Despite the normal feeding habits of brooks and browns in the streams along the Route of the Spring Creeks, where small hatches of mayflies and caddisflies tend to happen on a daily basis -even leading to selective feeding on calmer days- hoppers, beetles and ants are some of the top choices in their menu.
Our favorite dries to match the summer hatches:Addams parachute in sizes 14-16 in light grey and light oliveElk hair caddis in size 12, natural.Goddard caddis in size 10, brown.Stimulators (they can cover a large range of bugs from large caddisflies to stoneflies and even hoppers) Our top terrestrials include:Foam beetles in sizes 6 to 10Light tan hoppers in size 8 /E.g. Fat AlbertAnts in sizes 12 and 14. Damselfly fever: Larger dry flies imitating Damselflies tend to trigger some of the greedier trout and the takes are epic as they don’t seem to measure the effort on the raises, going aerial and more… check out this brownie going for it the video below.
Fishing mouse patterns is always a fun game, we all agree, and in this area they are very much appreciated by trout. Fishing them close to the banks with short strips imitating their attempt to swim makes ‘em a deadly fly for the big browns. Carrying simple yet effective patterns like the Morrish mouse in size 4 has you covered for those opportunities.
Tips and Tricks:Dapping on windy days can be a lot of fun just by keeping the rod high enough and letting the wind lift the leader and fly and make it bounce on the surface. The repeated action of that fly bouncing will make the more difficult ones raise and crush it as you can see in the following clip:
