Tag Archives: fly fishing

The (Super-Sized) Magog Smelt Flatwing

It would be pretty fair to say that I’ve got a jones for the Magog Smelt. The Magog Smelt is a classic landlocked salmon streamer that originated in Maine. It sports a striking color palette: white, yellow, and purple bucktail. Silver flash accents. Flowing red marabou, offset with barred teal flank and iridescent peacock herl.

Up until a few years ago, I’d never heard of the Magog Smelt. Then one day I was having a conversation with Ken Abrames about old time striper flies, and he told me the Magog Smelt was his father’s favorite fly for Rhode Island bass. So I looked up the pattern and tied a version based on the Ray’s Fly design. The first time I fished that that fly was at night in a breachway, and when I caught a striper on it, I could almost picture Ken’s dad standing on the shore, nodding in approval.

I started playing around with the color scheme of the Magog Smelt in different formats, from soft-hackle to single feather flatwing. They all worked in the salt. Then I got ambitious and tied up a 10” long, nine-feather flatwing. A substantial morsel to tempt the stripers when the big bait is in. Bold. Daring. More of a caricature of a herring than a formal portrait.

And here it is.

The Super-Sized Magog Smelt

Hook: Eagle Claw 253 3/0
Thread: Black
Platform: White bucktail
Support: White neck hackle
Tail: 3 white saddles, under 2 strands pearl flash, under one yellow saddle, under 2 strands pearl flash, under 2 yellow saddles, under 2 strands silver flash, under one lavender saddle under 2 strands silver flash, under one lavender saddle under 2 strands red flash, under one lavender saddle under 2 strands purple flash.
Body: Silver braid
Collar: a 2/3 veil of long white bucktail one hair thick
Throat: Full tip of red marabou
Wing: 30 strands purple bucktail
Topping: 7 long peacock herl strands
Cheek: Teal flank feather tip
Eyes: Jungle cock

A closer look at a fly that fishes big, casts small.

Tying notes: Since I didn’t have the darker purple the original calls for, I used lavender saddles and some deep purple bucktail in the wing. There’s something magical about the effect created by placing the jungle cock over the teal flank cheeks. This fly is tied Razzle-Dazzle style with the flash about an inch longer than the saddles.

You can see the stiff, white neck hackle I’m using for a support along the arm of the vise. A properly constructed big flatwing like this will not be prone to fouling.

Another Good Night For The Five-Weight

“What?”

That was my wife’s response, delivered with no small amount of incredulity – or was it sympathy – when I told her I was going fishing tonight. I really couldn’t blame her. After all, I had been traveling home from Florida all day. Now it was evening, and I was on the phone with her, calling on a New Haven-bound Amtrak from Manhattan. I wouldn’t be home for another two hours, and then it’d be another two hours before I could leave.

But, you get to used to the oddball treatment from people who don’t obsess over tide times, heights, moons, and river levels like you do. Even if you’re married to them.

I hadn’t fished in over a week, so I had it bad for some stripers. Tonight would be a perfect night for the five weight rod. Not too windy, and the prospect of a striper in the 15 pound class. I attached a fresh 30-pound test leader about eight feet long to the line, then tied on a Herr Blue flatwing about eleven inches long from nose to flash. Everything looked just right.

Not even a nighttime roadwork traffic jam could slow my spirits. I ended up getting my spot ten minutes late. So what? The fish would still be around.

The current on the outgoing tide was moving at a slow walking pace. In what little ambient light there was, I could see the intricate cake-frosting swirls of the eddies as they passed over the hidden bottom structure. I tried to guess the water temperature with my index finger. 58? 62? The thermometer said 59 degrees. Not a bad couple guesses.

I began by working a deep little run between the rocks. Herring swirled near the surface right in front of me. I tried a few dead drifts, almost like high-stick nymphing, but there were no strikes. So I began to methodically walk down-current, greased line swinging the whole way.

The fish in this section of river tend to hit on or about my second mend, but forty minutes had gone by without a tap. The drill was comforting. Cast. Immediately throw an upstream mend. Then another. Let the fly swing around. Swim, pulse, and dance it in the current. A few short strips, then let it fall back. Even fishless, the presentation was pleasant and meditative. A glance at my watch showed it was well into the wee hours, and I was out here all by myself.

Except for her.

