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FLY LIST
Al's Rat, baetis, See Blue Winged Olive, Beadhead Pheasant tail
Cranefly, Fabulous Five Fly Selection, Griffiths Gnat, Honeybug Inchworm, Pheasant Tail,
Sulphurs;
Sulphur Selection,
Al Miller fished the "Little Lehigh” with his friend Dick Miller every fishable day for about 35 years until Dicks' death. During this time the fly evolved into what it is today.
Al usually "sight fished" the "Rat" casting it to a visible fish. He dressed his 8x tippet to about ten inches from the fly and sometimes
twitches it. When the fish are lying on the bottom he dispenses with the floatant.
Some folks fish the "Rat" with a small split shot with great success. others fish it blind, across and downstream. Both are usually well rewarded for their efforts.
I caught three fish over 18 inches on 5 casts, sight fishing on Spring Creek.
I believe the fish take the fly for a midge pupa. If you stop by the shop we will show you the natural.
Dr. Ernest Schwiebert told me the most important thing the presence of midge adults tells you are that there are pupa in the film. The dark brown monocord provides an excellent silhouette for the fish.
The "rat" works all day, all year. For many Little Lehigh regulars, it's the first fly they try every day all year.
The "Rat" can be particularly useful during periods of "Behavioral Drift." Gary Borgers excellent book "Presentation" provides an excellent description of this phenomenon. Try the "Rat" at dawn when large numbers of midge pupa, Scuds and Baetis are in the drift.
If you would like to discuss the "Rat," stop by the shop, have a cup of coffee, and chat.
HOOK-SZ. 20 94840
BODY-Brown Monocord. Start the thread over the hook point. Wrap the thread to two hook eye lengths from the eye. Wind back to the bend of the hook. Return the thread to two hook eye lengths from the eye
Dubbing-Dub very sparsely with muskrat under fur. Wind dubbing over the area two hook eyes behind the hook eye. Whip finish a head over the first hook eye. Don’t settle for a half hitch, it will unravel!
Al Miller 1923-2008
Click here to watch Al tie his "Rat"
Thanks Underwater Oz
$2.00. Free Shipping!
baetis, See Blue Winged Olives
Blue Winged Olives
(BAETIS – VAGANS, LEVITANS)
baetis
nymphs are active swimmers. They hatch with water
temperature as low as 46.
These bugs are multi-brooded
(Three broods per year.) They emerge by crawling.
You will see them in the morning and afternoon with the main activity
from noon until evening.
Nymphs are streamlined vigorous swimmers. They are light to medium
olive-brown, size 18, with a brown head with pale patches on each side
of mid-line. Their gills are slender with small gill plates. They have 3
tails; the center is shorter (half the size of the outer 2.) Tails are
banded at mid length and the tips.
Baetis nymphs can be imitated with a size 18 hook, standard
length. They are tied with an underbody of fine lead. Use olive thread,
natural wood duck for the tail and legs, with a body dubbed with olive
angora rabbit. The covert is made of iridescent green or blue feather
from a pheasant or mallard, or peacock.
A pheasant tail also makes a good imitation.
A properly dressed emerger with no weight will usually out fish a dry
fly. Try shallow riffles and weed beds.
Hook- sz. 18, 94840
Tail-Medium Blue dun CDC or after shaft feathers.
Tie in a clump the length of ½ the hook shank and secure it at the
bend of the hook.
Body- Dub the thread with olive angora rabbit, wind the thread
forward to form a thin tapered body. Stop two hook eye lengths behind
the eye. Cover the hook eye length of hook shank in front of the body
with thread as a base for the wing sprouts.
Wing Sprouts -Tie in a clump of CDC or after shaft feather to form the wing sprouts. They should be ½ the length of the hook shank, form the head and whip finish.
Blue Winged Olive, Emerger. Our best selling Olive pattern by Far!
$2.00
Size 18
Duns
The natural has two tails as an adult.
Blue binged Olive Dun, (traditional, Catskill tie)
$2.00
Size 18
PICTURE
COMING SOON!
We tie it on a #18 94840 hook.
