For fly fishermen living in northern climates, winters can be difficult at times. This time of year usually finds those of us inflicted by the sport, running to fly shops for tying materials and updating our fly boxes with 'hot' new patterns for the upcoming season. It's always a little discouraging to find out that the extended bodied, hackle stacked pattern you took one week and a sore neck to perfect doesn't work very well in the end. Looks great in the box but........... Those are the flies we pass on to other fly anglers in the hopes that they can instill some magic on those painstaking creations you tied and since they look good they are generally recieved well.
These trade encounters often occur because those promising 'techy' little patterns you spent your winter time wrapping and filling your box with actually suck and you've just spent the last two hours watching your 'new friend' fleece trout after trout out of a tiny seam you had already vigorously worked. Has you humbly offer your patterns up hoping 'new friend' will offer his `magic' pattern, you notice on the end of his tippet is a #14 cream sparkle dun. Upright deer wing, little bit of dubbing and z-lon tail....so basic you could cry. And he offers you one because he cares and in his own moment of angling knighthood he has taken pity on you and your elaborate but pointless offering. As he opens his box you notice an assortment of about 8 patterns, but lots of duplicates, because all his years on the river have taught him, that's all he really needs to put trout to hook.
Fly boxes tell a lot about an angler and how they fish or feel they should fish. Some fly boxes are meticulously arranged, hook bends/sizes/patterns in formation like they're waiting to be told to march!!! Organization is key and this angler likely spends a good deal of time analyzing the sorroundings and thinking about the proper method of presentation. The chosen rod and reel combined are no less than $1000 and purchase occurred after reviewing countless consumer reports and harrassing shop owners into weeks of casting demonstrations. His flies are bought or tied with rigid imitation of the original pattern, very little experimentation exists. Not satisfied with just any fish, this angler will ignore all other rising trout to focus on the one that appears largest in the pool. Getting to that fish means casting over and putting down the 6 others that are feeding aggressively downstream of the prime lie giant, but that's the fish of choice and the others may as well be rain droplets on the surface of the water. The fly is chosen carefully and chronologically, the cast is meticulous and in place, the mend reacts as it was planned and the fly freely drifts to it's quarry. The fish, who has no concern for chronological fly selection and organization adheres to the path of nature and rises to the fly only to shun it at the last moment returning to it's well selected home behind a boulder. Never discouraged but slightly perplexed the angler neatly clips the fly off the tippet, opens the fly box replaces the fly in it's orginal setting and selects the next logical pattern. Re-tie, dress, cast, mend, drift......rise and .......success!!! Sense of entitlement is fulfilled, time to go home and relish in the greatness of their accomplishment.
Then there's people like myself. I've got flies stuck in my hat in my pockets, in my skin sometimes. My fly boxes are chaos by the end of the day because I am constantly trying to find the perfect fly. Not satisfied with a fly that catches only half the fish, I want that fly that works everytime a proper presentation is made so I feel as if I've imitated nature as opposed to tricking it. It's like piecing a puzzle together in that you know that perfect piece exists somewhere amidst the chaos of the pile and sometimes only experimentation will lock the puzzle tags together. After finding that pattern, I can put the rod down and just enjoy watching nature onfold as trout gently sips fly. Followoing a tough day of guiding, my boxes will take about an hour to sort and re-organize and as I place the flies back in there appropriate compartments, I re-enact the day wondering "why the *#@! would have I had tied that on when all I needed was that cheesey little sparkle dun!!!!
These trade encounters often occur because those promising 'techy' little patterns you spent your winter time wrapping and filling your box with actually suck and you've just spent the last two hours watching your 'new friend' fleece trout after trout out of a tiny seam you had already vigorously worked. Has you humbly offer your patterns up hoping 'new friend' will offer his `magic' pattern, you notice on the end of his tippet is a #14 cream sparkle dun. Upright deer wing, little bit of dubbing and z-lon tail....so basic you could cry. And he offers you one because he cares and in his own moment of angling knighthood he has taken pity on you and your elaborate but pointless offering. As he opens his box you notice an assortment of about 8 patterns, but lots of duplicates, because all his years on the river have taught him, that's all he really needs to put trout to hook.
Fly boxes tell a lot about an angler and how they fish or feel they should fish. Some fly boxes are meticulously arranged, hook bends/sizes/patterns in formation like they're waiting to be told to march!!! Organization is key and this angler likely spends a good deal of time analyzing the sorroundings and thinking about the proper method of presentation. The chosen rod and reel combined are no less than $1000 and purchase occurred after reviewing countless consumer reports and harrassing shop owners into weeks of casting demonstrations. His flies are bought or tied with rigid imitation of the original pattern, very little experimentation exists. Not satisfied with just any fish, this angler will ignore all other rising trout to focus on the one that appears largest in the pool. Getting to that fish means casting over and putting down the 6 others that are feeding aggressively downstream of the prime lie giant, but that's the fish of choice and the others may as well be rain droplets on the surface of the water. The fly is chosen carefully and chronologically, the cast is meticulous and in place, the mend reacts as it was planned and the fly freely drifts to it's quarry. The fish, who has no concern for chronological fly selection and organization adheres to the path of nature and rises to the fly only to shun it at the last moment returning to it's well selected home behind a boulder. Never discouraged but slightly perplexed the angler neatly clips the fly off the tippet, opens the fly box replaces the fly in it's orginal setting and selects the next logical pattern. Re-tie, dress, cast, mend, drift......rise and .......success!!! Sense of entitlement is fulfilled, time to go home and relish in the greatness of their accomplishment.
Then there's people like myself. I've got flies stuck in my hat in my pockets, in my skin sometimes. My fly boxes are chaos by the end of the day because I am constantly trying to find the perfect fly. Not satisfied with a fly that catches only half the fish, I want that fly that works everytime a proper presentation is made so I feel as if I've imitated nature as opposed to tricking it. It's like piecing a puzzle together in that you know that perfect piece exists somewhere amidst the chaos of the pile and sometimes only experimentation will lock the puzzle tags together. After finding that pattern, I can put the rod down and just enjoy watching nature onfold as trout gently sips fly. Followoing a tough day of guiding, my boxes will take about an hour to sort and re-organize and as I place the flies back in there appropriate compartments, I re-enact the day wondering "why the *#@! would have I had tied that on when all I needed was that cheesey little sparkle dun!!!!
As years pass I simplify my choices and can confidently say that when guiding I have about 12 patterns that I catch 90% of my fish on. So why do I need 10 large fly boxes with countless patterns? Because there is always that one fish that doesn't like your top 12 and you need to dig deep in order to open up it's jaws and this sometimes requires a lot of choices to find the right fly and I will change so many patterns in anticipation of the right choice that there is no time for proper compartment alignment in the fly box.....later is a good time for sorting and I become totally consumed by the puzzle and the quest to unlock the mystery nature has presented to me.
A good day generally takes very little clean up, the combination of one to five patterns and a whole lot of praise from satisfied clients. In actuality these are the easiest days, the days that don't challenge the guide. The guide's knowledge of the river and it's natural cycle is a process of elimination more so than creation and when the guide becomes more tuned to the environment, the good water and the right fly are used more often and bad days become few. But there is always the need for creation when something is not exacting enough to satisfy your curiosity and an inquisitive guide will grab some thread, hit the vice and continue the quest for imitating nature's flow.
