Shrek – Chatto’s viva
It seems that these days the term ‘VIVA’ has been given to the very popular and successful colour combination of light green or chartreuse and black.
Woolly buggers & variants
Sort out your fly boxes
Every now and then it’s worth going through your fly boxes and resorting them. Not only does it give you a chance to re-establish some order in your fly boxes but it also helps identify where you need to tie a few and which ones you can discard.
Silver TBH CDC black/red MKII fuzzel bugger
MKII woolly buggers without any weight are amongst my favourite top dropper flies when loch style fly fishing in lakes and these smaller versions with a silver tungsten bead are up there amongst my favourite river flies.
Silver TBH CDC black sparkle fuzzel bugger
This one of the 4 colours of TBH jig buggers that I carry in my river fly box. It’s a great buggy looking fly that sink well and swims hook point up so less likely to get hooked up on the bottom othan flies that swim hook point down.
Double eyed, soft hackle dog nobbler
At the same time the woolly bugger was evolving in the US in England a similar fly that became known as a dog nobbler was also evolving. Dog nobbler flies were heavily weighted for use in deeper water, were generally not palmered with a hackle and often were tied with bead chain eyes.
September 2012 – Competition fishing at Eucumbene
There was a lot of interest in this competition and a strong filed of competitors including 2 from Tasmania and 3 from Victoria as well as a number of Eucumbene specialists. The reason for the record number of registrations was no doubt the fact that the two sectors being fished were two of the 4 sectors to be fished in the 2012 National Fly Fishing Championships in November.
Spring into action – 2011 in the Snowys
Well the river season has opened with a blast and there have been great reports in relation to most of our local rivers and lakes. For the rivers – I have spent quite lot of time fishing the Eucumbene River either side of Providence Portal. On the lakes it has been fantastic with plenty of double figure days. this year has been the best polaroiding season we have seen for years. The ‘doom sayers’ predicted that the flushing of the Snowy River with water from Lake Jindabyne would kill the fishing off for a few months. They were so wrong …
Banded bugger
A similar fly to a Shrek or Bloody Mary this fly is distinguished by the bands of fuzelled seals fur and holographic tinsel along the full length of the body. This is a particularly good point fly early and late in the season when the browns and bows are getting ready to make their spawn run. Brown with red or gold tinsel as well as olive with green tinsel also work well.
Mid winter 2011 Snowy Mountains fishing report
The old adage ” when the weather is good for fishing it’s bad for fishermen” definitely was conjured up to represent the way things happen down here in the Snowy Mountains. If your coming down for a fish don’t forget to bring plenty of layers of clothing and of course if your fishing from a boat make sure that everybody wear and knows how to use their PFD. The fishing however can be fantastic at this time of the year … my last 3 outing produced 37 very good fish.
Skirted woolly bugger – Chatto’s original
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.