Nymphs how to fish
 

I have fished nymphs on and off a little bit. I sell flies.. that doesn't
mean I know how to use them all the right way.
I have always had a tough time figuring out when I get a hit on a nymph.
After knowing i missed a few pick-ups I go back to dries. Pretty easy to
know when you get a hit.

Maybe I am fishing them wrong? I let them drop as close to bottom as I
can... say when fishing a pheasant tail or a stonefly. then just try to
creep them along at a slow buggy pace with random little twitch, jerks and
rests. I try to keep them coming enough to not get hung on the bottom, but
overall fish them in very slowly. I also fish them on floating line (I don't
often fish deep water) so the leader and tippet are usually enough to get me
to the bottom.

Should I be pulling them along at a faster more steady pace so that when I
get a hit I would just hook the fish automatically? I know mosquitoes just
sort of squiggle in one place.

How should I be fishing the little nymphs and do most folks use a strike
indicator or just hit/miss by watching their line and guessing or the leader
that happens to be on the water?


_______________________________
www.fly-fishing-flies.com
Flies from $5.60 per DOZEN and more!
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Nymphs how to fish
 

How should I be fishing the little nymphs and do most folks use a strike
indicator or just hit/miss by watching their line and guessing or the leader
that happens to be on the water?

....a little of both.

When I do use a 'strike indicator' it is always a dryfly of some kind.
I like strike indicators that catch fish (Royal Wulffs, Foam Hoppers,
etc). But strike indicators only work well when the fish
are feeding within a foot or two of the surface (less than a meter).
Another way of saying the above is "why use a strike indicator that
does not catch fish?" (You can attach a hopper to a 20lb tippet,
if you want, so it turns over a trailing nymph well. And fish will still
bite that hopper).

When fishing deep, I try to keep a tight straight line and I
set the hook a lot. If you wait until you know for sure you've
had a hit, it's almost always too late. In other words, set the hook
so often someone else might think you have an uncontrollable twitch
in your hand.

Nymphs how to fish
 

Sprattoo wrote:
I have fished nymphs on and off a little bit. I sell flies.. that doesn't
mean I know how to use them all the right way.
I have always had a tough time figuring out when I get a hit on a nymph.
After knowing i missed a few pick-ups I go back to dries. Pretty easy to
know when you get a hit.

Maybe I am fishing them wrong? I let them drop as close to bottom as I
can... say when fishing a pheasant tail or a stonefly. then just try to
creep them along at a slow buggy pace with random little twitch, jerks and
rests. I try to keep them coming enough to not get hung on the bottom, but
overall fish them in very slowly. I also fish them on floating line (I don't
often fish deep water) so the leader and tippet are usually enough to get me
to the bottom.

Should I be pulling them along at a faster more steady pace so that when I
get a hit I would just hook the fish automatically? I know mosquitoes just
sort of squiggle in one place.

How should I be fishing the little nymphs and do most folks use a strike
indicator or just hit/miss by watching their line and guessing or the leader
that happens to be on the water?

Try an indicator. You'll like it. Believe me. It makes a big difference,
although the purists may snub their noses at you. I recommend the Fish Pimp:

http://www.anglingevolutions.com/new_products.htm

:-)

Seriously, they're good indicators. (I have one of their t-shirts.)

--
Cut "to the chase" for my email address.

Nymphs how to fish
 

Sandy Pittendrigh wrote:

When I do use a 'strike indicator' it is always a dryfly of some kind.

If that makes you feel better, fine. As the creative fly tier I know you
are, maybe you could design a superior "dry fly indicator." I think it
would look something like a fish pimp with a hook.

I like strike indicators that catch fish (Royal Wulffs, Foam Hoppers,
etc). But strike indicators only work well when the fish
are feeding within a foot or two of the surface (less than a meter).

I disagree with this. In general, deeper is harder, but I believe you
can successfully fish nymphs below an indicator much deeper than a foot
or two.

--
Cut "to the chase" for my email address.

Nymphs how to fish
 

rw wrote:

I disagree with this. In general, deeper is harder, but I believe you
can successfully fish nymphs below an indicator much deeper than a foot
or two.

1.
Well sure, you can fish a little deeper than a foot or two, with
and indicator, if you work at it. There is a threshold level
of depth where indicators stop being useful--beyond which
you're better off fishing without the indicator at all.
I had to fish that way this past weekend. The water was
cold and a little off color, and the fish were podded up
in deep water. When I found them I caught 3-4 per hole,
down deep. I used a barbell crazy charlie as weight
with a stonefly nymph behind that. It worked like a charm.
An indicator rig would have produced ungats. They were far
too deep for that.

2.
I'll guess ungats is the also the number of fish you've
caught on Fish Pimps over the years. Hopper indicators
don't work well in early April. But they do work.
If it's the visual thing you like, you can make
a hopper indicator with a hot lime or pink wing.
If it floats well, and there is a wet fly behind it,
then it's an indicator. If that indicator has a hook
in it, ungats is not the number of fish you will catch
on the indicator.

Nymphs how to fish
 

I had a thought (it's a miracle).
I like to use dry flies as indicators.
Itty bitty nymphs can be 'indicated' with a
#16 Royal Wulff. Heavier nymphs need a bigger,
better floating (cant' remember how to spel
bouant) dry fly. I like dryfly indicators because it's
more fun to watch an indicator that might catch
a fish, than it is to watch one that cannot
and will not.

But the one complaint I hear over and over again
is that a grasshopper followed by a beadhead
is "too hard to cast" ...... and that you
can't attach a hopper close to the butt of the leader.

But that argument misses several crucial points.

