How many fly patterns????

[Steve Totten]

Monday was gorgeous, warm sun, no wind, and Blue Gills were biting.  I used three or four different flies.

Over the past couple months it has been too cold or windy to fish, I've been tying a few flies just to deep busy, I've probably tied twenty different patterns in a variety of sizes.  Leads me to this question, how many different flies do you use in a days fishing? 

When I find a fly that gets eaten,  that is the one I throw until it doesn't produce any more.

[Greg McWilliams]

I have a bunch of boxes of flies, but when it comes down to an OUTING, I will use about 6 til I find one that works !!!!!!! If those don't work then I will find a fly I only have one of, that is usually the ticket!!!!!!

SO MANY FLIES, SO LITTLE TIME!!!!!!!!!

[David, aka, "McScruff"]

"If those don't work then I will find a fly I only have one of, that is usually the ticket!!!!!!" - Funny Greg!

[Allen Morgan]

I know you should "match the hatch".  I will try, but, I know what's been working for me the past few weeks.  Scuds, size 12, in either Olive or Orange.  I've been fishing them suspended under a Deer Hair Caddis.  Occasionally a 'gill will take a slap at the DHC, but won't hook up.  I have been seeing fish hit emerging Midges.  I do have some Griffith's Gnats, but they're to small for me to see at the distance I'm fishing them.  I have tied up a parachute midge, but haven't tried to fish it yet.

That said, when the water warms up, I expect it to be a repeat of last year, poppers (although I doubt I'll be buying any more of them), GFA Grasshoppers in various colors, and some Bead Chain Wooly Buggers in Olive.

I've tied a BUNCH of different patterns over the winter.  If I get in on a hot bite, I'll have to try these different bugs to get some confidence in them.

[Donald Schmotzer]

  I always carry too many different patterns with me,(maybe 40) but I almost always end up fishing the same 3 to 5 patterns that I have the most confidence in. If I have fished more than 8 or 9 patterens, you can bet it is a VERY slow day. The only exception is when the fishing is so good, (after catching starts to get boring " I love that")  I will try new patterns .........but I know that on such a good day, that is not a valid test for my new patterns...........Don in SC

[Mark Stine]

I love swaps, if I don't join any more swaps this year I will still get over 300 different flies. This is a lot to pick from, wish I could try them all to see which one works best.  I carry a couple hundred in the boat but I usually tie on a popper or chernobyl ant when they are hitting top water, then go deep with a Gronaw's grass shrimp tipped with something, or a bead head nymph as the day heats up.  I will switch up colors and sizes until I find the winner. Even with trading colors and sizes I probably fish with 10 or less in a day. I carry multiples of my favorites because I loose a lot to snags, tree fish, and etc. for instance I will carry ants in 3 different colors shoot for a half dozen each. 90% of my fishing is with the fly rod. Sometimes I will use the kayak and might be limited by room and only carry one box of like 50.

[Bill Purmort]

Steve,

I'm pretty much like you, I have gobs of flies, sizes and color combos...I think part of my issue is that I like to tie them almost as much as I like fishing them.

I have a go to box that I never leave home without...pretty simple stuff, haresears, leeches, wooly buggers, spiders, san juan worms and poppers

then I have the box that contains about 40 dry flies in case I come acros a hatch of some sort ...lots of blue wing olives, adams caddis

then the box of the group that doesn't quite fit...foam, bead chain eyes, marabou...blah blah blah...experiments for sure.

To think of it, I've caught fish on all of it ...which is the reason I carry it....

Great question...it got me thinking and now I'm off to take a serious look at my boxes...either I missing something or I need to go fishing.

 

Bill

[Allen Morgan]

I know that in my previous post on this thread, I said I was expecting this year to pretty much be a repeat of last year.

BOY WAS I WRONG!!!

The pond at my job, for all intents and practical purposes, is dead.  Two months ago, Maintenance asked the grounds-keepers to spray the pond with a chemical to kill off the algae.  Well, the algae is gone, the water is a weird color, and no one has caught any fish since.  I don't think they're totally dead, as I can sometimes hear a small fish sucking down a bug, but it's always deep in the weeds.

On top of that, I haven't really been fishing for sunnies that much this summer.  I started chasing LMB, both on-the-fly and with lures.  Then, we got a weird late flood coming down the river, and I took advantage of that to target some Catfish, followed by Crappie.

I've finally started catching more sunnies again, but it's been on almost completely different bugs than last year.  I was using Deer Hair Caddis flies, with a small Scud under that early.  Then, I found a pattern for a damselfly nymph that proved to be deadly.  Recently, I've found a pattern for a foam "bug" that looks like a cross between a hopper and a spider, but the way the foam is tied and cut gives it a cupped face, so it pops, gurgles, and spits water just like a Pop-R topwater for LMB.  I've got three sizes tied up, and I've been catching LMBs and various sunnies on it.  I've also started using a couple different Emergent Midge patterns, one with a foam strike indicator, and the other is a parachute-style bug that is highly visible, and deadly effective.

[David, aka, "McScruff"]

I wish I knew half of what you just said.

But I sure would like to see pics of that popper, damsel nymph, parachute bug and emerger