Start the olive thread at beginning of hook point, wrap to
the eye.
Wind the thread backward to the bend leaving 2 hook eye lengths of
bare shaft behind the eye. (We don't allow the body creep onto the
bare hook.)
Over wrap toward the bend of the hook. Stop wrapping 1 thread width
from
the bend.
Tie in a hackle clump tail. The 1st turn of thread holding
the hackle clump tail (Light Blue Dun Hackle Barbs) goes directly
over the last turn on the hook.
Using the finger snap/pinch technique to mount the tails, with
thread tension near
the breaking point. Thread torque slides material to top of hook
shank.
Tie in. (The tail should be as long as the length of the hook.)
The body is dubbed with olive angora rabbit) to form a
carrot shaped body. Stop the body when you reach the bare hook.
Wrap thread forward one hook eye length, Tie in a size 14 Blue dun
hackle.
Wind 5 or 6 winds of hackle and tie off. Figure 8 with dubbed thread
drawing the hackle barbs to the top of the fly forming a hackle barb
wing.
Tie off.
SPINNER
Female spinners crawl into the water under debris to lay their
eggs. We use the emerger
pattern (above) to imitate drowned spinners.
These bugs are sometimes present without being apparent to the
angler. Little Lehigh fly fisherman
Gary Pyle has observed nymphs, duns and spinners under the dry side
of partially submerged rocks. Apparently the complete life cycle
occurred out of sight of the angler.
Little Lehigh Fly Shop Cranefly, Size 18
Little Lehigh anglers should not bewithout the "Fabulous Five" fly assortment.
It comes n a compact fly box and includes:
2 Al's Rats
2 Griffiths Gnats
2 Henryville Specials
2 Ants
Griffith Gnat $2.00. Free Shipping
Honeybug Inchworm, $2.50. Free Shipping
This pattern is the best selling bottom fly at the Little Lehigh Fly Shop.
It works all year all day, It works in Spring Creeks and Freestoners.
Developed by Don Douple, the texture of the Honeybug material seems to appeal to the fish.
Designed to imitate an Inchworm, the fish may take it as a Cranefly larva or a Caddis larva.
I've seen the fish pick the fly off the bottom and swim around with it.
It needs to be in your fly box!
The Pheasant tail is a GREAT attractor pattern. It also is a dead ringer (in size 18) for a baetis nymph.
Check out the pictures!
.JPG)
Dons Sculpin
$7.50, Free Shipping
This bad boy has caught most of the big fish I know of being caught in the Little Lehigh
S
During the April / May doldrums, find a school of Suckrs, chuck in a Sucker Span. There is a probably a trout holding downstream of the suckers scoffing up the spawn.
Sucker Spawn works as an attractor pattern all year.
Gary LaFontaine told me he believes there is a genetic instinct to take eggs.
A
brief synopsis relative to each fly is included.
It includes 2 Sulphur Nymphs (Crawlers,quiet
water,esp. Limestone silts, flats and runs. "Attractor" or "Imitative"
pattern.) , 2 Pale Evening Duns (A classic fish getter.), 2 Sulphur Compara
Duns, (Most consistent pattern on the Little Lehigh. Imitates duns or
spinners.), 2
It is shipped in a "Myran" fly box.
Price: $24.95
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Tricos
start life as an egg. The eggs develop when the water temperature is
fifty five degrees and above. Eggs laid last fall went dormant, or
into diapause. This
spring when the water temperature hit fifty five degrees again, they
began developing again.
Eggs
take about forty five days to develop into a nymph. When hatch time
comes, (usually around July fifth), the nymphs begin to congregate
in the “cushion” (the slow water on the bottom.) Between
Females
(light olive abdomens) hatch the same way at first light.
A few
hours after first light, the duns (sexually immature adults) change
to spinners (sexually mature adults).
Males and females swarm over the stream. Look for them over
canopied riffles. Female spinners (white abdomens) on the bottom of
the swarm, mating males (black abdomens) and females in the middle
of the swarm and all males on the top of the swarm.
The
first ones to die and fall onto the surface film are the females,
followed by males and females, followed by all males. The trout go
nuts!
