You Favorite Wet Fly Patterns

[redietz]

shakey wrote:
Cobblers wax is different than tying wax . You can get it from Dette trout flies.
Joe fox is one of the greatest.

Cobbler's wax is different than dubbing wax. It's exactly the same thing as tying wax.

 

[shakey]

troutbert wrote:

shakey wrote:

also,if you fish nymphs,and want to get into fly fishing, be aware that there are some nymphs that you can fish like a wet fly .

When you say "fish like a wet fly", what technique are you referring to?

How do you fish wet flies? And how does that differ from the way you fish nymphs?

There are many ways to fish both. But often the way I fish wets and nymphs are very similar. In fact I often fish both at the same time. A nymph on the end, a wet fly on a dropper. (And no float.)

Part of you question is " how do you fish nymphs?"
I don't.

When I say fish like a nymph, I am referring to the common practices of high stick nymphing and the trend of European nymphing. So ,usually ticking the bottom etc.
There are other ways to nymph, but I am not knowledgeable about them.

I do use nymphs as wet flies,so maybe I am nymphing and don't know it?

How I do fish wets is similar to how I fish dry flies,or streamers ,as well as traditional slack line dead drifting and what everyone seems to think you always do,and swing.

Of course I hand twist,figure eight,strip,etc too.

 

[shakey]

redietz wrote:

shakey wrote:
Cobblers wax is different than tying wax . You can get it from Dette trout flies.
Joe fox is one of the greatest.

Cobbler's wax is different than dubbing wax. It's exactly the same thing as tying wax.

Ah ha !! I did not know that.
I use cobblers wax to turn things a different color so I never looked into tying wax vs.dubbing wax.

 

[shakey]

Another good fly is dyed olive hen tail and hackle with a yellow thread body and Easter egg pink thorax. It is a tups variant that works earlier in the season.

 

[Prospector]

My main wets in order of productivity.....

1) March Brown
2) Royal Coachman
3) Leadwing Coachman

The March Brown is my best wet at any time of the year

The Royal Coachman is great as the middle fly in a string of 3 wets.
I've heard it theorized the RC draws attention that makes other flies in the string better. I can't argue with that and it produces a lot of fish itself.

Leadwing Coachman is good throughout the year but really excels when isonychia are active

 

[ryansheehan]

shakey wrote:
also,if you fish nymphs,and want to get into fly fishing, be aware that there are some nymphs that you can fish like a wet fly .
.

So in your opinion nymphing is not fly fishing? I'm not really into wet flies but I know some folks who won't do anything but.

 

[afishinado]

ryansheehan wrote:

shakey wrote:
also,if you fish nymphs,and want to get into fly fishing, be aware that there are some nymphs that you can fish like a wet fly .
.

So in your opinion nymphing is not fly fishing? I'm not really into wet flies but I know some folks who won't do anything but.

Hey Ryan,

You haven't been here long enough to meet Shakey. He's a traditionalist-nonconformist... :lol:

Here is a vid of him. He's playing lead guitar on far right...

 

[bikerfish]

"also,if you fish nymphs,and want to get into fly fishing"

hahaha!! That is great tag line material right there!!! Love it Shakey!

 

[Bruno]

Drunken Bourbon Magic Fly

 

[AFISHN]

Any input to the leader rigging when you fish wets:.
# of flys, leader construction,split shot placement???

 

[shakey]

ryansheehan wrote:

shakey wrote:
also,if you fish nymphs,and want to get into fly fishing, be aware that there are some nymphs that you can fish like a wet fly .
.

So in your opinion nymphing is not fly fishing? I'm not really into wet flies but I know some folks who won't do anything but.

It is certainly superior to dry fly fishing,which is easier because it is two dimensional,and you can see the fish take the fly.

However, if the beadhead is heavy enough, you could just use a spinning rod.

Streamers are good too! The British call them lures ????

 

[shakey]

AFISHN wrote:
Any input to the leader rigging when you fish wets:.
# of flys, leader construction,split shot placement???

A nice thing about wet flies is,sometimes you can use straight mono for a leader.if the water is fast and strong, like the salmon river,for example.

Otherwise, I like a braided leader the most, furled second and a hand tied (like those tied by Christopher Fave) are good.

I always use three flies when legal .

I will go P&G,P&O then ,say, peacock and brown.

I usually put whatever is closest to an attractor in the middle.

So,say you wanted to fish a royal coachman.and there was a possibility of Hendricksons and sulphurs.
I would put a Hendrickson ,then a royal coachman,then a P&Y,

If I caught two or three on one of those flies, I might put three of that fly in different sizes on.

