many years left to grow and make more like it and that it was too cool to take home for dinner, instead we let it run up a shallow riffle down to his hole. I kept the fly and we hiked out (3:00pm), I’ll have that fly for along time. I’m still floored by the striking number of factors that aligned to really make this day one to remember, beautiful weather, a willing patient partner, active trout, CADDIS FLIES, and realistic expectations that were far exceeded. Thanks Jake for getting to know this part of my life, I’m glad you dug it, I know I did.

Haven’t been able to get out much as of late but I have been running out to a local spot day after day to check on the Grey Caddis, looking for the start on this particular stream. I saw the 1st leaping trout on the 8th of April and at that time noticed very active trout holding low and eating everything, darting, turning, clearly eating pupating caddis flies. The pupa roll deep in the stream (especially in slower water as in this case) for a time before filling an air bubble that helps propel the pupa to the surface. It is at this point that the trout rushing to catch this pupa on its way to the surface will often leap completely out of the water. On April 8th the trout were holding low eating pupa deep, on the 11th when I arrived at 2pm the hatch had already been going for a bit, a few smaller trout were feeding on the surface but the important thing I took away was that the hatch in this spot is growing and has a week or more before it is over. Most of the larger fish were eating the pupating caddis deep in the water, only the smaller trout would rise for the sporadic adult. The Barr’s Graphic Caddis (#14-16) and X-Wing Style Caddisflies (#14-16) were working well for me.

I picked up the few I needed to make me smile and tried to get a few images of the adults but few were around. I moved downstream and found a few more but nothing compared to what I witnessed last year. Note: Stop into the Driftless Angler and pick up a tube of Dry Magic Fly Flotant! This stuff is awesome, a SMALL amount rubbed togather turns into a powder of sorts and keeps your fly floating high without gunking it up. Mat and his guides recommended it the last time I was in Viroqua and although it is a bit on the pricey side I feel it will be well worth the extra funds.  It was excellent to toss dry flies for a change and with the earlier caddis I find they are larger (#14/16) taking the smaller trout was a breeze, fun too. As this hatch wears on the flies will get smaller in size moving to a #16 then #18 and maybe down to a #20. Getting an adult to sit still on my measuring tape wasn’t going to happen, I’ll have to gather some specimens to get more information. Time will be made for this, hopefully soon.

I took off around 3:45pm and drove to a second spot to see what was going on, I wanted to check up on a bigger fish that I know lives around these parts. I flipped rocks right away and noticed a huge variety of bugs; cranefly larva, Baetis nymphs, Ephemerella nymphs, Macaffertium nymphs, diptera larva of all kinds, Stone Fly nymphs all amongst all the usual caddis larva. I have spotted Macaffertium nymphs on several streams in larger quantities than I’ve seen in the time I’ve been trout fishing (which isn’t that long). I need to learn more about the cycles that bug populations go through and how some years will have much larger numbers of certain bugs and others won’t, I’m sure there are many factors that go into understanding bug populations, something to look up when I have a bit more free time.

I fished a smaller Olive Bead Head Bugger and picked up only one trout on the second stream. I saw more white suckers than trout and unfortunately I saw three otters and a beaver dam that is really turning the stream into a sludgefest. Don’t get me wrong I like all the wildlife and believe they have a right to some of the fish just as myself and others do, I just know I witnessed this place in better shape last year with regards to brown trout population. No large fish were seen and only a mess of suckers and a few pockets of smaller trout less than 10 inches were found. As it grew closer to dinner time I took off. Second Note: Deer and Wood Ticks are about BIG time. Check yourself, and your dog. Get out and go fishing, it’s good for you. Catch and Keep Opener is this Saturday April, 17th.

Slide Show

Sporty Girl Foam can be purchased at just about every Claire’s in the country and with just about every mall in our nation having one of these stores this material should be fairly easy for you to find. It costs a few bucks a roll and comes in a few nice colors (Pink, Orange, Yellow and Black) along with a few useless ones but the black that is more of a charcoal matches the Grey Caddis fly and is useful for midge bodies and perhaps even Trico bodies. I like this material because it doesn’t hold water, aides in flotation and is easy to use. So here is a simple tutorial for tying a simple fly that could be the most important fly in your box come April if you live around here.

The Sporty Grey Caddis:

• Hook: #18 Dry Fly
• Thread: Black 70 Deiner
• Body: Black Sporty Girl Foam
• Rib: Tying Thread
• Wing/Head: Grey Deer Hair

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