It's only hard to cast a hopper
dropper if you attach the hopper to the end of
a long light leader. If you attach the hopper at
4 - 6 feet from the butt, to 15lb test, then
you can turn it over in a hurricane. And if you
think the 15lb leader that attaches to the
hopper ruins it's chances of catching a fish,
you be wrong. Everybody fishes the way they
like to fish. But it is important to have all
the important information.

Nymphs how to fish
 

Sandy Pittendrigh wrote:

2.
I'll guess ungats is the also the number of fish you've
caught on Fish Pimps over the years. Hopper indicators
don't work well in early April. But they do work.
If it's the visual thing you like, you can make
a hopper indicator with a hot lime or pink wing.
If it floats well, and there is a wet fly behind it,
then it's an indicator. If that indicator has a hook
in it, ungats is not the number of fish you will catch
on the indicator.

I don't have anything *against* using a fly as an indicator, but I
usually prefer an fish-pimp-type indicator. The reason is the same that
I don't much like yarn indicators -- it's hard to change the depth.

Whenever I'm fishing hopper/dropper rigs I feel like I'm primarily
fishing the hopper, and that the nymph is an extra.

--
Cut "to the chase" for my email address.

Nymphs how to fish
 

"rw" wrote


I disagree with this. In general, deeper is harder, but I believe you can
successfully fish nymphs below an indicator much deeper than a foot or
two.



The indicator that I've had the best success with was the orange fly line
stuff that you pulled off the core and slid up on the leader ... sometimes
I'd use two or three apaced out so that one could sink out of view in deep
holes and the other still be seen. I fished this much like Sandy says,
trying to keep a tight line, and with the jitters. This type indicator is
not a 'float'

I guess they stopped making this type of indicator as I haven't been able to
find them in several years.


Later Sandy wrote

Everybody fishes the way they
like to fish. But it is important to have all
the important information.


These days, I either sight nymph to visible fish, or I fish nymphs trailing
slightly behind dries but high in the water column, in the early parts of
hatches. I carry yarn and 'fish pimps' but I just can't 'get involved'
when I use them. Rather than getting into that lovely timeless state, in
the moment now, that I associate with fishing, I find it very difficult to
concentrate or become immersed ( mentally not Reid style ).

Nymphs how to fish
 

"Sprattoo" wrote in message
...
I have fished nymphs on and off a little bit. I sell flies.. that doesn't
mean I know how to use them all the right way.
I have always had a tough time figuring out when I get a hit on a nymph.
After knowing i missed a few pick-ups I go back to dries. Pretty easy to
know when you get a hit.

Maybe I am fishing them wrong? I let them drop as close to bottom as I
can... say when fishing a pheasant tail or a stonefly. then just try to
creep them along at a slow buggy pace with random little twitch, jerks and
rests. I try to keep them coming enough to not get hung on the bottom, but
overall fish them in very slowly. I also fish them on floating line (I
don't often fish deep water) so the leader and tippet are usually enough
to get me to the bottom.

Should I be pulling them along at a faster more steady pace so that when I
get a hit I would just hook the fish automatically? I know mosquitoes
just sort of squiggle in one place.

How should I be fishing the little nymphs and do most folks use a strike
indicator or just hit/miss by watching their line and guessing or the
leader that happens to be on the water?


_______________________________
www.fly-fishing-flies.com
Flies from $5.60 per DOZEN and more!
_______________________________

One of the things that is highly overlooked when fishing nymphs, and this
falls under the category of presentation, is the "mend" or mending the line.
The mend is to make adjustments to the current and control the line and fly,
especially when using indicators. There are many types of mends to use, I
like upstream mend, and sometimes throw a combination of the
upstream/downstream mend when tight against the banks. Knowing how to read
waters and make adjustments is the key.
fwiw,
-tom

Nymphs how to fish
 

"Jonathan Cook" wrote


Guess I'm easily satisfied.

About the only fishing that doesn't put me in that state is
powered-motor trolling. All else (including trolling while
paddling a canoe) I find easily carried away into that "timeless
state". Just ask my wife :-)



I'm spoiled too, Jon I would not have the same attitude given less freedom
in the use of my time.

I'm often struck between the similarities between my changes over time ( I
was starting to say development or progression, but I don't want to imply
improvement, just change ) as a waterfowler and those I'm experiencing as a
fly fisher.

In waterfowl hunting I was very much a 'get my limit by any legal means'
kinda guy for years, but gradually I started adding my own rules much
stricter than the laws.

Towards the end I'd often call the species I would kill next before the
opportunity and simply pass on any shots at other types of game, until I
successfully decoyed that species. Three years in a row, when our local
Canvasback limit was two and finding any on known hunting areas nearly
impossible I declared a week or so in advance that I would finish my season,
the last Sunday with a limit and a limit that included doubling on Cans (
two from one group) as the last two birds of my year. I succeeded by
'doing the research' and having the patience to wait until things were just
right.

Very much like my current trends in fly fishing, I got to the point where I
had my duck boat behind the truck 100% of the 3 month season, and often
hunted every day for weeks BUT, I seldom just got up early and went hunting.
I'd hit the water for short periods at the best times. Many times I've
been working in my yard at 10AM only to notice a wind shift that made me
drop all work and been picking up the decoys, limited out, by noon. The
'hunt' became for the best conditions and best times, not best techniques,
or even places ( the last few years I only hunted at a lake about 5 miles
from my house). And for the last many years I absolutely refused to shoot
unless the birds 'did it right' ... the artful fooling with call and decoys
was the sport.

In a similar vein, I find that many times ( not all ) I'd rather just sit
and enjoy being there than "work at" catching yet another fish. I'll wait
till later when it gets more like I like it, when I can ply my feather and
fur decoy where I can see it and visually judge the fishes response.