Rusty Spiders for Dusk

[William Anderson]

Last weekend I made a crazy 22 hour day trip to fish with Eric on Slate Run and Pine Creek in Northern PA. I don't recommend that kind of travel, but it was worth it. So fishing was dismal all day and things didn't pick up until the witching hour and the rises were consistent and fun to fish. There were very small light cahills about and the occasional caddis but Eric and I quickly realized about half the rises were steady to spinners and the others flashy to emergers. We both decided to target risers with wet flies and soon realized a rusty spinner was in order so we fished Partridge and Orange to great effect. Not that we didn't try other patterns, successfully, but I think most of the takes were on the P&O. I had Iso Flymph on a #12 daiichi 1550 bent wide open by one bruiser which I didn't land and a couple takes on a small grouse caddis pattern.

To get to the point, I have intended each time I find my self in utter darkness trying to tie on a fly or rebuild a leader or tie on a dropper, to pre-tie up some rigs that I can tie in and cut loose if needed. My vision is faltering and there is nothing worse than standing in the midst of large, rising trout knowing they could turn off any time and I'm fussing with tippets and flies.

This morning I tied up a dozen Rusty Spiders on #14 Daiichi 1530's (a heavier, shorter and much more robust hook). These are not pretty, so don't judge the tying skills please, I just never got a "pretty" fly out of these materials today, but I will tie a bunch of these to a lengths of tippet with droppers attached and hopefully I'll be ready the next time I'm waist deep in total darkness.

Daiichi #14 1530, Rusty Orange 8/0 Uni-thread, Partridge hackle, gold wire, copper Gutterman rayon thread length for the body.


Rusty Spider Dry


Rusty Spider Wet


I hope to get to try these again soon. A classic P&O will work perfect for this situation, but I wanted something more robust. Losing that gorgeous brown as the hook opened has haunted me all week.

[swellcat]

Those are fun photos. A coordinated, diving squadron on a mission seems to be depicted in the first.

[tie2fish]

Pretty is in the eye of the beholder, and I find them so. Same goes for practical.

[DUBBN]

22 hours? I remember a time doing that, or something close to it.

You are a GREAT fly tier. Your wonderful photos over the years are proof of that. Even the patterns you claim as not pretty are beyond my abilities. Be truthful, what is prettier, a perfectly tied North Country Spider that you post on the internet, or a drab little concoction that is hanging from the lip of a wild Brown trout? One you share with the world. the other you keep all to your self.

Fly vests and chest packs are getting smaller and smaller. I would find room for a head lamp. They are small and easy to store. Perhaps a pair of cheap readers from Wally World are in order as well.

Great report Mr. Anderson. I enjoyed it.

[redietz]

Losing that gorgeous brown as the hook opened has haunted me all week.

I feel your pain. My son & I went up to Pine/Slate Run over Memorial Day weelend. I hooked 5 trout during the afternoon. I lost three due to broken leaders. With the other two, the hook protected my leader by straightening out and losing the fish that way. In mean time, my son hooked and landed five browns -- the smallest was about 17". I'm still smarting over that trip.

P & O's were the order of that day as well.

The only problem with pre-rigging is remembering to do it. It's especially useful in winter.

IMO, if you take the time to tie P & O's "pretty", you're doing it wrong. One of their great advantages is that you're not afraid to throw them into log jams, under trees, etc, because they're easily replaced.

Nice photos!

[Mataura mayfly]

William, they are very fine fishing flies. None I tie are for human presentation, I tie fishing flies and the trout do not judge beauty as much as they judge practicality .

As to fishing in the dark, I do a lot of that. Keeps my casting style away from critique, nobody sees me catching backcast trees......
A small headlamp as Wayne suggests is a must. If for nothing else it makes the walk back to your vehicle much easier if your hands are full of rods and such. Some folk do not like the band around their head- or the battery pack weight of some of the stronger lights, but they are getting lighter. The other option is one of the hunting/fishing style of caps with the LED's built in to the peak of the cap.
You do not need much light for a working light to tie knots by, but sometimes a stronger light is nice to see when landing the "big'un" trout that tend to come out after dark, or to see a bit further up the trail on the walk out.
Just watch though, nothing puts rising trout down quicker than torch light swung over the surface of the stream. Least that is the case here and they may not come back on station for many hours. So, best to have the torch (okay- flashlight for you lot) turned off when approaching the water and turned on only when facing away from the water to change flies etc. When fighting the trout of your dreams, pretty much doesn't matter where the light is shining.

The other thing you can do is learn to tie tippet knots in the dark and thread half a dozen flies on to the small wire threaders that come with some nipper tools and in some fly boxes. Then you can push your tippet through the wire threader by feel, slip a fly off the wire and you know it is threaded, tie your knot in the dark and keep fishing.
Or, make a fly box like the one of old that has tint springs at one side and hook keepers at the other. Designed for eyeless hooks or at least flies with the gut built in as the fly was tied. The short section of gut had a loop formed that the tippet tied to (or you could do a loop to loop nowdays), so the hook was clamped at the bend one end and the short gut loop was held by spring and hook system at the other.

[Smuggler]

I just finished tying more P&O's as I type this. Thorax variations, lightly dubbed body jobs too. I tied mine on a 1560 after thinking about the fish that straighten you out. That was a fun trip, worth it even though my legs were on fire the next day from treading upstream on that one section.. hah.

That floss body looks great, I've never tied a spider in the traditional sense of using floss for bodies. Looking at this fine set I think I'll try my hand at some. These look astounding man.

[William Anderson]

Thanks for all the comments and especially the flattering ones. You guys really are too kind. I don't know what it was about this set but I never really felt right at the vise and it showed. I used an oversized wire because I found this season and last that most of my successful nighttime flies had tinsel or were wire bodied. So the SM Uni-wire generated a little more bling than X-SM.

22 hours? I remember a time doing that, or something close to it........Fly vests and chest packs are getting smaller and smaller. I would find room for a head lamp. They are small and easy to store. Perhaps a pair of cheap readers from Wally World are in order as well.

I left my just before 5:30 to get Eric by 8 so we could be on the water around 11:30. We didn't get off the water until about 10 so I didn't get back to Northern VA until about 4. After several years of fatigue and sickness, to be able to make this trip was a serious accomplishment.

dang...I gotta go. I'll be back.

Hold this until I get back.
.

[Smuggler]

What in the world is that?

[redietz]

What in the world is that?

It's for holding pre-rigged leaders (or least tippets, if not the whole leader)

The better question is "where can I get one?" to which I was I knew the answer.