Friday Fly Day - Bling Bling

So we all know that fish spend most of their time feeding subsurface, and on either something small and dark or big and green it makes sense then to fill your boxes with nothing but small PT and Hares Ear variants, Kyles Deleatidium, Killer Caddis and Silly Stones. But does it?

There are many situations, even on Southlands most notorious hatch driven fisheries where I reach for something bright and ‘out there’, when fishing safe patterns just aren’t cutting it, for example:

• When fish aren’t doing much... give them something out of the norm. If they see it, they have only two choices: yes and no.
• When the nymph drift is heavy. You may finally get the perfect drift, but then your size 16 quill bandits or pheasant tails become lost amongst the dozens of naturals drifting down into his foraging area. What makes yours stand out?
• In discoloured flows. Sure, trout will still locate naturals, but why not give them a helping hand?

I regularly fish a bright ‘bling fly’ trailed by my small, dark natural simply to get the fish looking in the right direction. He will see my Orange bead or purple collar, it stands out. If he doesn’t want that, 12-24 inches behind is a subtle Kyles Deleatidium or similar. At least now he is looking in the right direction.

Fish are more likely to spook because of crap presentations than something colourful tumbling down the drift, so check out some of these puppies and load a few into that fly patch.

OTB Hare and Copper

River Ninja Purple

BH Batman

Purple Nosebleed