Evidently I was quite a productive tier when I couldn’t fish due to time, work, and heart problems (all in the past!). I found a box of black and blackberry mohair leeches, some damsel flies some ants, 3 worms, and a bunch of “leeches” with sparkle and multicolors. Several years ago I read a blog post at Singlebarbed.com about tying and trying patterns using a brand of yarn (I don’t remember it’s name). However, he stated that we don’t really know what fish see so the sparkle and seemingly random colors should be worth a try. I tied up a couple of dozen but never have used them. Perhaps they should be my “go to fly” on my bike trip across America.
Also, evidently, I must have thought that midges were the way to go at Lewiston Lake. So, I tied up a bunch, sizes 16 and 18, bead heads on the right at bead free on the left. There are black, red, maroon, olive, peacock herl, plain thorax, gold beads, clear beads, black beads, thread bodies, Sulky Holoshimmer bodies, rubber bodies, and some really cool ones that are red at the base and morphs into black towards the head. I tied a lot of flies.
There are more than 200 midges in the box, at 3 minutes per fly, that is 600 minutes or 10 hours of tying. I must have been really bored and / or motivated. I actually have a throat tube to wash out a fish’s mouth to determine what midges have recently been consumed. I’ve never used it but now that I can release a fish in my net without taking it out of the water, it may be the time to try to “match the hatch” on the midges the trout are feeding on
These flies are worthless unless they make it into my vest. They will join my on the water arsenal today.
Tight Lines!