I do not own ,nor do I carry splitshot .

 

[ryansheehan]

Nice video, maybe I need to broaden my horizon and start fly fishing :lol:

 

[redietz]

AFISHN wrote:
Any input to the leader rigging when you fish wets:.
# of flys, leader construction,split shot placement???

I almost never use shot with wets. If it's needed, a nymph is probably a better choice.

As to number of flies, I usually use two. It's all that's legal here in Maryland, and when I fish PA or NY, I don't believe the third fly adds much. One of the English authors (I forget which one) about 10 years wrote that he'd looked in his log books going back to before WWII and found that 60% of his fish were on the point fly, 30% on the top dropper and only 10% on the middle dropper. His conclusion was pretty much the same as mine. (That said, it's definitely true that fishing two flies will often catch more fish than fishing either one individually, even if one of the flies isn't getting much attention. The same may be true for the third fly.)

On really small, brush lined streams, I may use only one, but that's pretty rare

My leader starts with a 9 foot tapered leader, three feet of tippet until the top dropper, and another 2 feet to the point. The tippet between top and point is always 1 X size finer that that to the top dropper; that's just to give me a chance of recovering one fly if the point snags and I have to break it off.

 

[Fly-Swatter]

Hey Ryan,

You haven't been here long enough to meet Shakey. He's a traditionalist-nonconformist... :lol:

Here is a vid of him. He's playing lead guitar on far right...

Shakey,

Love the Cab cover! I was cracking up at "No, just the white people..." and "Now the women....I wanna go home with Shakey."

Too funny!

BTW, is that a resonator?

 

[JeffK]

I use a standard leader with 4" droppers 20" to 24" apart. Usually 2 flies for simplicity but 3 are good sometimes.

Like a mix of bright and dull flies. General color schemes through the year - April grays(maybe some big 6 and 8 flies if it is cold), early May green and tan caddis like things, some yelllow or cream flies for sulphur/cahill season. Have one or two flies in the ballpark of common bugs out, but an outlandish one may do the trick many days. Have had my best luck some days with a Peter Ross in sulphur season and in some low, clear water, overcast olive days a Teal, Blue and Silver works. I like the "you never know" aspect of wets. Too much match the hatch stuff takes the mystery/fun/history out of fly fishing IMHO.

Don't go below 4X with a team of wets. Light tippets can get all tangled up with multiple droppers.

 

[NewSal]

JeffK wrote:
I use a standard leader with 4" droppers 20" to 24" apart. Usually 2 flies for simplicity but 3 are good sometimes.

Like a mix of bright and dull flies. General color schemes through the year - April grays(maybe some big 6 and 8 flies if it is cold), early May green and tan caddis like things, some yelllow or cream flies for sulphur/cahill season. Have one or two flies in the ballpark of common bugs out, but an outlandish one may do the trick many days. Have had my best luck some days with a Peter Ross in sulphur season and in some low, clear water, overcast olive days a Teal, Blue and Silver works. I like the "you never know" aspect of wets. Too much match the hatch stuff takes the mystery/fun/history out of fly fishing IMHO.

Don't go below 4X with a team of wets. Light tippets can get all tangled up with multiple droppers.

Have you experimented using dropper loops and 0x-2x dropper tags? I've seen a video where Dave Allbaugh of Wet Fly Waterguides uses this set-up and swears that the 0x-2x isn't too heavy and really helps keep the flys from twisting around the leader. I haven't tried it but I do know for sure that anything below 4x for a dropper tag is a messy situation as far as twisting is concerened. I may try the heavy dropper tags this year but it just seems way to heavy for anything smaller than a size 10.

 

[NewSal]

And as far as favorite wet flys are concerned, the most productive fly last year for me was a peacock and partridge during the grannoms on the little j, followed by a tan and partridge whenever the tan caddis where visible.

 

[shakey]

Fly-Swatter

BTW, is that a resonator?

Yes, it is a 1938 national duolian ,not as new car as turkey's guitar but the same one I use at the jams.

Don't mean to be a thread hijacker but, if you are interested, there are more pics and recordings at shakeylee.com .

All the best to everyone!

 

[PhilC]

One of my favs for sulphurs
Body: pale yellow floss
Ab: dub ball cream snowshoe hare (I save the short loose fibers from making wings)
Wing: partridge (use the lightest color feathers)

...it'll float on it's own for a while, for the in the film sippers. And sink after a couple strips for then fish who want movement