Fly of the month (South America)
What fly works best for this time of year in and around South Ameria
4.1.09
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
skip to main |
skip to sidebar
Labels
- Africa (1)
- Canada (1)
- Classics (1)
- Europe (1)
- International Fly Fishing Guides (1)
- New Zealand (1)
- North America (1)
- South Africa (1)
- South America (1)
- United kingdom (1)
About Me
- Joe "Mad about fly fishing" average
- This page is born out of a passion for fly fishing and for the bugs that we tie at the end of our leaders. If you think about it... ...it doesn't matter what altra light custom made rod with double tapered line and 100% flurocarbon tippet you have, if the fly is wrong they are not going to bite and them biting is what we want :) Tight lines
2 comments:
Wild and Woolly All-Season Success in South America
Can you say that ten times fast? Neither can I, so let's talk about fly fishing! If you're packing (or dreaming about packing) for an exotic trout fishing getaway to South America, chances are you're occupying your time imagining what kind of newfangled gizmos and accoutrements you might need to successfully navigate a foreign country. Whether it disappoints or relieves you, I'm here to say that you can mark “newfangled/exotic flies” off of your shopping list. Why? Because there's a versatile oldie but goody of the fly box that will serve you just as well, if not better than, pretty much any other fly you might buy or tie. It's the Woolly Bugger, and if you haven't heard of it, you're probably not packing for a fly fishing trip anywhere!
Italian guide Armando Quazzo says of the Woolly Bugger: “Should freshwater be found on Mars, Martian trout would rise to a well-presented Woolly Bugger.” He's not exaggerating. As with any good fabled figure, nobody can say for sure what the origins of the Woolly Bugger are. Some people believe it was developed in the 1800's while others say it didn't come around until the 1920's. It may have come from Missouri, or it may have come from Mars. What's known for sure is that the Bugger has met with both universal fame and universal disregard. Let me put it this way: anglers who want to catch fish and don't give a whit about how their fly looks or what its historical value might be will use a Woolly Bugger; anglers caught up in being high tech, modern, or any variation thereof—in other words, anglers who might not want to catch fish as badly as they think—will turn up their noses at the Bugger. There's no denying that a Woolly Bugger isn't the most interesting thing to look at, but flies aren't for us to look at, they're for fish to look at, and when a fish looks at a Woolly Bugger, it has but one thought: food. The beauty of the nondescript Bugger is that it resembles so many of a trout's favorite meals—everything from damsel nymphs to crayfish, sculpins to stone flies, hellgrammites to fry. This brand of versatility is not to be taken for granted by a traveling angler!
Tie your Buggers in a variety of sizes and colors so you can find the one that works best for you on any given day. In South America, Buggers are used primarily for lake fishing, and guides there recommend Buggers tied with no. 2, 4, 6 hooks and tell us the most popular colors are olive, black, and brown. The fly is weighted with lead wire and cast from a boat in the shallows, just over the “drop off” where the lake starts to get deep. It is then allowed to drop for a only a moment before it is stripped jerkily back towards the boat, hopefully with a fish in hot pursuit! When the going is good, it's been reported that as many as five trout will pursue a Bugger all at once with either victorious or disastrous (but humorous) results. Pretty un-boring action for a “boring” little fly, eh? Tie a couple dozen and tear em' up!
South American Protocol: Big, Ugly Fly=Big, Beautiful Trout
There's probably not a one of you out there who would fail to acknowledge fly fishing as an art—the perfect cast and retrieve, the morning mist over an icy river, the meticulous skill and intuition it takes to tie an effective fly, and the glossy beauty of a big rainbow rising to sip at your fly...
What if I told you that it's time to dispense with the niceties, do away with the proprieties, and get nasty? The fly you're about to meet isn't a thing of beauty. There's no glinting gold thread, elegant peacock feathers, or silky rabbit's fur. This fly is made of foam, rubber, and more foam. It's like something out of a cheap horror movie or a dime machine...and it works. It's called the Chernobyl Ant, and it's one of the top-recommended flies for summertime trout fishing in South America.
Created by a mad scien--errr--a Utah fly fisherman named Emett Heath, the Chernobyl Ant was originally designed for clobbering cutthroat trout in the western United States. Due to its wild success (and, let's be honest, its strangely attractive ugliness), the Chernobyl Ant has become a necessity around the globe and plays no favorites when it comes to species, water temperature, or weather conditions. It's at the top of every South American guide service recommendation list for an effective December (summer!) fly, and for good reason. South American trout are monsters, and they deserve/desire a monstrous fly to match their attitudes and appetites. The Chernobyl is a monster of a dry fly through and through, imitating an unlucky cricket, beetle, ant, grasshopper, or katydid struggling on the surface of the water. This kind of easy, meaty prey is like a Big Mac for a trout large enough to handle it.
Fishing a Chernobyl Ant couldn't be anymore straightforward. In water with a slow current, cast and let the fly drift, preferably over a deep pool, twitching it every now and then to imitate a terrified insect. If you're in a boat, cast towards the shore, allowing the Ant to float into weedy patches and alongside logs, boulders, etc. If you have any problems at all with the Ant, it will be the fact that about half the time, it will land on its back when cast. A flick will often right it. Also, check the hook's position after a strike to make sure it hasn't slipped sideways. If anyone laughs at you for bringing your Chernobyl Ant down to the river, don't say a word. Just flick it out there, give em' a smile, and hang on tight!
Post a Comment