Looking for input on seasonal fly boxes and overall organization

[PaScoGi]

I fish eastern and central PA. My main streams are the Tulpehocken Creek, Lehigh River, Pohocopo Creek, Penns Creek, Clark Creek, & Little Schuylkill River.

I am looking for input into my proposed "seasonal boxes" that I plan to carry, instead of carrying my entire library with me year round which seams pointless.

My basic idea of this came last week when I looked in my dry fly box and saw Hendricksons and Sulphurs. And I thought to myself "It's July, why the hell do I even have Hendricksons and Sulphurs with me?" So, right off the bat, is it right or wrong to think like that?

So here are my four season proposed fly boxes. Please let me know what I should add or delete. Again, keep in mind I only fish PA and mostly the streams listed above

Winter Box (December, January, February)
Subsurface - Egg Fly, Zebra Midge, Perdigon, Rainbow Warrior, Barrs Emerger
Dries - BWO, Griffiths Gnat, Early Black Stonefly

Spring Box (March, April, May)
Subsurface - Egg Fly, Zebra Midge, Perdigon, Rainbow Warrior, Barrs Emerger, Pheasant Tail, Hares Ear, Frenchie, Blow Torch, Sparkle Pupa, Green Caddis Larva, Soft Hackle Patterns, Black & Golden Stoneflies
Dries - BWO, Griffiths Gnat, Hendrickson, Sulphur, Rusty Spinner, March Brown, Adams, Green Drake, Quill Gordon, Various Caddis Patterns

Summer Box (June, July, August, September)
Subsurface - Zebra Midge, Barrs Emerger, Pheasant Tail, Sparkle Pupa, Soft Hackles, Black & Golden Stoneflies
Dries - BWO, Griffiths Gnat, Rusty Spinner, Adams, Various Caddis Patterns, Tricos, Various Terrestial Patterns

Fall Box (October, November)
Subsurface - Egg Fly, Zebra Midge, Perdigon, Rainbow Warrior, Barrs Emerger, Pheasant Tail, Hares Ear, Frenchie, Blow Torch, Soft Hackle Patterns
Dries - BWO, Griffiths Gnat, Various Caddis Patterns

Also, I have a separate small box of streamers & junk flies (san juan worms, mop, green weenies, cress bugs, etc) that I always have on me that I only use in desperation and also because fishing with those patterns is too much like spin fishing in my opinion.

Anyway, my goal is to reduce weight in my vest by only carrying flies that I have used over the seasons.

Let me know your thoughts on this list and what has worked for you during each season and the various months, taking of course into consideration conditions such as weather, flow rates, etc (for example some years are warmer than others)

 

[dryflyguy]

Here's my scheme:

I usually start my season in late february/early march.
Carrying midges, BWO's. and stoneflies - what I call early spring.

Late march/ early april, I switch to what I call mid spring mode.
Adding grannoms, quill gordons, hendricksons, and other assorted caddis
I also add a few march browns and sulphers then too, as I've often seen them hatching in late april.

Early may, I remove the stoneflies, grannoms, hendrickson, and quill gordons.
And add the rest of the spring hatches: march browns, gray fox more sulphers, cahills, green drakes, and iso's. Terrestrial box goes in vest now too
Late spring mode, I guess.
This is the peak of the hatching season, and when my vest is really full.
Especially this year, when I also carried cicadas then

At some point in early to mid june, I remove most of the spring hatch stuff.
And get down to summer mode, which I'm in now:
Iso's, tricos, and terrestrials.
I also carry some cahills and sulphers all summer long, and have caught fish on them throughout.

Midges, BWO's, spinner patterns, and caddis stay in my vest pretty much all season

 

[larkmark]

I like both of your approaches. Been meaning to do something like that for a while. My stuff is a jumbled mess.

 

[PaScoGi]

Yeah I have found summer (when I really only fish from 6am-10am) I dont need many subsurface nymphs, as the trout see to be looking up. I am sure that any of my nymphs would work, it is just less of a need than in winter and spring when top water action is limited to certain short time periods, and the water is colder anyway so nyphing is needed more. Hell I found terrestials and tricos to be pretty much the only dries I need all summer too, although I am sure if I did more evening fishing I would see more dries.

Anyway I like your approach and hope more guys and gals can post their box strategies too.

Thanks for posting!

 

[Prospector]

PaScoGi,

I like your approach. Your choices are solid.

