George's Fly Box (or Bag)

The weekend before last, I had the pleasure of fishing up on the Salmon River with George and Chris. After an early wake up, 4 hour drive, and getting geared up in the parking lot, we made our way down to the stream. I was standing there looking up and down the river, no one in sight, I must have had a look on my face that George recognized from his own. He looked at me and said "you love this, don't you?!", I thought to myself, was this a complement, question, or just a statement, I wasn't sure. After a while of thinking, I realized it was that crazy look on my face, saying "I love this", that George recognized, so yeah it was a complement.

Anyway after that rant, I'll get into the real story. I was rigging my switch rod with a streamer, when George asks me "" what is your favorite color?"I look up to a quart Ziplock bag full of flies... 

Not much more to be said about that...

We fished all day, it was kinda slow, but we had most of the DSR all to ourselves and that was worth the trip in itself. Chris landed the first Steelhead a pretty bright hen. Then we moved down stream and George got into a nice one. We fished for a long while before George was hooked up again, it was a nice Brown, a while later and George was into a couple small skippers and that was our day. 

It wasn't until about 5 minutes before we were about to leave that I finally had a little action (maddening action). I had a fish eat my indicator, 4 TIMES! it was awesome, but that was it for me.

Featured Fly - Winter Stone

Here is an awesome Winter Stone Fly pattern that I have been tying up since the Fall. Stoneflies be a common bug, found in most streams in the Mid Atlantic, this is a great fly to have in both your trout and Steelhead boxes. This fly has done very well for me this year, fooling fish on streams from NY for steelhead and browns, to trout streams in PA. I tie it from a 14 to a 10, for the black and brown winter stones.

Materials:

Hook: TMC 2302 sz. 10-14

Thread: UNI Thread 6/0 - Black

Bead: Cyclopes Black - Sz to match hook

Tail: Goose Biot - Black or Brown

Rib: Ultra Wire - Brassie - Brown

Body: SLF Dubbing - Black Stone or Brown Stone 

Shellback: Swiss Straw - Black or Brown 

Legs: Mallard or Partridge - Black or Brown

Wing Case: Swiss Straw - Black or Brown 

Thorax: SLF Dubbing - Black Stone or Brown Stone 

Antenna: Goose Biots - Black or Brown 

Step 1: Make a thread base, tying in the ultra wire at the same time. Once at the hook bend, make a    small thread ball. (this will help split the biot tails)

Step 2: Tie in the 2 goose biots in front of the thread ball.

Step 3: Move your thread to the front of the fly, tie in a piece of swiss straw. (for the smaller flies split the straw into 3rds length wise)

Step 4: Add the dubbing the the thread and dub moving forward, about half way up the hook shank.

Step 5: Pull the Swiss straw forward, pull tight, then tie down.

Step 6: Rib the body with ultra wire.

Step 7: Dub the back of the thorax.

Step 8: Take a partridge feather and split the tips of the feather forming a "V". Then lay the feather down with the fibers sticking out each side, making the first set of legs.

Step 9: Fold the swiss straw forward making a wing case. 

Step 10:  Repeat step 8 and 9.

Step 11: Tie in goose biots out the front forming the antennas. 

Step 12: Trim the goose biots, then whip finish.

Finished Fly:

Here are a couple fish that fell to the Winter Stone this past fall and winter:

This Oak Orchard Brown fell to the Winter Stone  

This Salmon River Steelhead fell to the Winter Stone 

Tully Winter Fly Selection

Its been a strange winter so far, 45 to 50 in December with only a couple cold days in the 30s. Some like it, I do not! Bring on the cold, but anyway thats not why I am writing this post. This one is about the fly patterns that have been producing over the past month or so, and will continue to do so until the caddis start to fly in the spring. 

It is no surprise that, the Tully being a tailwater, midges are the primary fly in my box from November until March. However there are plenty of other bugs floating around under there, caddis larva(not my favorite this time of year), mayfly nymphs (PTs, and Princes), stoneflies (black and brown), worms (San Juans), and crustaceans(scuds). So if you were to look into my box this is all what you will see this winter. In the pictures below you will see a few variations of basic patterns and a few that you may have never saw before, either way, they have all worked well for me, not just the Tully but many small steams around the area.

Salmon River Report

This weekend I was floating down the Salmon with a great customer and friend Barry. Barry spent 2 days last year with Joey and I when we did our fall Steelhead Camp. He had such a great time he wanted to go back. So we floated, we went 2 for 4 on the trip, but the first one Barry decided to throw back before a picture(not intentional). The pressure was low and we had no trouble finding spots to fish throughout the float. It rained on us, but oh well. God Love Gore-Tex. Fish were eating stoneflies and sucker spawn, both blue and pink. Here are a few pictures from the trip.

Barry with a beautiful Salmon River Steelhead 

Just the perfect fish

Meet the New Guy

TCO Welcomes Casey DeGiovanni to Reading PA. Casey will be taking over for Joey as he steps away from TCO to work for Simms. Casey was born and raised outside of Pittsburgh PA. He has been fishing his whole life, and shares our somewhat sick obsession for fly fishing and pursuing  anything that swims. Stop in the shop and pick Casey's brain on the trout and steelhead streams of western PA.

Casey with his first Tully trout!

Tully Report December

Fishing on the Tully the past few days has been pretty good, with the temps slowly dropping again I would suspect the top water action to slow up a bit. Over the past week I have been seeing midges all over, and fish up eating them with some consistency. Nymping has been the best, small black midges, caddis larva, and pheasant tails, are top producers.

Not heading north the past weekend, I decided to take the switch rod out and practice a bit. I had a couple new creations I wanted to test out as well, see if they looked as cool in the water as in my vise. Six nice rainbows later, I figured I had done something right. So naturally I had to head back out today to try again. Temps were a few degrees cooler, but I still managed a couple fish.

Featured Fly - Biot Body Midge

After spending a couple morning on the Tully, fishing midges and watching fish rise to small emerging midges, I decided to take a break from steelhead flies and streamers. I put together this little midge earlier in the fall, it has been working great for me so far. It is a super fast and easy fly, I tie it with a glass bead, or a black tungsten bomb bead and Ice Dub collar.

Materials:

Hook: TMC 2488 sz. 18-22

Thread: 8/0 Uni Thread - Black

Bead: Killer Caddis Bead - Small - Clear 

Body: Goose Biot - Black 

Collar: Peacock Herl - Natural 

Step 1: Slide glass bead onto hook.

Step 2: Make a thread base, warping until the middle of the hook bend. Tie in goose biot.

Step 3: Wrap goose biot forward, tie off right behind the glass bead.

Step 4: Tie in one peacock herl.

Step 5: Make about 4 wraps of herl, then tie off.

Step 6: Whip finish and start your collection