Knots: make sure you know them!

Sure we know how to tie a fly on our tippet. But do you know how to tie a streamer or a nymph which wiggles freely on a 3x (or thicker) tippet? I'm sure many of us know a knot or two but specialty knots are probably unknown to most of us.

Martin Joergensens' site Global FlyFisher is an excellent site with tons of information on fly fishing and tying. Martin's illustrations of the knots seems to be stolen so often that it's probably in the 'stolen without permission section' of the Guinness book of world records and Martin hates that! So I'll just put a link here to his site where the knot section is and you can have a look there. Thanks Martin!

Why do we love fly fishing?

Last weekend my buddy Rolf and I headed for the Weisse Traun in southern Germany. It was our first trip of the year and it turned out to be a very interesting trip indeed. The warm and sunny weather of the past couple of weeks was about to end. Of the three days of fishing we had one day of rain. But all together still a very enjoyable trip.

The gin clear water of the Weisse Traun still blows my mind away. Especially when the sun shines you can see how clear the water is. This also makes a bit hard to sneak up on the fish. Still we managed to catch some very nice sized fish. The second day turned out to be a very wet day. As long as it doesn't rain too hard, the stream stays reasonably clear.

We decided to fish a different stretch on the third day. Since we never really tried the Rote Traun, a tributary of the Weisse & Deutsche Traun, we gave it a shot. Especially since a new much longer upper stretch (4 km) of the stream was added (license wise) to the existing lower stretch (1 km). The lower and upper stretch is divided by a man made dam making interaction between both stretches impossible.

The difference between both stretches are pretty big we found out. While the lower stretch is well known for the nice sized fish, the new stretch appeared to be pretty much yet to be inhabited by the fish, at least any sizable fish. The Rote Traun is also a smaller stream than the Weisse Traun. A short (<7.5 foot) rod makes casting much easier. We were hoping to see some graylings in the Rote Traun, but as in the Weisse Traun we only caught rainbows and browns (= caught in the Weisse Traun BTW). Well, the change of scenery was nice.

We are trying to figure out how to add a video stream to this blog. We filmed some action on the Rote Traun with Rolf's video camera. Fishing with a video camera is really something different than with a (digital) camera since it's such a heavy load. Eventhough the current generation of video camera's came a long way from the huge VHS based trucks, my guess is that in the near future we will see much smaller video camera's. Especially video camera's based on small harddisks will probably make a big difference in weight and size. I won't be surprised if future mobile phones are capable of making really decent video shots. Well, we'll see.

As promised we tried the new yellow colored polarized sunglasses (see posting below) during the low light situations. And boy do they work! The additional contrast and just plain bright view during low light conditions has been a huge help. Just don't forget to take along your regular sunglasses because as soon as the sun starts shining, you're bound to have a very tired eyesight or even a head ache.

This trip showed us again why we love fly fishing. For me it's all about enjoying the friendship, enjoying the solitude and generally having a good laugh.

Polarized sunglasses for low light conditions

During low light conditions like falling dusk, the regular sunglasses are generally too dark. I've never tried photochromatic sunglasses (this feature only works with glass lenses I'm told), but as soon as evening approaches I have to take off my sunglasses to see where my fly is. Obviously this isn't recommended since sunglasses are also a protection for your eyes.

Couple of months ago I was browsing in one of those car accessory shops (for our Dutch vistors: Halfords). There was a shelve with sunglasses and the bright yellow ones caught my attention. Surprisingly these were polarized as well! These 'driving glasses' are supposed to give drivers a better view on the road by taking care of glare as well as giving additional contrast during low light situations. Well, whadayaknow?...

Today I bought one of those yellow polarized sunglasses. They are pretty cheap (about 15 euros / approx. 20 dollars). The quality of the frame is barely adequate. I had to rebend one of the legs since it was off position. But again I will use them only during a couple of hours at the end of the day. These yellow glasses REALLY does add a lot of contrast! Wearing them during sunny conditions will surely give you a banging head ache. But for low light conditions, they probably work great. Keep posted for feed back on this!


*** Update 10 June 2006 ***
I bought sunglasses which are both photochromatic AND made of lightweight polycarbonate glasses. I'll report on these after my trip to the Czech Republic late July.

My 'go-to' flies

Generally I'll fish with some kind of nymph during 80% of the time. Fish feeds for more than 90% under water so that makes sense. Most streams and rivers I fish contain some species of mayflies and caddis. Some streams also inhabits smaller stoneflies like the yellow sally. And of course insects that crawl around the banks and branches that hangs over the banks like hoppers, beetles and ants.

Over the years I trimmed down the numbers of patterns in my fly box to just a several patterns. Even the numbers of sizes are trimmed down to one or two sizes. Since most of the streams I fish in Europe are some kind of freestone type streams, fish don't have the time to observe whether the fly that swims down is the correct size.

My favorite nymph patterns over the years have been pretty consistent, both in European as US/Canadian destinations. Obviously, local patterns won't be neglected. Although I like to keep my fly boxes to a minimum I'll always have enough of these patterns:

* Bead head caddis pupa in some shade of olive.
* Pheasant tail type of nymph (I got rid of the wing-case to save tying time). I prefer darker shades for these nymphs.
* To imitate smaller type stoneflies as well as a general 'attractor nymph' a Prince nymph (with and without bead head).

Another variant on the general may fly nymph is a rubber legged version. I have used many rubber leg nymph patterns over the years and I found them to be very productive, especially when the regular nymphs aren't producing. My guess is that the fish are fed up with the same dish served by fly fishermen and are looking for a nice juicy cheeseburger.

I'll give the nymph a twitch every couple of seconds during a dead drift. This pattern is based on a general may fly type nymph. Basically any nymph pattern can be adapted to a rubber legged version just by adding some strands of rubber around the thorax area. Sizes 10 and up work great as stonefly nymphs.

The remaining 20% of the time, I'll try a dry fly (or a streamer) of some sort to play a different game. Especially spots with nice undercut banks, overhanging brushes and trees are potential areas to switch. Caddis patterns like the Elk hair caddis, CDC & Elk or even a small hopper pattern will work. Parachute style dry flies, both regular style as well as emerger / Klinkhamer styles, will do. The white parachute posts one usually sees in these patterns aren't visible as well as they should. So I changed my posts to a 'hot orange' color. This color is visible both during light and low light conditions. It's even visible when it rides a heavy current.

I just love the big strikes when fishing with hoppers. Last summer I changed my favorite hopper pattern. The Alien Bug is my hopper pattern to go. It's easy to tie, it floats and it's durable. I haven't tried it in Europe since I got back from my US / Canada trip, but I'm sure it will get its share of playing time.

The Humpy is a very versatile dry fly. It's a searching attractor pattern, it can be used as a beetle imitation as well as a general heavy current dry fly since it floats so well. Just have some in your fly box!

I must admit I've never given the good old ant pattern a try so far. Probably because they are so hard to see! There is no doubt that ants are available as a food almost year round. Probably the most common land insect of all. So, I tied a few dozen ants in sizes 18 to 22 this winter. We'll see what happens.

About streamers, I'll come back in a later posting. We have to wait for about a week before heading to southern Germany. Can't wait!

So which are YOUR favourite patterns?