Spiders
I have extended the population of flies that I carry in my fly box to include Spiders because they are an alternative representation for what we traditionally think of being a nymph representation.
Public Fly Boxes
Carixia and shrimp
I have extended the population of flies that I carry in my nymph fly box to include flies like Carixia and Shrimp flies because I fish them ostensibly in the same way that I fish my nymphs.
Bead head nymphs
I have listed this fly box first because its undoubtedly the most important of my river fly fishing boxes. I am a firm believer that when fishing rivers you have to get down to where the fish are holding and also that flies particularly in faster running water should include “hot spots”. These flies satisfy both these requirements for me and consequently have a place in my Bead head fly box.
Bead head spiders
An important part of my bead head fly box. I am a firm believer that when fishing rivers you have to get down to where the fish are holding and also that flies particularly in faster running water should include “hot spots”. These flies satisfy both these requirements.
Egg flies
Fishing to spawning fish isn’t everybody’s idea of fun . . . it certainly isn’t mine so I just don’t do it. In the interest of completeness however I have included a selection of pre and post spawn run flies that suite this style of fishing.
Detailed below are the flies that I carry in my ‘pre and post spawn run’ fly box, the sizes that I carry and the colours that I carry.
Bass, EP’S and perch flies
I have lumped the flies that I prefer for Australian Native fish into one group as by in large they are all structure oriented. they tend to frequent areas with structure such as weed, sunken logs, rock bars, under cut banks, holes and drop offs etc. and generally react in much the same way.
Saltwater – tropical
When I am traveling to tropical destinations I take these flies as well as my estuary fly box for flats fishing, my bass box for anywhere there are lilies and my offshore fly boxes for any pelagic fishing.
Salt water – offshore
You could easily go over board with your selection of flies for offshore fishing as there are heaps of options out there. I don’t think you have to do that and that just the few flies listed below in a couple of sizes and a few color combinations will do the job in 95% of offshore fishing situations
Boobies
Boobies are an essential fly if your going to cover all the bases with your impoundment fly fishing techniques. They are also great flies for targeting other species especially Australian Bass. because they cross over between species, have specialist applications and and are bigger flies any way I have separated them out into a separate fly box.
Hoppers, locust and crickets
There are more hoppers flies out there than there are actual hopper varieties and you can carry a few of each if you like but I have opted to carry just three patterns that work well in most situations. There are of course a couple of flies in my dry fly selection such as the elk hair caddis, claret daddy or humpy that fill any perceived gap in my hopper selection.