Top Five Fly Patterns for Winter

I am sure a lot of you guys have heard of Hatch Magazine, if not I thought I would share a blog post that was written back in November of this past year. The post details the top five fly patterns for the winter months. I use some of the same patterns that were mentioned in his post, but what I found interesting is the various comments he received from his readers.

I have become a fan of Jonathan Barnes Fly Fishing Videos. His videos are filled with lots of information about the type of flies, equipment, and the techniques he uses to land the different trout species he is pursuing. If you are free for the next 25 minutes this one video featuring soft hackles is worth the watch.

  

Fishing The Soft Hackle During a Feeding Frenzy

A quick Saturday morning trip to the Sipsey proved to be productive using the soft hackle. I was not in any big hurry to get on the tailrace this Saturday, because the humidity and fog were heavy. I forgot to mention the crowds. Generators were scheduled to be running at 1 PM so the 2 hours I had needed to be spent wisely. My plan was to spend all my time in two areas right above the pump station. Both spots always have trout and today were no exception. As usual, the trout were in a subsurface feeding mode and feeding on tiny brown midge flies. As I stood there and watched the feeding frenzy I notice other anglers casting above and below me. My little area only covered roughly 100 ft. so I staked the area out and stayed put. Needless to say there were a lot of anglers on the Sipsey today.

I got somewhat irritated with the canoes, kayaks, and even an aluminum boat floating in all the areas that everyone was trying to fish. I’ve never seen any watercraft during the weekdays, I guess that tells me something???

I always get pumped when I can get some action on the dries, so with the size 18 Gnat I gave the dries their due, but to no avail. My first strange-looking wide-body trout of the morning, in fact, I thought I had landed a small skipjack.

The real reason for this Saturday morning trip was to fish some of the soft hackles Alan tied for me a couple of weeks ago. I know I could have waited until the weekdays with less traffic, but I was like a kid with a new toy I just had to play. Even a Geezer can still be a kid at heart!!!

  Structure slowed the midge drift down and that was the area where the heavy feeding was occurring.

Another rainbow which couldn’t resist the silver hackle; this morning the trout was taking the hackle a little different as opposed to previous trips. No drift takes today, all the hits occurred as I was working the soft hackle back across the feeding area. No indicator, just a slow retrieve tight lining. Numerous rainbows landed today using the 3 weight.

One beat up fly pattern after a mornings work. As I’ve said many times the Sipsey is pressured every day with lots of fly fishermen especially on weekends; so when one finds a pattern that will produce they better guard it. I found that pattern this morning in Alan’s soft hackle