Ultra-realistic patterns

[Stevie-B]

My wife bought me the book "Fly Fishing Pressured Water" by Llyod Gonzales for Christmas last year. I really enjoy the book and have incorporated a lot of his techniques into my own tying. My question(s) is, does anyone tie and fish ultra-realistic patterns on a regular basis? Is it necessary or is it another case of selling to the angler?

 

[Fishidiot]

When I think of "ultra realistic" patterns I think of stonefly nymphs with individual antennae, eyes, and six perfect legs - something suitable for display in a glass case, rather than fishing.

However, I do like realistic patterns and think that sometimes adding some detail to a fly - esp streamer flies - can trigger fish that are keyed on a certain shape, color, or movement. This is true for bass as well as trout. Realistic sculpins, crayfish, stonecats, and helgrammites get some nice trout and smallies for me. I've also spent years trying to design the perfect crab fly for saltwater flats. I think the challenge with realistic flies for actual fishing is to ensure that they're tied in a manner that allows them to move and breath in the water without being too rigid or stiff. Hence rubber legs, zonker strips, thick fuzzy dubbing,and esp marabou, remain staples of my streamers even though they're tied to imitate specific prey species. In the final analysis, however, this affinity for realistic flies is largely, I think, a matter of personal preference. Most of the time, presentation of the fly and the general impression it makes are bigger factors in success than exactness of imitation.

This is all part of the fascination, beauty, and art.... of fly tying.

 

[DGC]

I saw the book cover when it first came out and ignored it because of the price tag and because of its emphasis on realistic tying, which I had read was actually counterproductive to fishing success.

When I saw it at Ollie's for $10.00 a few months ago, I decided what the heck and bought it. As it turns out, Gonzales' manner of realism incorporates movement, and there are a few ideas that would be useful to any tier. He also writes well.

As to your questions, no, I have not really incorporated his ideas, but I may at some point, especially some of the Hi-Vis techniques for baitfish and some of the wing burning.

As to whether it makes a difference on catching, I dont know. It is a very intersting theory that he lays out for it, however.

A book worth spending time with, and the guy is from PA so there is local flavor.

 

[GreenWeenie]

The book is well worth reading and contains many little tips and useful techniques and simply tying some of these will dramatically improve your skill level. But I think the most useful aspect of the book was the way he bends and weights the hook for the particular style of fly being tied, which can really make a difference in how it behaves in the water. If anything, I started weighting flies in his style even if only suggestive ties.

As for fishing his ties, I’ve tied and fished enough of them to feel I can reasonably state that if I had to rate the effectiveness of his ties/flies I would say some of his dry fly variations are extremely effective and far outperform all other styles of dry ties under certain conditions (especially the inverted patterns); his more general/simpler nymph patterns (basically a standard nymph except with a split tail and three pairs of legs) worked when standard patterns didn’t but his really intricate ones performed no better or worse than standard nymphs (I really fished the wiggle nymphs quite a bit thinking these things would work but they really didn’t perform as well as expected); and I did much better fishing a plain old Shenk’s White Minnow, Shenk’s Scuplin or Muddler Minnow than with any of the streamer patterns in the book. However, his use of eyes on a streamer as a trigger makes a lot of sense and is worth incorporating onto standard normal ties.

 

[Stevie-B]

GreenWeenie,

I too like and incorporate his weighting techniques. I'm glad someone had the patience and skill to tie and try his patterns. Of course, I am partial to his caddis pupa.

 

[MKern]

All of my patterns I tie for specific insects I try and make as realistic and durable as possible. I use picture of insects and try and copy them.

It's a balancing act. Sometimes I sacrifice durability for realism, sometimes it's the other way around.

What I really aim for is body shape (length, flatness, segments, and thorax to abdomen ratio). Then gills, gill sysle and gill color. I also always have legs, unless midge larva.

I always hear guys say, "sulphurs are coming off tonight, so I'll use a hare's ear." The problem is, although a hare's ear will work, it doesn't look like a sulphur nymph. However, anything you tie from steel, feather, fur, and thread doesn't look like a sulphur nymph either. (but you can get closer).

 

[GreenWeenie]

I wouldn't say have have the same skill level as Lloyd when it comes to tying flies and it took me a long time and a lot of swearing to tie some of them reasonably close.

Then there's nothing worse than spending 45 minutes to an hour tying a single realistic fly only to have the wind gust up and cause you to overshoot your target by 5 feet and loose it in the brush on the first cast. One thing about time consuming realistic fly ties though, they snag trees, weeds, brush, rocks, etc., just as easy if not better than standard easy to tie flies.

BTW, those synthetic streamers that look so nice and shapely when dry, I don't know how he does it but once mine got wet they lost all shape and looked like a tangled mess. I tried applying some of the soft cement, hard cement to keep things in place but nothing seemed to work - they were either lifeless and hard or lifeless and tangled.

 

[GreenWeenie]

I mostly fish limestones and what I have found is a sulfur pattern that works well at say Big Spring might not work as well on the Letort - but a different style sulfur will. Sometimes it's color (the slightest shade can make a difference), sometimes it's contrast (thorax slightly darker than abdomen), sometimes it's size (small and thin vs. longer and bulky), somtimes it something as simple as adding a very fine rib, etc. Experiement because every stream is different and while some flies will work average everywhere, once you start figuring out the trigger keys for certain streams that's when you go from hopefully catching 1-2 fish at the Letort or Big Spring to having 15+ fish days consistently. There's no secret pattern per say but each stream requires certain tweeks to your typical standard design.

