Fly Fishing for Beginners: What Fly do I use

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Fly Fishing for Beginners
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Fly Fishing From Scratch

Selecting flies can be a difficult task. With the thousands of different patterns in existence, and the dozens of different patterns that may be in your fly box now it can be overwhelming. When your on the river and your first and second choice flies just aren’t working there may be a few things to consider.

Are you matching the hatch

Fish like to eat food that their used to. If they see something that is even remotely close to the food that they eat on a regular basis, then chances are you’ll get a bite or two. However, the more realistic it is, the more bites you’ll get. I’m not telling you to go out and buy a fly that is the exact replica, but you need to match color, size, and general shape (wings, body, tail) in order to bring more bites.

To match these food sources you’ll need something to match.

• If you already know what they are feeding on then great, but if not…
• try looking around and under rocks for food sources.
• Think of the bait fish that are in the water, and try to match a general size.
• Look for flies that are buzzing the top of the water and try to match one.
• If you see a fly on the top of the water and a fish takes it, then use this fly over all others. This will get you results because your sure that at least some fish are eating these flies.

If matching doesn’t work improvise

Try looking for bugs and insects that are around the water match them. If this doesn’t work, then it comes time to improvise. Try thinking of what the fish you’re trying to catch eats on a regular basis. This is a list of some of the more common aspects in flies that bass, trout and pike eat.

Bass

• Like bright colors in the spring time when the water is murky or on cloudy days, and darker colors on the brighter days.
• Worm and fish imitating lures work great for these fish if you’re wanting to fish a wet fly. Flashy, fish-like lures work great at all times of the season.
• Poppers and oter top water lures that make a lot of disturbance also work great for these fish.

Trout

• Trout love flying insects and their nymphs. They also like worm like insects. Some of the wet flies I like to use are prince nymphs, wooly buggers, san juan worms, copper johns, muddler minnows, and caddis fly imitators.
• When it comes to dry flies places vary greatly for trout. Some of the flies I like to use are wolfs, humpys, hoppers, addams, and mosquitoes.
• In most cases nymphs and dry flies with a small amount of flashy colors will attract fish more. Don’t shy away from using pinks, purples, oranges, reds, and flashy tinsels or flashy bead heads just because thry aren’t the right color. These flies work great in my experience because they stand out.

Pike

• Pike love large flies that imitate fish, frogs and even mice. These flies make a lot of noise on the surface and the fish are usually brightly colored.
• Using large, flashy flies under the surface will increase your odds, but on bright days I find large, dark colored flies work the best.
• If you’re fishing top water use large flies that make a lot of ripples and make some noise. Pike are attracted to movement and noise, so these flies should work well.
• Some of the flies I like to use for pike are perch, sun fish and white colored fish-like streamers, frog and mice top water flies, and large poppers of any color with long tails coming off the back.
  Fly Fishing for Beginners
  Fly Fishing Guide Book
  Fly Fishing From Scratch

Fly fishing for Beginners: Presenting the Fly on slow moving water bodies

A long name for this post, but a fairly short post today. Today I will be dealing with the presentation of a fly on the slower moving bodies of water, and the tips and tricks you can use to catch more fish with this method.

If this article isn’t quite what your looking for you can always go the the available links below and learn a whole lot more about fly fishing. These sites contain a whole lot of information on how to fly fish… And yes, some are E-books and cost money, but I assure you they are worth the money.

Fly Fishing for Beginners
Fly Fishing Guide Book
Fly Fishing From Scratch

Anyways… When it comes to fishing the slower waters on well established, slow moving rivers and lakes there are only a couple of tips that I can offer you, simply because these waters differ from one another so greatly.

The first tip I have is finding out croppings and vegetation were the fish will most likely be. Most fish will hold to some type of cover, weather it be a rocky point, or thick vegetation. They will do this for several reasons, to hide, to hunt, etc., but they also will venture out of that comfort zone for food. They never move to far away from these covers though, so find them and fish them.

Once you find these areas you need to get your fly placement at the level in which the fish are feeding. This can vary greatly, and the only way to figure it out is by testing with the different levels. The easiest way to discover were their feeding is if you see them jumping. That would be top water, and fish accordingly. However, if their not rising, then you need to go down with a wet fly. Experiment with different depths by moving your indicator up and down if you are using one, or if you are stripping line, let your fly sit for different periods of time before stripping it in.

If you are using an indicator, let the fly sit. No movement is necessary when fishing this way on slow moving waters. The small, choppy waves will bounce your fly up and down, and attract fish far better than any other method.

I hope this post was helpful to you, but if you still need something more try these sites. They offer free information, and if you decide to go for the e-books, they offer a far more extensive breakdown of the things I’m talking about here, with a lot more tips for catching big fish.

Fly Fishing for Beginners
Fly Fishing Guide Book
Fly Fishing From Scratch