She took the fly as they often do on the greased line, slowly, with full confidence, inhaling the Herr Blue near the head, then turning back toward the bottom. I felt it as a sudden change in pressure on the line. Subtle, nuanced, yet distinctive from the unimpeded drift. No demonstrative WHACK! No explosion on the membrane between water and air. Not yet. I came fully tight to the line with a backward thrusting motion. The hook point found its seat in the corner of her mouth. Right where it was supposed to be.

Now she becomes unhinged, tail thrashing at the surface. At first, I’m unsure how large the striper is, and I under-guesstimate her to be in the 24”class. She’s moving toward me, and I’m hand stripping her in. Once she reaches the edge of the sand bar and discovers she no longer has the comfort of depth to rely on, she lets me know that hand stripping will be ill-advised. The fish begins her first run, taking the slack line out of my shooting basket through my thumb and forefinger at a jerky, frantic pace.

The drag protests as more line is peeled off. I ratchet things down a little tighter, and that stops her. Just to be sure, I re-set the hook. Line is regained, lost, and regained. She’s tantalizingly close now, about twenty feet out, but not quite finished.

Her last defense is her undoing. To escape the shallows of the sand bar I’m standing on, she heads for the deepest nearby water, which happens to be upstream. Between the current and the pressure I put on her, she tires quickly.

As I cradle her in the water, I wonder how many herring she’d eaten that night? Our time is all too brief together, not only the fight, but the release as well. I don’t have her in the revival position for more than a few seconds before she thrusts out of my hands and melts away from the beam of my headlamp into the darkness.

I climbed into bed around 4am. The birds were singing. I was, too. All the way home.

Miss Piggy poses for posterity. “Dang,” she’s thinking, “I really thought that was a herring.” For perspective, the fly, a Herr Blue flatwing, is about 11″ long.

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A close-up of the Herr Blue flatwing.

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This piece was written in May, 2012, and originally appeared in several online fishing forums.

Today’s Blue Plate Special: the Rhody Flatwing

The Rhody Flatwing is an old pattern that was developed by Bill Peabody (of Bill’s Bodi-Braid fame). Being a Rhode Islander, Bill is said to have drawn his inspiration from fellow Ocean Staters Ken Abrames (flatwing design template) and Ray Bondorew (Ray’s Fly colors).

The result is pattern that makes a superb generic baitfish imitation. By altering the size of the fly, the tyer can match all manner of baits. The original pattern calls for a sparse tie. You can see from the picture that what I’ve used is more than enough material. Also note that there are no eyes on this fly – they’re just not necessary. Of course, if you must have eyes, jungle cock would be the appropriate choice.

This dozen was tied for a local fly shop, and the flies are about 5” long. Delicious!

A Dozen Rhody Flatwings

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Hook: Eagle Claw 253 1/0-3/0
Thread: White 6/0
Support: 30 hairs white bucktail
Pillow: White
Tail: 2 strands gold Flashabou under yellow or olive saddle hackle
Body: Pearl braid (Bill’s if you’re going for homage and tradition)
Collar: 30 hairs short white bucktail on bottom, 30 hairs long white bucktail on top
Wing: 15 hairs yellow bucktail under 8 hairs light blue bucktail under sparse olive Krystal Flash under 20 hairs olive bucktail
Topping: 5-7 strands peacock herl

Tying notes: The Eagle Claw 253 is a classic hook choice for flatwings. It is light and has a short shank that helps prevent fouling. You can use either an olive or yellow saddle –well, heck, you can use whatever colors you like. Try all black. Try all white with a hint of pink or chartreuse. I like a hollower, springy bucktail fiber for the support on this fly. I made the collars an even length because that’s what looked right to me. Adding flash to a fly is like applying cologne: easy does it. Less is more.

Thanks to the FRAA for hosting me tonight

Tonight I gave a presentation at the Farmington River Anglers Association meeting on wild brook trout and fishing small streams. I’d like to thank the group for their hospitality and welcoming spirit. I had a lot of fun.

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If your group is looking for a speaker, I currently have presentations on the Farmington River and Wild Brook Trout/Small Streams. I hope to be adding Wet Fly Fishing and perhaps Striped Bass on the Fly in the near future.

The Crazy Menhaden three-feather flatwing

This flatwing draws its inspiration from Ken Abrames’ classic streamer, the Crazy Menhaden.

The original pattern calls for eleven saddles. But what if you don’t have all the right colors? Or, what if you have precious few saddles? One solution – the one I’ve chosen here – is to use bucktail instead of saddles to complete the proper color blend that makes this such an attractive fly.

