Yep,
Kent, that sounds about right. I have 2 or 3 dozen patterns in boxes but
these six are what I use 90% of the time. Another 5% is a pattern I
concocted for a specific lake.
1. Parachute
Adams
2. Wooley Bugger
3. Irresistible Adams
4. Beadhead Gold-ribbed Hare's
Ear
5. Parachute Royal
Coachman
6. Chironomid
I will
admit the Yakima does not seem to respond to me with these patterns but I do
well everywhere else with them. I'm afraid I've pretty much written the
Yakima off as a pretty canyon to spend a day in if I'm not really concerned with
catching fish. I fish a lot of smaller streams and local lakes most of the
time.
-Jewelee Umphfres
-----Original Message-----As a Christmas present, my wife gave me a wonderful book titled 'The Longest Silence - A Life in Fishing' by Thomas McGuane. In the chapter 'Unfounded Opinions', he writes:
From: Kent Lufkin [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Friday, January 12, 2001 10:27 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: WAFF fly pattern poll
"...I asked the greatest trout fisherman of my era, who is himself an out-of-control proliferator of equipment and technical doo-dads, what percentage of his annual catch would remain if he were reduced to Adamses and Gold-Ribber Hare's Ear nymphs. His answer: "Certainly over ninety percent." When pressed about the staggering variety of patterns available in his fly shop, he said, "I don't sell flies to fish."
This admission reminded me of a similar conversation I'd had several years ago with one of my flyfishing mentors who maintained that he can successfully fish for trout* anywhere in Washington's fresh waters* with just six fly patterns.
So here's a question for you: if you could have just six patterns in your fly box, which would they be?
Please send me your list of 6 (or less if you feel confident!) as an offline reply to this email by clicking here mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
I'll tally your responses and post the top six in the Fly Patterns section of the new WAFF web site when it debuts in a few weeks.
(* To start out, let's just consider trout patterns for freshwater streams and lakes - not those for steelhead, salmon, or for searun trout fished in salt water. If this poll proves popular, we'll do new polls for those categories later.)
Thanks,
Kent Lufkin
