Going down !

[Otter]

2 weeks to go to opening day, the trout will be down deep, finding a fish on top will be like looking for a needle in a haystack.

What technicues do u guys use in such a situation.

[Mike Connor]

Deep ones!

In early season deep fished streamers like woolly buggers are among the best bets. Large deep nymphs will also work, small ones less so.

TL
MC

[narcodog]

Black and olive buggers with tung beads a little weight a little flash on a 9671 hook size 12

[JohnP]

Something heavy and meaty. Not the most pleasant way to fish, but one must go where the fish are.

[tjd]

You can always tie up some big, weighted soft hackles. I took the largest non-migratory brown I've ever taken on April 1st (season opener in NY) on a size 8 Grouse and Hare's Ear-Heavily weighted with a wire underbody and a bead. And a split shot on the leader. The overnight temp was 29 degrees, with 2" of snow on the ground. Water temp was 35 degrees. Deep flies, with lots of movement, drifted naturally.

Best,

Tim

[Soft-hackle]

Good to see you, Tim!

Mark

[Otter]

Philistines, Heretics..... glad to see I am in good company.

With all this winter discussion of subtle hackles and dubbings and manuscripts , various shades of silk, loops dubbed on and off the knee, dubbing blocks, touch silk dubbing, trout vision, colour, irridesence, relfection, refraction, translucence, round bend, sproat, wax on, wax off......... we can return to the first rule of fly fishing.

If the trout are stuck to the bottom then thats where your fly needs to be. May not be the most enjoyable methods of fly fishing but it sure beats watching TV.

[Mike Connor]

On dour days when absolutely nothing is happening, especially early season but it works at most such times, then getting down with a suitable fly is your only real option. If anything starts to happen, ( Iron Blue hatch for instance) then you can change of course. If you have bullheads or crayfish etc, then a suitably coloured weighted woolly bugger usually works well although a black woolly bugger seems to work everywhere if not quite so well as a suitably coloured imitation. There are now thousands of variations but one close to something in the water usually works best. I think the black woolly buggers are usually taken for leeches.

TL
MC

[Otter]

On one stretch of my local, there has been a resurgence of minnow and crayfish in the last season or so. A few miles upstream, crayfish populations have been in excellent shape for many years. Thankfully so far the dreaded signal has not arrived.

I suppose , fishing a few buggers now and then might be a bit of fun.

[Mike Connor]

On one stretch of my local, there has been a resurgence of minnow and crayfish in the last season or so. A few miles upstream, crayfish populations have been in excellent shape for many years. Thankfully so far the dreaded signal has not arrived.

I suppose , fishing a few buggers now and then might be a bit of fun.

If it's the choice between catching a few and catching nothing at all then why not? It is a lot of fun. Of course it is not at all the same as catching fish on various small fly imitations, and is not a method I would use all the time, although many do. There are many occasions when various small fly imitations. especially various small wet flies fished in particular ways, like spiders and such like close to the surface, simply wont work very well if at all. Same goes for dry flies. Sometimes you have to get down to the fish and only a heavily weighted pattern will do the job. A "good" pattern will still work better than one chosen at random just because it's heavy enough.

TL
MC