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For this version of the Crazy Menhaden I’m using one white, one yellow, and one orange saddle to anchor the center of the fly, add length, and provide the swimming action flatwings are renowned for. (The exception is the biggest fly pictured, which has eight saddles.) The bucktail on the top half of the fly is tied like a Blonde, at the tail end of the shank and near the head. These fibers provide the bulk of the color and content, along with some flashabou accents and long peacock herl. The beige and yellow bucktail throat and sides remain true to the original pattern.

Along with the saddles, the rest of the color palette is bronze, pink, ginger, red, blue, chartreuse, olive, light green, and copper. The largest fly here is 12″ long; the smallest, just a bit over 7″.

I’ve had a lot of success with this fly at night on our rivers here in Connecticut. I like to fish it during the bottom of the tide, on a greased line swing.

You can find the original pattern in Ken’s book, A Perfect Fish, on page 93. When it comes to fly fishing and fly tying, I don’t usually speak in imperatives. But if you’re interested in flatwings and you don’t have this book, you need to get it. It’s the flatwing bible.

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Hook: Eagle Claw 253 3/0
Thread: Tan
Platform: Orange and yellow bucktail, mixed
Support: White neck hackle
Tail: Natural white saddle, under 2 strands copper flash, under a yellow saddle under an orange saddle, under 2 strands red flash, under 30 total hairs ginger, pink and violet bucktail, mixed, under 20 total hairs pink and chartreuse bucktail, mixed, under 2 strands green flash under 20 total hairs blue and red bucktail, mixed.
Body: Bronze braid
Collar: Beige bucktail on bottom, yellow and beige bucktail, mixed, on sides
Wing: 15 hairs orange bucktail under 30 hairs olive bucktail
Topping: Peacock herl
 Eyes: Jungle cock

 A closer look at the head detail and the color blends:

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A Classic Bergman Wet: The Fontinalis Fin

This is a fly with a great backstory.

The Fontinalis Fin Wet Fly

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Hook: 6-16 (this is a 1x short, 2x strong Orvis 1641 size 10)
Thread: Black
Tail: White hackle fibers
Body: Orange wool with fine gold tinsel rib
Throat: Furnace hackle fibers
Wing: Orange mallard married to a thin strip of black or natural grey mallard, then a slightly thicker strip of white mallard

The old-timers up in Maine (or down East, if you’re going for authenticity) who were fishing for brookies thought their quarry was highly territorial. So after they creeled a fish, they’d clip off one of the fins and use it for bait. And what an attractive bait it was: shiny, deep orange, contrasted against dramatic black and white bands.

An enterprising fly tyer named Phil Armstrong realized he could replicate this bait in the form of a married-quill wing wet fly. And thus was born the Fontinalis Fin. “Fontinalis” from the second half of the brook trout’s taxonomic name, Salvelinus fontinalis. “Fin” for rather obvious reasons. What a brilliant concept.

The real McCoy

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While it’s tempting to look at the flies featured in the color plates of Berman’s Trout (this fly appears on plate 10) as more of an exercise in tying legerdemain than practical fish catchers, I can tell you from experience that this fly does work. It’s pretty simple as far as married quill wings go, and the rest of the pattern is something anyone with basic tying skills can do.

Tying notes: If you’ve never tied a quill wing, don’t start. Your first quill wing can be the fly-tying equivalent of the Bataan Death March. While I was kidding (mostly) about not starting, I think it took me over a half hour to tie my first quill wing — and that was accompanied by a generous use of rather colorful language. Once you get it, though, the process becomes easier. I’m often asked at classes and demos, ‘How do you glue the different quill sections together?” You don’t. The edges of quill fibers are like velcro — they stick together quite nicely. There’s a specific technique to matching quills (the wings should be a mirror reflection of one another) and marrying the sections. Perhaps someday I’ll post them. In the meantime, you can probably find a good how-to by doing a web search. Also, the quill wings should sit a little higher on the shank so as to not hide the body; I was in a rush to finish this fly, so I plead sloth.

The Catskill Wet Fly

I first learned of the Catskill when I read Ray Bergman’s classic, Trout. While it lacks the garish palette of the majority of the flies that appear on the color plates at the beginning of the book, the Catskill is nonetheless an attractive fly – albeit in a rather understated way.

There’s something seductive and buggy about wood duck. The soft brown hen hackle will collapse and pulse in the current, contrasting nicely against the orange floss body. It’s easy to imagine this as an over-sized caddis. Or at least as something that looks alive, and good to eat.

