Dry Dropper Tips

[JimNovo]

I want to fish the dry dropper setups more this winter until the fish start to rise regularly. I hope I can put away the indicator more often. So what recommendations do you all have on:

1) the Dry fly - best patterns and size
2) the Dropper - best patterns and size to accompany the dry
3) the connection - length, tippet size

Thanks.

 

[dc410]

1) size 18 Griffiths Gnat
2) size 20 black Zebra Midge w/ clear glass micro bead
3) 16-18” of 6X tippet

 

[dudemanspecial]

1. X caddis or similar size 14
2. Lightly weighted pheasant tail nymph or emerger size 18.
3. I go from the bend of the dry about 16 inches with 5x or 6x.

 

[fcarp]

Corn fed caddis or heavily dressed elk hair caddis (both lots of hackle and heavy wing)

Any nymph you like, max of 3mm tungsten bead. Walts, PT, HE, small stonefly.

4 or 5x floro off bend, about 12-24” depending on water depth and speed.

 

[Fly-Swatter]

It's not uncommon to see BWO hatches on some streams during warm winter days, especially in about a month or so.

1. #18 parachute baetis (with indy post?)
2. #16-20 Zebra midge, Iron Lotus, or similar
3. 6x 18" off the bend

Alternate - Brookie streams

1. #12 Fl. Orange Humpy
2. #14-16 Bead Head Prince with red collar
3. 4x 12-15" off the bend

 

[JeffK]

It all depends. Generally on broken water I like a size 12 Stimulator or Ausable Wulf with whatever nymph you have confidence in. On stiller water and during a hatch I like something more realistic. BWO combos listed above are fine and I do something similar in sulphur season with sulphur patterns. Often most fish come from a sulphur nymph below a sulphur dry. For realistic dries I like to place them on a dropper so I can change the dry without changing the nymph.

A modified copper/hopper/dropper combo has worked on limestoners. Instead of the hopper use a stimulator or some other larger, high flotation fly like a foam beetle. Need enough flotation for the weighted fly. The weighted fly can be a weighted scud or a weighted ant, depending on season. Weighted scuds work all year. The dropper was usually a small 19/20 starling soft hackle. I suppose a midge pupa or Avatar would do just fine as well.

 

[jarebearbinks]

I have been using a chubby Chernobyl hopper on a tag with 6x tippet down to a weighted bead head nymph. Pheasant tails, zebra midges, squirmy wormys, and perdigons have been producing well. Even have been getting a decent amount of strikes on the hopper with the mild winter we have been having.

 

[caddisflyer]

I have had good luck sometimes during a Blue Wing hatch by fishing a size 18 unweighted pheasant tail or wd40 under a size 16 caddis. Depending on how the fish are feeding I may lengthen or shorten the dropper. When the Blue Wings start the fish will move up into the riffle and take the emergers. As the hatch progresses they often drop back and spread out in the pool. Then I will switch to a dry.

 

[Tracker]

With my aging eyes I just stick with a hopper on top and fish what ever dropper is right for the conditions.

 

[Swattie87]

IMO, you may still struggle to catch fish in the Winter with a dry dropper, despite the above good advice. Unless you’re on a fairly small “Brookie” type stream, it’s hard to get the dropper deep enough most of the time. Fish are almost always glued to the bottom in Winter. I don’t really like fishing a dropper much longer than about 24” or so, and in the warmer months I prefer to fish a dropper at about 12” off the dry. Becomes a pain to cast the longer the dropper is, and the dropper weight becomes an issue. If you go with a heavy, tungsten type fly to get it down quick, you’ll need a really, really buoyant dry to float it. You’re probably talking like a big foam hopper. If you go with a lighter nymph, you can get away with a more natural dry, but you’re gonna struggle to get that nymph down to the fish at all.

I’ve had decent dry/dropper fishing as early as early April, and I can usually count on a dry/dropper working pretty well until the spawn in the Fall or so. But from the spawn, until the water warms closer to 50 or so again in the Spring, I think a traditional indicator rig, that can support more weight to get the flies down, or, a Euro approach will work better. (Again, outside of small Brookie streams. Dry/dropper will still work decent in Winter on those.)

