Hatch

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boli

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Joined
Apr 19, 2012
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My cousin and I were out at Laurel Hill Creek over the weekend and got caught up in a pretty intense hatch. This is my first month of fly fishing so i'm not familiar with too many flies. I caught a couple on a march brown, and a few other dries but the trout were targeting a very small fly that I had a hard time even seeing. We got there in the morning and there was sporadic rising but then around 9:30 or so they were coming up everywhere. It lasted about an hour and a half and all of a sudden it was over. Ended up catching 9 on various dry flies, cousin caught 10, but if I had what they were eating I probably would have caught 30. Anyone know what flies would have been hatching? Very small.

Also, when fishing smaller flies are you supposed to use smaller diameter tippet? Thanks!
 
was the fish sipping the smaller flies off the surface? if so probably a midge. And yes i usually fish 6x for smaller stuff and picky trout.
 
Yeah they were sipping them up like crazy. Some you would see actually jumping up out of the water. From beginning of hole to the end they were coming up. Like I said, it last probably an hour and a half like that.
 
when i see splashy rises i will throw a size 16 0r 18 tan or grey caddis based on what is hatching. But those sipping fish are probably taking midges in the film or on top.....
 
Boli, you might of misunderstood the question as you seemed to give multiple answers. We know they were rising, and we're trying to help you figure out what they were eating. You can tell a lot from HOW they rise. There are boils, sips/dimples, gulps, porpoising, splashy/jumpy rises, etc. They generally all mean something different.

Really splashy rises, mixed with actual leaps, generally means they are actively chasing something up to the surface, and more often than not that would be some sort of caddis. A typical midge rise would be more like sips/dimples, with no splashing, just a little ring on the water. Often spinners are the same way. A boil is very often mayfly emergers or nymphs in the surface film, i.e. something just under the surface. Porpoising is typically taking something that is truly floating, like a dun.
 
I'm not sure. They would come up and eat them 3 inches from my dry fly. It was frustrating but at the same time really cool to see that many coming to the surface. Catching my first trout on dry flies was pretty awesome, so not going to complain about getting 9, but with how they were coming up, it could have been a lot more had I known what to use. I can not emphasize enough how small the flies were that they were eating.

When do tricos typically show up?
 
It was more of a ring on the water and them casually going to the top and sipping it and going back down. A few jumps but for the most part was the sipping.
 
Tricos usually show up in July, I seriously have my doubts. Though everything else about the experience fits. They are small mayflies, black bodies, usually like a size 26 or so. Unlike most mayflies, they mate and fall as spinners in the mornings. You'll see massive balls doing the up and down mayfly dance over riffles before they fall. And when they fall, you get some hot action for a time.

But I'm guessing this was probably midges.
 
well tricos are hatching ath the tully, and i am 100 percent serious.
 
+1 on the Tricos. They have arrived! I caught my first trout on a Trico spinner this year on Monday morning May 14. At least three weeks earlier than I have ever seen them before. Considering how early all of the hatches were this year I was sure we would be seeing them by Memorial Day but I didn't expect them this early.
 
If they are in fact tricos, with the fly being so small, I imagine that it will be difficult to see your fly, so do you just kinda set the hook if you see one strike where your fly should be and hope for the best?
 
Boli,

If they are tricos you will see them flying over the water in mating swarms. The spinners have a very characteristic flight pattern once you know what you are looking for. Try to catch one of the flies. They are small black (size 24-26), fairly prominant dark thorax, small light colored wings and probably the most recognizable trait is the three long tails on the spinner (as much a 4 times the body length). I fish my spinners on about a 18-20" piece of 6x tippet off of the bend of a size 18 Griffith's Gnat. The GG should be big enough to see and I use it as an indicator fly. I catch most of my fish on the spinner but occasionally catch a fish or two on the GG which I think the trout mistake for a cluster of tricos on the surface. This system has worked well for me over the years and catching fish on these little flies is a lot of fun and you really have a good chance to tie into some really big fish as well. Good luck and tight lines!
 
boli wrote:
If they are in fact tricos, with the fly being so small, I imagine that it will be difficult to see your fly, so do you just kinda set the hook if you see one strike where your fly should be and hope for the best?
Click to expand...

Just a note, when doing this use a "strip strike". That's to say, keep the rod low and strip your flyline. It's an effective way to set the hook, but you won't launch your fly up into the trees if you come up empty.

Come to think of it, use the slip strike all the time.
 
You look REAL close to see your fly. But yeah, it can be tough, and if you lose it, let the drift carry out and strike on anything that rises in the area where you think your fly is.
 
I kinda doubt that there were tricos hatching on a laurel highlands stream in may also.
More likley, midges or small olives.
Seining the water would have probably solved things
 
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