Want to try clousers in freshwater

[Lonewolve]

Guys,
I already fish clousers,and clouser half and halfs in saltwater.I have tried them about 14 yrs ago an couldn't do squat in freshwater,in slatwater they are my go to flies and i literally have the fun of my life when im chasing stripers.What sizes should i tie,hooks?Also colors? In saltwater sad to say i use Lefty Kreh's advice if it aint chartreuse it aint no use.In the surf i sometimes fish surf candies in natural colors but its chartruese usually.
I dont want to use chartrueuse in freshwater i figure the fish want something a bit more natural.I will try these for Smallies on the Delaware And Susquehanna,And then trout in the Fall on the Lehigh and Delaware.
any Ideas?

Tight Wraps & Tight Lines
Rick Wallace
P.S. in saltwater i use a teeny 350 or a depthfinder 400 on a GLoomis GL4 9' 9 wt.For Fresh water i use 10 ' 6 wt or a 5 wt rod.I use a Rio Windcutter or a Cortland 444 double taper floater

 

[gfen]

I tie from size 18 to 1/0, but the majority are gonna be either 14 or 8.

 

[Lonewolve]

Gfen,
i would like to go no smaller than say #8 and go a lil bigger.how do most fish em i have no clue ,my main smallmouth flies are in order wooly buggers and Clouser crayfish. i would like to learn to use the Clouser minnow.

 

[jayL]

I fish them pretty much the exact same way as a woolybugger. On average, I'd say that I actually fish them a little more actively, but the fundamentals are the same.

Swing, drift, twitch, strip slow, strip fast, etc.

It's a very versatile fly.

 

[Fishidiot]

Rick,
By all means use Clousers in freshwater. I catch piles of smallmouth bass on 'em every year. I do prefer them for the colder months of the year. During summer, I don't use them as much as I think the Clouser best imitates baitfish and SMBs key more on small fish in autumn. I'd add that I don't use them as much for trout preferring flies with marabou.

Chartruese (and the popular in saltwater "green over white") will do well for freshwater. For SMBs most of my Clousers are about 3-4 inches long. Brown over orange with a few strands of copper tinsel or flashabou is a favorite of mine.

 

[Lonewolve]

Fish,Jay,
thnx for the info.
True story i used to help Rod Rohrbach down the Lil Lehigh years agoand he had a Lefty Class.Lefty was showing how to us e a streamer across from the shop and down stream from the shop,he used a Brown/Orange Clouser and started strippin out of now where came this huge shadow chasing it Lefty got it back in and casted out and all hell broke loose ,heres this huge brown had to be over 25" kype and alligator nose locked on the fly believe it that fish held that damn fly till Lefty tried to slide the fish on the bank then it opened its mouth and slid back into the creek.Was the wildest chase other than Steelhead chasing Big streamers on the salmon river in Ny.
I will have to try them .just wanted to hear yours as well as others stories and or methods.
Tight Wraps & Tight Lines
Rick Wallace

 

[Shuu]

I often use Clousers for trout. I'm suprised anyone would question their effectiveness. I fish a lot of different color combinations but the color I've had the most luck with (on trout) is Bob's baby smallmouth pattern in 8 or 10. I've had good results with it on the Tully, French Creek, the Brodhead the Delaware the Coeur de 'Alene and the St. Joe to name a few Eastern and Western streams. The baby smallmouth has a white belly, green stripe and a sort of mahogany brown for the back with some bronze flash. I've also had good luck in the salt with Clousers. Honestly, If I had to make due with only one fly pattern for the rest of my life I'd pick Clouser deep minnows.

 

[PACOFRANSICO]

Chartruse is a good color for anything. And mimics nothing in natural stream envirment. I think it just getts fishs attention better than natural tones.

 

[gfen]

The littlest ones I tie are marabou with a strand or two of flash, its amazing that the trouts will come out of knowhere to hit them, too.

Its my number one streamer for trout.

 

[Shuu]

You guys are right about chartreuse. Chartreuse reflects ultraviolet light. Fish can see ultraviolet light. Try shining an ultraviolet light on a box of fly tying materials in the dark, the chartreuse and blaze orange materials light up like neon beer signs on a dark night. Some other fly tying materials are treated to reflect ultraviolet as well but always chartreuse and blaze orange do it. Fish eyes are very sensitive to reflected ultraviolet light (ours not so much.) This means that these materials light up like neon to fish even during the day. You'd think it would scare fish but for more reasons than I can explain here it does not. It tends to attract them. (Professor Shuu is done for the evening.)

 

[turkey]

I had my best luck this summer with a olive over white on a #6 hook. there were about 3 weeks that it was all that I fished. I used chartruese over white too later in the summer.

I think that the reason the Clouser deep minnow works so well on bass is because bass have a tendency to strike between strips...while the fly is falling in the water. Bob Clouser even wrote in one of his books that the minnow is better fished from a boat (as opposed to wading) so you can keep this "strip/fall" action going for a longer drift than stationary wading would allow.

I never tried them on trout but Gary, your marabou clouser sounds like a great idea.

 

[bam]

Caught my first fish ever on a clouser Sunday morning and managed to pull out a half dozen more smallmouth in the 6-8 inch range on a 3-4 inch chart/white clouser. Hook was a size 2, but the bass had no problems with it. I used a black over olive wolly bugger about the same size earlier in the day and managed about two dozen with a bigger average size... but it was earlier and there was better holding water. I'm still up in the air on them, but they're certainly nice to cast after heaving a size 2 weighted bugger...

 

[PACOFRANSICO]

Look at most pf the most productive musky, pike and bass lures colors. Most them have some sort of none naturally occuring "hot" or floro colors on them. Firetiger is a good example. I'm just knoow incorporate uv flashabou and krystal flash in more of my streamers beacuse of this.