MRO's Intermediate/Advanced Winter Class week three

Had a great time with the guys in the class again last night. So far the class has been pretty streamer heavy, something with which I am totally cool. For a change of pace last night we changed it up and added a few mayflies to the repetoire. With Hendricksons only a few weeks away I decided that would be our target so we busted out the 70 denier and went to town.


Hook: Tiemco 100, size 14
Shuck: ZLon, Mayfly Brown
Body: Stripped quills, ginger and mahogany
Thorax: Superfine Dubbing, mahogany and burnt sulphur yellow
Wing: Dark Dun Snowshoe

First up was an emerger pattern. This will border on sacreligious, but I personally have never been a fan of the way stripped quill dry flies fish (maybe I can get Allen Landheer, John Bonasera, A.K., Dave Brandt and the rest of the Catskills boys to send me some and try to change my mind...). That said, for emergers the quill bodies are the cat's ass! This is a snowshoe hare emerger that I have done very well with through a number of different hatches simply by changing the size and material color.

Hook: Orvis Big Eye straight, size 16

Tail: Deer Body Hair, natural/light dun

Body: Deer Body Hair, mahogany

Thorax: Superfine Dubbing, mahogany

Post: Rainy's Parachute post, 1/16" white

Hackle: Grizzly

The second fly was an extended body parachute. This style fishes like a tank and floats forever...perfect for my tastes. To accomodate the extended body you undersize the hook one size so then the hackle is actually two sizes larger than the hook, but in doing so it is proportional to the size of the full fly. Outside of BWO emergers I have likely caught more trout on this fly than every other mayfly I fish.

Next week we are looking at a few saltwater backcountry flies and probably one more articulated streamer for good measure...maybe one with the Fly Lipps I have on the way!

-mike schmidt

http://www.anglerschoiceflies.com/