I tied it large, but I can see going down to about a 16 or so with this fly. Although I have not yet fished it, I already have supreme confidence that it will be a fish catcher.

You can, too.

The Catskill

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Hook: 1x short, 2x strong size 8-16 (this is an Orvis 1641 size 10)
Thread: Black
Tail: Wood duck
Body: Orange floss under brown hen, palmered
Wing: Wood duck

The Kate McLaren Wet Fly

Ah, Kate-O, my little not-so-yellow friend.

Every year, I’m on the lookout for new flies to tie and fish. My friend Jon, who’s been wet fly-fishing forever, also happens to be from the UK. So he’s been exposed to a broad cross-cultural mix of patterns. When I asked him for some suggestions, he immediately offered up the Kate McLaren. It’s fair to say that I liked Kate the moment I laid eyes on her.

The Kate McLaren is a Scottish loch fly, intended to be the top dropper (or bob fly) on a team of three. While its traditional use is on still water, I’m going to be fishing this on rivers. And while I might give it some time as a top dropper, it’s going to get the lion’s share of action on point.

There’s something about the contrast of the golden pheasant crest tail and the dark body that I find magnetically appealing. Golden pheasant crest almost glows when wet. Who knows what a fish will think this fly is – perhaps a flash of spotted salamander, or a chubby stonefly – but I can’t wait to feel that first take.

Kate McLaren

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Hook: 8-14 (this is a 1x short, 2x strong Orvis 1641 size 10)
Thread: Black
Tail:  Golden pheasant crest
Body: Black seal fur (I used angora goat)
Rib:  Fine oval silver tinsel
Body Hackle: Black rooster (I used soft hen)
Head hackle:  Brown rooster (ditto on the hen)

Tying notes: Technically, this is a Kate McLaren variant since I used soft hen instead of stiffer rooster hackle. Since I primarily intend to fish this fly subsurface, I wanted the action the soft hackle would provide. When finishing the body, I tied the black hackle in near the head, leaving the thread at the tie-in point, and then wound the hackle backwards toward the tail. I then secured the hackle with the tinsel, and wrapped it forward to the thread. Also note that the black hackle is smaller than the brown. Some of the Kates I’ve seen have a longer tail, but I like the proportions of this one. I got lazy on the head and left it rough. As Dave Hughes said, trout aren’t interested in neatness.

Rescheduling of 2/16 Wet Fly Tying Class

The Wet Flies and Fuzzy Nymphs class at UpCountry Sportfishing in New Hartford, CT originally scheduled for last Saturday has been rescheduled for Sunday, February 24, 9am-2pm. There are a couple spaces still available. Contact the store at 860-379-1952 to enroll.

Speaking of wet flies, I have a few new patterns to post. I’ll try to get them up soon.

A new flatwing from the Culton bench: the Rock Island

Rock Island Flatwings

Depending on your cultural exposure, Rock Island Line is a blues, country, or skiffle song. I won’t go into the details of the story, but there’s a railroad and a train involved. It takes place ‘way down south, miles away from the Metro North line, but that’s the route I take when business calls in the City. That train parallels the shoreline, and it goes over plenty of marshy, salty estuaries — you know, the kind stripers like to hang out in. If you’re a bass angler, you can’t help but notice them, especially that rocky island right next to the channel that’s just got to be holding some decent size fish.

The Rock Island is a flatwing bucktail hybrid about 8″ long. Like a lot of the flies I make up, the tying process wandered around a bit before the pattern discovered where it wanted to be. For example, I started with black thread, then switched to purple. Then changed some of the bucktail color blends. I really like the contrast in this fly from bottom to top.

The Rock Island will get fished on a greased line swing on a cool May night when the herring are in. A’board!

A closer look at the head detail:

Rock Island CU

Thread: Purple
Pillow: Pink
Platform: Gray bucktail
Tail: Pink saddle, under 2 strands blue flash, under lavender saddle, under blue saddle, under 2 strands red flash, under 30 total hairs royal blue, amber, and olive bucktail (mixed), under 20 total hairs dark blue and red bucktail (mixed), under 2 strands purple flash, under 20 strands purple bucktail.
Body: Purple braid
Collar: Pale blue, light blue, and gray bucktail, mixed
Wing: 15 strands purple and 30 strands black bucktail, mixed
Topping: 7-8 strands peacock herl
Eyes: Jungle cock