Another old fly this little beauty has its origins on the salmon and trout streams of Ireland probably around the 1820’s. Its alternative name of ‘hares ear and red’ gives away its ancestry. Early versions of the fly presented were no more than a gold ribbed hares ear with a woodcock type wing tied on top. Over time the recipe has evolved.
The Dunkeld is certainly one of my top 5 middle dropper flies for lock style fly fishing. Until 18 months ago I was using a version of the Dunkeld that had a hackle Palmered along the body as in the original. At that time I was experimenting with “fuzzeled” bodies an an alternative to bodies with a Palmered hackle and applied that technique to this fly with immediate success.
The MK2 is a great alternative middle dropper lock fly to my tie of a Dunkeld for those bright full sun days and also a very formidable wee wet for faster or discoloured rivers.
The Bredbo fly is accredited as being the first Australian designed and made fly and whilst the originator is not known with certainty there is highly persuasive evidence that suggests that it was conceived around 1896 as a grass hopper imitation for targeting fish on the Bredbo river just outside of Cooma NSW. The evidence points to the fly being created by Mr C.R. Burnside and Dr A.J. Brady who along with Howard Joseland are amongst the pioneers of fly fishing for trout in New South Wales .
Woolly buggers and their variants would have to be close to the quintessential wet fly. This woolly bugger version is one of my favourate late season still water flies.
I was introduced to this variation in the lead up to the 2002 Tasmanian One Fly which by chance I won. Whilst I was not comfortable enough to use this fly in that contest I have used it many times since to great effect.
The MK 2 woolly buggers evolved from standard black and olive woolly buggers as a fly that would imitate an American frog that had bright red between its hind legs. The red is a great trigger point and I find the MK2 as a great generalist search pattern. In southern climes the hot spot is tied in any of the ‘roe’ colours and is widely accepted as one of the best early season search pattens.
Whilst not tied to imitate any natural food source it’s a very buggy looking fly with heaps of trigger points including the marabou tail, the soft body and front hackles as well a the skit itself. In particular I like to incorporate blood red or orange skirts which are suggestive in the case of a red skirt as bleeding from around the base of the tail or the claws depending on what the fly is taken as or in the case of an orange skirt as a fish roe.
This is a cross between an English claret hopper and a daddy long legs fly and it fills a gap in my fly box for a buggy looking search pattern when there are a few terrestrials about but no clear consistency of species. Because of its size and the way that it floats this fly is also useful as a top fly when either Loch Style Dry Fly fishing or as an indicator when fishing a team of dry smut flies or other small flies.
Crane flies are of the family Tipulidae and of the Order of Diptera or true flies and are the largest family of flies in Australia with some 800 species. An alternative name particularly in the United Kingdom is ‘daddy long legs’ but of course they should not be confused with the wispy spider often also referred to as a ‘daddy long legs’ in Australia.