Ive gone a different route. I’ve carried the same 9 fly boxes of varying sizes all season for years. Essentially carrying every fly I own with the exception of salmon/steelhead flies. My 9 boxes are my limiting factor. I probably could cut back but I can think of many scenarios where I needed flies that I didn’t expect to use. This is even more true if you carry scissors so you can trim flies on the stream to make them more closely match what you are seeing.

The guys I fish with can’t believe I carry so many boxes but they often aren’t carrying flies they need with their minimalist approach. I highly recommend the scissors.

 

[JeffK]

I use seasonal boxes, but also use small single hatch dry boxes for tricos and sulphurs since there are times those are the only dries I need.

Even so, my boxes get cluttered in short order and I am always rearranging them. It does save space in my vest, but not my closet.

i.e These days for a Little Lehigh morning I started with a small box of trico dries and a small box of trico wets and some small nymphs to fish after the spinner fall dies out. Then added a few beetles because they help dry fly fishing when spinners aren't falling, but soon added other terrestrials. Then began messing around with different wet spinner patterns and different hooks because my land/hook ratio for 22 wet flies was mediocre. Fish wet spinners behind a nymph to get it down better and am trying scuds, chamois worms, sucker spawn, and wet ants to see what works best. All of a sudden my simple trico boxes are a mess. Am catching more fish by fine tuning the rigs though.

 

[Bamboozle]

I use a Richardson Box that I modified so I could swap trays and I do something similar with static trays for year round dry files like caddis, midges and terrestrials and a back tray with nymphs, streamers & wets.

In between those trays, I insert dry fly trays that match the seasons HOWEVER…

The biggest space saving thing I did years ago was to reduce the number of EACH fly I carried and keep spares in cheap fly boxes back at the car to refill my fly boxes when I get low.

I used to carry a dozen of every fly, which is ridiculous, as even during a hatch, I almost never use more than one or two flies of the same size and pattern. Now I carry about a maximum of six, often three for patterns I don’t use that often.

That one simple step doubled the available space in my chest box with not a single time where I felt the need to walk back to the car for spares while fishing. I usually do my refilling when the fishing is done or before the next outing.

Another thing I can suggest is to create a box or two that you will carry all the time with the stuff you will use all year. When you start putting the same flies in multiple boxes for different seasons, you will inevitably end up stealing from one box to replenish another.

You will also have to check three or four boxes to see what you got and remember to replenish multiple boxes with the same fly. That is a pain in the arse and something I avoid by keeping all my year round stuff in two trays and nowhere else.

Good luck!

 

[PaScoGi]

Great info, exactly what I was looking for. I did not know Sulphurs worked all summer. I may have to keep them on hand during those months then. But sounds like our strategies are similar.

Thanks for posting.

 

[PaScoGi]

Mine was too until I got tired of wasting time on the water rummaging through too many flies. No judgement here, I was the same way a year ago and have been working on streamlining my seasonal boxes to help with this. THanks for posting.

 

[PaScoGi]

Will try the scissors, good point and makes sense. Thanks for posting!

 

[PaScoGi]

Thanks for the strategies, I will try them and add some of those wet patterns for when they stop rising. THanks for posting!

 

[PaScoGi]

Great advice thanks and I will check out the Richardson Box. I agree on the number of flies, I keep about 2 in each size on me, and I am working on building a master library to keep in my car to restock throughout the day as needed.

Thanks for posting!

 

[Bamboozle]

PaScoGi wrote:
Great advice thanks and I will check out the Richardson Box. I agree on the number of flies, I keep about 2 in each size on me, and I am working on building a master library to keep in my car to restock throughout the day as needed.

Thanks for posting!

I have a divided “gear” bag I keep in the back of my SUV that I refer to as “The Portable Fly Shop.” It is in this bag that I keep the extra flies in cheap fly boxes. I also have extra everything, like leaders, tippet material, floatant, batteries, etc. in that bag so I don’t have to carry as much ON me and worry about running out.

One recommendation I can make if you want to go this route for bulk fly storage is to look for the thinnest compartmentalized clear fly boxes you can find. You will get WAY more storage and organization with thin boxes than fat, even if you need multiple compartments for the same pattern & size. If have bulky stuff, just put those files in something else.

I use the 3/4" deep 18 compartment 1043 Dewitt fly boxes (no longer in production) for my bulk storage and can fit at least a dozen in that gear bag. I don’t know what’s out there today that thin with that many compartments, but there should be something close.

Good luck!!

