About a month ago, the central mass chapter of TU sent an email asking you to imagine being restricted to only five basic patterns on your favorite trout stream. They compiled the results by ranking the fly that showed up the most. The results weren't surprising, but it got me thinking (as it is fly tying season) what would be my 5 go-to flies for the Quinnie? The results they got are as follows: A total of 34 different patterns were mentioned. The numbers in parenthesis represent the number of times the pattern was mentioned. 1. Elk hair caddis (18) 2. Wooly bugger (17) 3. Pheasant tail nymph (14) 4. Adams (12) 5. Hare’s ear nymph (7).
If I were to do this for the Quinnie specifically, I think I'd go:
1. Wooly bugger
2. Caddis pupa nymph
3. Elk hair caddis
4. Hares ear
5. Light Cahill
Now this list doesn't necessarily represent the 5 best hatches or 5 best flies on the Quinnie, but rather, if I were to hit the quinnie at any time of the year, and could only choose to bring 5 flies, those would be the flies I choose. They are also somewhat of a personal preference, for instance I've had such good fortune with the Cahill on this river I just couldn't leave it off the list, yet many would probaly choose the Adams over that fly.
What did I miss for the quinnie? Any other good go-to flies? What about other rivers?
Im with you on alot of them, personally I dont head to the quinnie without a Henryville special, also stone fly nymphs kill especially in the early season. Also, although it prob goes without mention but a san juan or a vladi worm. Your cahill looks nice, just getting into tying myself and they arent coming out anywhere near that clean. So cudos to you. Heres hopin for spring
ReplyDeleteAgree with the HS and the stones. I've seen yellow and even green stones hatch on this river. I actually do not use the san juan worm that often, if ever. I don't know what it is about it, I just tend to stay away from them.
ReplyDelete