A famous fly that you dont care for?

ErnieBall

ErnieBall

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Jan 24, 2009
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I was thinking about this the other day. I am not a big fan of prince nymphs and am wondering if there are any famous flies that you guys don't use for one reason or another.

I guess I dont like the prince nymph because I feel that it doesn't have enough taper on the body and I try to get my nymphs perfectly tapered so that bothers me.

Anyone have any or am I just crazy?
 
I hate muddlers, bucktails, and hare's ears. (less of course they are working).

I hate tying muddlers, and most flies that use hair.
 
Another one for muddlers. A fly that is meant to imitate a sculpin, yet it floats like a cork. I still scratch my head there.

I don't use copper johns because they are annoying to tie and don't outperform sparsely tied/heavily weighted PT nymphs.

I have also found soft hackles to be as effective as winged wets, and tenfold easier to tie.
 
I agree. It is hard to find them weighted. Adding weight isn't quite right because you'd have to put it right at the fly to have it where it should be...on the bottom.
 
Royal Wullf - love the Wulff pattern, but it makes more sense and has seemed more effective to me to use in natural colors.
 
Stimulator patterns in general. Any thing with a bobber..
 
I don't even attempt muddlers. Haha - I prefer other sculpin/streamer patterns. I dont have one muddler in my box.
 
I hate muddlers, bucktails, and hare's ears. (less of course they are working).
Click to expand...

Ha. Those are some of my favorite flies. Not a huge fan of bucktails, but a mickey finn is a go to fly when nothing else is working. Muddlers are best in shallow pocket water... not very effective on rivers IMO.

Not a fan of any of the traditional wet winged flies. Soft hackles are much more effective
 
jayL wrote:
Another one for muddlers. A fly that is meant to imitate a sculpin, yet it floats like a cork. I still scratch my head there...
Click to expand...

The problem is that most muddlers aren't tied properly. Commercially available muddlers usually have a deer hair head packed like a popper. It's supposed to be much more loosely spun - that way you can squeeze the water into it and sink it much more easily.

That said I don't use them that much - but my favorite streamer is a black Shenk's Sculpin, which also has a deer-hair head. Just don't pack the deer-hair too tightly. And a few split-shot at the nose of the fly don't hurt either.

As far as popular flies that I don't care for - it would have to be the Prince Nymph. I'm not saying that they don't work - I just can't stand the white biots, what the heck are they supposed to be anyway?

Also comparaduns - I know they work, but I don't like to tie them and I hate the way they look. I just can't get over the way the wing fans out - I've never seen a real fly like that.
 
Royal Coachman-
 
pickins,

Not sure about the white biots on the prince. Maybe a splitting shuck? Try grey biots. They don't seem to stand out quite as much. I tied some white rubber legs in place of the biots. They add some extra movement which seems to help with they fly's effectiveness...
 
I don't have much use for Muddlers either.

So far as Copper Johns go, there's Copper Johns and then there's Copper Johns, IMO.

I agree with Jay that a regular copper wire CJ is inferior to a properly tied PT.

On the other hand, one of the best flies in my arsenal is a CJ tied with the dark green wire (not olive) in sizes 14-18.

I wouldn't be without it...

Other than that, I don't have much use for foam ants. No splat. I think deerhair is far superior. Even the old cork McMurray ant is better than foam, IMO.
 
In addition, I'm not real keen on either any sort of Trude fly or the royal wulff, even though i know Pad and Chaz respectively think well of them.

Fly selection (particularly attractor fly selection) is a little like religion in that an abiding faith will often carry one through the low spots. I just never developed the faith in the above mentioned flies to be able to tolerate the slack times. I have quick nippers..

Oh, and Charlie's "Patriot" too. What a heartburn-induced nightmare that thing is. IMO, at least...:)
 
Gapen's Muddler should probably nowadays be called an American Muddler since it has changed a great deal over 70 years. Some of the literature from Canada frowns upon how we pack that head so tight and smooth, since they are well aware that inhibits sinking.

The American Pheasant Tail, however, is an improvement over the Sawyer original.
 
I never liked the royal wulff until I fished out west in mid summer.

That thing was absolutely killer in the high runoff flows.
 
im not a fan of traditional streamers the only streamer ive ever had luck with was a clouser and a deep clouser and i dont care for green weenies....... the first time someone told me they were using a green weenie fly i thought they made it up to jag me around i was kinda mad at that guy
 
Wooley Bugger, I like standard streamers more. give me a ghost, or nine 3, or any tradional streamer/ bucktail. I carry them but don't use that often. Of course right now a brown and orange wooly worm is doing great here now.
 
I came in here to admit I hate the bugger.

I'm surprised I'm not the only one. Whereas I put absolute faith in the Royal Wulff when all else fails.
 
Another vote for the muddler.
I had to tie them for tying class many years ago, and I don't believe I ever caught a thing on them
 
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