riverman skrev:

A very common fly
in the Scandhoovian regions is a "Skating Caddis", something which as of
yet, seems rare in the shops I have looked into. The folks at LLBeans had
never even heard of it, yet it was the most productive fly at both Lapland
Claves I attended. I still use it as my 'secret weapon' when I fish in New
England because I'm quite sure the fish have never seen one before.


IMHO, the streaking caddis is a good imitation, but if we speak about
"deer hair", "caddis" and "skating" in the same sentence I do prefer
the Elk hair caddis. It floats high, leaving just the tiniest of wake
behind it, imitating the natural in soo many ways. In our neck of the
woods, "Scandahoovia" as Myron (riverman) prefers to call it, we tend
to fish the caddis more often than just about anything else. I'm going
to quote myself and my first ever post on ROFF "Fly fishing for trout,
arctic char and grayling is mainly done with different sedge (caddis)
imitations, pupae's as well as fully developed insects". I was speaking
of Myron's Scandahoovia and the fact that living extremely far north
tend to limit the range of available insect species. But, to conclude,
since all caddis "skate" in a manner, there's very little reason to
fish this fly in a dead drift, other then extending the fishable drift
further by letting it float drag free at first, hence all the
streaking/skating patterns. What I'm saying, and yes, I'm rambling
after a bottle of Shiraz and Jean-Marie's excellent 40 year old Cognac,
is that the efficiency of the skating caddis is not only a documented
fact but also the plain truth. So, it doesn't surprise me to hear that,
after the Lapland claves, Myron considers this his secret weapon and I
do believe that Vaughan uses this type of fly on a regular basis. The
general idea of the skating/streaking caddis is to imitate the the
action so commonly seen by the caddis on the surface of the water, and
further I think that most fish (predators) react to the
streaking/skating caddis due to the movement and that this movement
makes them less careful and more aggressive than usual. The method is
somewhat related to the induced take.
Sorry guys, I'm a bit drunk and when drunk I tend to repeat myself. It
is not that I think you don't understand what I'm saying, more that I
have to convince myself that I'm saying the right thing ;-)

BR/ Roger