Countdown part 3 - and the rest....

Less than 1 week to go now and preparations are well under way. I've added some more trout-tempting morsels to my armoury including some Midge emergers and Baetis nymphs and adults. I'm still focused very much and the small end of the size spectrum as I'm enjoying using my new vice with its "midge jaws".

One of my regular go-to flies last season was a tungsten head Pheasant Tail Nymph (PTN) which is a highly versatile nymph representation. I make these up in sizes 16 down to 22 and usuually add some flash to the thorax. The type of tungsten bead I use varies also from black, to gold and to silver. This has been a real fish-catcher for me in the past so I always make sure I have some tied and ready to go.


#20 Pheasant Tail Nymphs

These PTNs should take fish when the early spring Large Dark Olive hatches are underway. During these hatches and when the trout start looking upwards for their food, emerger and adult representation should bring success. I've prepared some RS2 designs in various shades of olive with size #20 and #22 hooks. These are really simple to tie so a great choice when starting fly-tying at the small end of the scale. I found the micro-fibbets (tails) a bit fiddly at first, but there's a great video (here) on how to tie a RS2 which really helped me. It includes a really neat tip on using the tag-end of your thread to split the tails.



#20 Olive RS2

On the midge front, I've expanded on the larvae imitations from the previous post to include some pupae and emerger representations that should be fished higher in the water as midge hatches develop. Here are two examples - a grey midge emerger with some UV Krystal Flash as the main trigger point; and black spider patterns with a small soft hen hackle plus a little flash for a trigger point.

#22 Grey Midge Emerger

#22 Black Spiders with a flash trigger

Finally, I'm doing some research into March Brown patterns so I hope to post some new ties in the next 'Countdown' entry.