 

[Swattie87]

I struggled with this too. I think everyone does to a degree. Any system you come up with will have its pros and cons. You have to prioritize what is most important to you. For me, it was keeping my pack light, and not having to carry more than one fly box at a time, while also not having to swap out flies from box to box. Here’s what I landed on. I carry only one of these at time, depending on the kind of fishing I’m doing that day. I small stream fish a lot, so the small stream one gets carried the most. If I’m on a week long trip I bring along a plastic Plano compartment box in the vehicle that I keep my bulk spares in, to refill as needed.

1. General Trout Box (Medium Size w/Swing Leaf) – This has the most variety. Kind of a little bit of everything, but it covers the major PA hatches I fish the most…BWO’s, Grannoms, Quills/Hendricksons, Sulphurs, MB’s, GD’s, SD’s. Has more nymph varieties and some junk and general attractor patterns too. Has a sparse bit of terrestrials and a handful of streamers.

2. Brookie/Small Stream (Medium Size Box) – Mostly attractor dries, a few small streamers, and a few BH nymphs. Also has a few big “night-time” poppers/gurglers and streamers for night fishing, as this is the box I take backpack camping with me.

3. Bass/WW (Medium Size Box) – Mostly bigger streamers for Bass. Some poppers. Whiteflies.

 

[troutpoop]

I have a weekender large fly box from Umpqua. One side is stuff I never leave home without such as ants, BWOs, midges, tan caddis etc. The other side is the seasonal stuff that gets swapped in and out.

 

[Tigereye]

I have a gear bag that has boxes of dries, wets, nymphs, terrestrial and streamers.

From those boxes I "build" a day box. Filling it with 3 or 4 each of perhaps a half dozen patterns of what I expect to see or use. I am usually fishing 2 to 3 days a week so I have a good idea what's been happening on a given stream. After a time, i replace the " expired" flies with "breaking" flies.

For instance, I may carry Hendrickson, March browns, and some grannoms in mid may. By the end of May, I'll put the Hendricksons away and replace with tan caddis. Eventually, the MBs will give way to slate drakes and sulfurs. By rotating you keep your boxes organized, and eliminate second guessing your selections. Always more productive fishing one fly hard than a lot of flies half heartedly.

The truck is seldom more than a 15 minute walk if something unexpected comes up.

Caveat. I carry a second box with hares ears, pheasant tails, green weenies, franchies, rainbow warriors, Adam's, royal Wulff, and elk hair caddis. I could probably fish just those flies and still be somewhat successful.

Thus armed, I think I only had to go back to the car 2 times in the last few years.

.

 

[hooker-of-men]

I also always have a row of "sulfurs" (which might also haphazardly include light Hendricksons or light Cahills, depending on what I have on hand) in my box. My priority is that I have a range of sizes of a light colored mayfly rather than any specific pattern. I also do so with BWOs (my dark bodied go-to) and caddis. 10-12 on me always.

 

[LongLineRelease]

Although I notice this strategy is popular with a lot of folks, something I try to avoid is adding and subtracting flies regularly from my boxes based on time of year. I don’t think I have the time to spend doing this and I don’t want to be caught fishing on short notice without the correct flies.

Instead I follow a strategy similar to Bamboozle. I have a Downs chest box with interchangeable trays. I carry three trays all of the time that contain flies I might need throughout much of the year.

Tray 1 is softhackles and spiders, CDC flies, a few fast water dries like EHC and Klinks, and a small handful of terrestrials.

Tray 2 is micropatterns. Lots of midges, baetis olives, blue quills, tricos, rusty spinnners, and small generic nymphs like cress bugs, shrimp, PTs, and Caddis larva

Tray 3 is streamers and anchor nymphs: Stoneflies, Walt’s worm, green weenies, and large generic beads heads.

As the season goes on I add tray 4 for sulfurs (actually sulfurs, Cahills and yellow sallies) and tray 5 with Drakes (green, brown, slate, March Browns) As the year goes by I take these trays back off.

On the rare occasion I wear a vest, I carry a match the hatch dry fly box, a match the hatch nymph box, a terrestrial box, and some spare streamers. I can pretty much get by without these though as olives, tricos, sulfur’s, and Caddis make up the majority of the hatches for me.

From time to time I carry some Altoids tins for specific occasions like cicadas or olive morning duns.

Small stream/Brookies, smallmouth, and largemouth each have their own dedicated box

 

[JoeE]

I use Chest boxes as well as others: Depending on the chest box, I set the box up or removable trays or inserts according to the stream or season.