 

[troutslammer]

i guess fishing with flies that have great detail kinda depends alot on your fishing style , me i like to fish broken fast water , those trout can't even tell if there is a eye on the side of that streamer , even more so in muddy high water -another time i use them alot , if the tail on a pt nymph was too long it doesn't matter in a super fast run of almost white water !!! i think alot of times they bite out of instinct not out of i nice set of nymph legs !!! we all like legs but i am not sure the trout care about them !!!!

 

[MKern]

I too fish ONLY moving water, but yet feel that realistic charateristics are important and the fish can and do see things; after all they live most of their lives in water (except for when I release them).

If spending an extra five minutes on a fly is not your thing than don't, but I like the idea of fishing with a black hendrickson nymph as apposed to a hare's ear. I will say that I think the PT can be an exception. And yes I'd rather fish with a flat-bodied stonefly nymph than a bugger.

But hey, fish also bite and consume twigs, leaves, rocks, and aquatic vegetation all the time too. However, I won't bring myself to tie water cress flies -- well not yet.

 

[DGC]

Reminds me, I need to tie some Mulberry carp flies over the winter. I am thinking I can just use Maxima Chameleon tippet to match the stem.

 

[SonofZ3]

Ultra realistic vs general? I'm not really sure. I do know that I have better success on woven bodied stonefly nymphs than dubbed stonefly nymphs, but I can't say that I have better luck on woven stones with 6 biot legs than a few wraps of hackle. I guess for me it falls somewhere in the middle, as the added realism of a woven body helps me catch more fish, but exact numbers of legs, or pre-made triangular wingcases, don't seem to make a difference.

 

[mute]

http://www.grahamowengallery.com/fishing/fly-tying.html

 

[DGC]

That Graham Owen gallery was nice. Thanks, mute.

 

[osprey]

Durability wins out over ultra suggestive in my own experience , but the joy of creating something that looks like it could bite ya is fun to do.

 

[afishinado]

"Fly Fishing Pressured Water" by Llyod Gonzales is a great book, with some innovative patterns. While I'm not a big believer in tying and fishing super realistic patterns, LG gives detailed tying instructions and some of his tying methods and materials can be applied to other patterns. It's a book worth studying IMO.

 

[jayL]

As a tyer, I enjoy realistic patterns. That said, they have little to no place in my boxes. I continuously find "triggers" or techniques and materials that seem to make winning flies. I try to include them in lieu of super realism. It works well for me.

An exception for me is stoneflies. I try to do my best to make them look like the real deal, though I have had my best success with exaggerated rubber leg- another trigger characteristic.

I feel that it's often nearly impossible to get natural looking flies to fish naturally. IMO it is more important to trade realism for better action and presentation in the water. I credit Afish with really getting me thinking along those lines.

 

[dryflyguy]

I've tried tying some very intricate, realistic looking dry flies over the years. And in most cases, they just weren't very practical to fish with. Often, they were hard to cast without twisting the leader, or just plain didn't work. And I'd go back to using my old tried and true, simpler patterns
About 10 years or so ago, I saw a beautiful looking green drake dun pattern on the cover of one of the fly tying magazines It was called the blade wing green drake - originated by an english tyer if I remember correctly now.
I was quite interested in tying it, and bought the magazine and the materiels for it. They weren't easy to tie, and I spent quite a bit of time cranking out at least a dozen of them.
That following spring, I gave them a good try during the drake hatch on Penns. It cast fine, and the fish hit it quite well. But, I missed almost every fish that struck it. Now, this fly was tied with the hook point facing up. Whether that's the reason I had trouble hooking fish or not, I'm not sure. But I gave some to several of my buddies, and they also had the same problem as me with it.
More recently, I've been fooling around with klinkhammer type flies. And they do seem to catch a few fish for me that have ignored my regular offerings. But I also seem to miss more strikes when using them.

 

[afishinado]

dryflyguy wrote:
I've tried tying some very intricate, realistic looking dry flies over the years. And in most cases, they just weren't very practical to fish with. Often, they were hard to cast without twisting the leader, or just plain didn't work. And I'd go back to using my old tried and true, simpler patterns
About 10 years or so ago, I saw a beautiful looking green drake dun pattern on the cover of one of the fly tying magazines It was called the blade wing green drake - originated by an english tyer if I remember correctly now.
I was quite interested in tying it, and bought the magazine and the materiels for it. They weren't easy to tie, and I spent quite a bit of time cranking out at least a dozen of them.
That following spring, I gave them a good try during the drake hatch on Penns. It cast fine, and the fish hit it quite well. But, I missed almost every fish that struck it. Now, this fly was tied with the hook point facing up. Whether that's the reason I had trouble hooking fish or not, I'm not sure. But I gave some to several of my buddies, and they also had the same problem as me with it.
More recently, I've been fooling around with klinkhammer type flies. And they do seem to catch a few fish for me that have ignored my regular offerings. But I also seem to miss more strikes when using them.

I've tied patterns upside down many times, and I always kick myself after fishing them for not learning after the 100th time that flies with the hook point up catch as many fish as the teasers used in big game saltwater fishing.

I have been fishing a lot of Klinkhammer type flies and have not noticed problems with hooking. What type hook do you tie them on? I use TMC 2487's and use one hook size bigger. They work well for me.

 

[dryflyguy]

Afish - I haven't really tied my klinks on the right hooks. Been using caddis pupae/scud hooks for the smaller flies. For the larger ones, I've been using mustad #37160 hooks, which have a pretty radical curve in them. They were the closest I could find for what's called for at the time.
I've run into another poster on this site - martinlf - several times astream. He ties klinks, and gave me one of his BWO patterns.
It looked very nice - he uses a Varivas hook, but I can't recall the model # right now. Anyway, I've been looking in fly shops for those kind of hooks, and no one seems to carry them. I'll have to order some online, or try what you use.

I won't be tying any more flies with the hook point turned up anymore either. That was a lot of tying for, basically, a useless fly