I’ve seen guys trying to fish like a 4 or 5 ft dropper off a dry fly sometimes. IMO, you’re just nymphing at that point and an indicator or Euro approach will be more effective and easier to work with.

 

[afishinado]

Tip for guys tying off the bend with dry-dropper rigs. I often tie the dropper line on the bend with a clinch knot and the dropper line has a tendency to slide down and end up on the lower part of the bend. When tying flies I plan to use with droppers I put a small dot of UV resin on the hook on the upper third of the bend to stop the dropper line from sliding down the bend. You could also use Sally Hansen's or equivalent I guess. It works great for me by keeping my dries riding correctly on top. Good luck.

 

[salmo]

I agree that it much depends on the type of water. If fishing a small limestone that gets a lot of attention small dry with much smaller nymph 6-15 inches below. In bigger faster water fish a larger dry that you can see with a 16-22 PT, midge or BWO nymph. In either case watch the weight of the nymph on smaller dries.

 

[globug15]

There are great articles written about dry dropper by Dom over on the Troutbitten website. I'd suggest checking those out.

To poorly paraphrase his writing, you need to first think about whether you intend to be catching more fish on the dry or the nymph. Do you want your dry fly to drift as a natural, or do you want it to act as a suspender? Do you intend to make longer dry fly style presentations or fish tight like an indicator? These questions are all based on where and how the fish are feeding. You'll construct and select your dry fly based on buoyancy and how heavy of a nymph you need.

There's more to it than just tying a nymph on behind a dry fly... you need to think about how each fly will drift. Nothing better than experimenting with different combos.

When pairing a dry and nymph I usually like a dry with just enough buoyancy to keep it atop the water while suspending the nymph. The dry needs to easily register any disturbance when the drift of the nymph is interrupted just as you'd expect an indicator.

To answer your questions, the majority of my dries are usually a size 10-14 stimulator or trude style fly. I like the down wings as they tend to cast easier. Some I add extra material like a poly underwing to keep them higher longer. Poly also hold's frog's fanny or other desiccants a little longer than natural hairs.

You can go with any of the nymphs in your box as long as it does not pull your dry under. I tend to stick with standard pheasant tails, a walt's worm, soft hackle, green weenie, zebra midge, emerger, etc. Most of the time it's a beadhead unless I see fish feeding high in the column or film.

I stick with tying off the bend of the hook for most of my connections. I like a minimum of a foot and a half and may go up to three feet. That's all dependent on the water depth and where the fish are feeding. I find going shorter there's too much tension between the two flies. Longer lengths, you tend to lose the benefits of this system.

Dry dropper is a blast! Enjoy!

 

[Bamboozle]

My favorite & most successful dry/dropper combo consists of a version of a tan Elk Wing Caddis (EWC) I tie that I named a "Foamie," created specifically for fast & broken water.

My version (if I invented it ) is Palmer hackled heavily but it has a body made from a 1/8" diameter tan foam cylinder that I slice CAREFULLY halfway through lengthwise with a razor blade, slip over the hook shank and secure with a few light wraps of thread to hold it in place before hackling.

I also like the hackle to be just BARELY longer than the hook gape so I typically use hackle one or two sizes smaller than the hackle gauge indicates for a size 16 or 18 hook to compensate for the fatter foam body.

My Foamies float way better & longer that an EWC made with conventional dubbing and they make a great "bobber." When employed in a dry/dropper combo I almost exclusively use a size 16.

I always tie my dropper off the bend with a clinch knot and my dropper is ALWAYS one size HEAVIER than my tippet. At least in my experience this lessens tangles.

When prospecting, I use two different flies most often for my dropper. First is either a size 16 or 18 Purple & Snipe soft hackle that I tie with very fine purple wire instead of purple Pearsall's. The wire gives it a tiny bit of flash & extra weight.

My second choice is a size 16 or 18 Partridge & Peacock soft hackle that I tie pretty much conventionally except that I make a tag with my ribbing wire which adds a little extra flash & weight.