Since
the trout are high in the water column their window is very small.
If a trout is one inch below the surface it’s window is only two
inches in diameter. Casting accurately is a must!
I find
success increases as tippet size goes down. The difference between
fish and no fish is 6x and 7x. The difference between fish and lots
of fish is 7x and 8x, 9x, 10x, 11x and 12x.
Al's trico
Stanley Cooper, Jr. has been tying flies since 1947Joan Matsui Abington Journal Correspondent If you were to ask 85-year-old Stanley Cooper Jr., of Tunkhannock about his employment history, he would likely tell you, “I always say I have never worked a day in my life.” Cooper’s inventory of fly-tying supplies includes everything from hooks to feathers and thread. He added, “I never had a job. When I graduated from high school in 1942, I knew I was going to be drafted. I got a job in a silk mill and I worked there from August of one year to June the following year. And that’s when I went in the service.” So how has he managed to make a living since he was discharged from the service in 1946? Cooper said, “I haven’t stopped tying flies since 1947 and I say, ‘When it gets to be work, I’m going to retire.’” Known in our region for his commercial fly tying business that has spanned more than five decades and has been both pleasurable and successful for this professional tyer, Cooper has tied well more than onemillion flies. One might ask, in Cooper’s life, what came first? Was it his love for fly fishing or fly tying? “I got involved in fishing when I was young but I didn’t get involved in fly tying until I came out of the service in 1946,” he said. “I spent three and a half years in the service. My dad was starting in this business (fly tying) and he said, ‘Do you want to start it with me?’ and I said, ‘Yes.’” His late father, Stanley Cooper Sr., taught him everything he knows about the art of fly tying. “When I came out of the service in 1946, he (my father) was at a
sports show in In the early 1950s, their business spawned an interest from two
sporting goods chains. The father-and-son fly tying team connected
with Abercrombie & Fitch of “They (Orvis) took every fly we tied to keep up with the company’s inventory of approximately 80,000 flies,” said Cooper. “They took up all of our time and we did that for years. Orvis usually gave us their order in October for the coming year.” Cooper currently ties for a few stores in the Poconos, one in “This year was the greatest Christmas I ever had,” he said. These days, he’ll tie seven dozen flies in comparison to the 10 to 12 dozen he tied on a daily basis. To make a living, “you’ve got to tie at least 10 to 12 dozen per day. Years ago, we tied a fly that was called Jassid, a very, very easy fly to tie. I tied 20 dozen of those a day.” Cooper maintains an inventory of fly tying supplies in his basement work area, including everything from the hooks, more common feathers, fur and thread to the coveted and more exotic feathers that he imports. One drawer alone couldn’t accommodate the approximately 22,000 fly tying hooks he has on hand. The ultimate goal of the fly tier is to fashion flies after bugs and know which bugs are hatching. “Match the hatch” is the adage used in fly tying and fly fishing and, in order to be successful as a fly fisherman, one must know what’s going to hatch. “Flies like the Hendrickson come out or hatch every year,” said Cooper. “They are so predictable that you could almost set your watch when the day will come. Sometime around April 28 or 29, it starts to hatch at approximately 1 p.m. and lasts for two hours a day. That hatch will continue for about a weekand it’s done. You carry that fly in April and after that, you don’t use it. We know what’s hatching so we’ll ‘match the hatch’ and we’ll catch fish.” Also an avid fly fisherman, Cooper is active with the Luzerne County Stanley Cooper Sr., Chapter of Trout Unlimited which is named after his father and whose mission is “preservation of the streams and conservation.” He also assists in teaching classes presented by Trout Unlimited. If you’d like to learn to tie flies, Cooper recommends taking a class that could cost $25 to $30 per lesson. Cooper said, “There are few guys that still teach fly tying. After about eight lessons, you could tie flies that would catch fish - guaranteed that your flies are fishable. “Today, I would consider Mike Romanowski to be the best fly tier I’ve ever seen,” he added. For details regarding fly tying classes, e-mail cooperflies@yahoo.com or call 570.836.8047.
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