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Trout Savor the Tastes of Summer:
Terrestrials Diverse and Abundant By Rich Osthoff |
| By the official start of summer, many of our significant mayfly and caddis hatches are history. But hang in there because as the weather heats up and foliage fills in terrestrial fishing begins to sizzle. In the Midwest, terrestrials are particularly diverse and abundant. During most seasons, terrestrial imitations produce my biggest surface-caught trout of the year and some banner fishing during the dog days of summer. Let’s take a look at fishing terrestrials the way they should be fished —strategically. HOPPERS I once cleaned a chunky foot-long brown trout for shore lunch and found 13 full-grown grasshoppers in its gullet. They were eaten before noon on a cool September day. The incident illustrated two things: 1. Trout love hoppers and 2. Hoppers are available to hungry fish. All hopper years are not created equal. Warm, dry weather in June and July means that large numbers of adult hoppers will be around during the late summer and early fall. During the good years, hopper fishing picks up by late July as squadrons of winged adults go airborne. Hoppers are clumsy fliers. On windy days, many crash land onto the water and, not coincidentally, warm, blustery days can produce stellar fishing with hopper imitations IF you fish cooler water where trout are active. Making sure you are fishing cooler water and active trout is an important strategy during hot summer days. Consider fishing toward the headwaters of your favorite streams where temperatures are likely to stay in the 60s even though the air temperatures are in the 90s. |
BEETLES
A beetle pattern is my go-to terrestrial when trout are bunched or if they are sporadically sipping from the surface. I often hook several trout from a pod using a beetle imitation; splatting a hopper to the same pod would have scattered the fish.
Beetles occur in the Midwest in an array of sizes and colors in both meadow and woodland habitats. A black, form imitation on a #14 hook usually will do the trick. Use three strands of black monocord for legs; tie them in on the shank at thorax position and clip.
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Trout relish ants and take imitations readily especially during the late summer and fall when water levels are often low. Fish them on the surface (made of foam) or under the surface (dubbed or lacquered). A quick-sinking ant pattern is a great summer pattern when trout are stationed in narrow weed channels.
During the late summer, flying ants can be an important part of your fishing. It’s not unusual to see thousands of winged ants on the water and trout eating them rhythmically. I carry a few small (#18 to #20) red ant imitations winged with short tufts of clear Antron.
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On hot days, I like to fish the grassy, overgrown meadows on spring creeks expecting that many trout will move upstream to cooler waters. Another reason to target the upper reaches of streams and rivers is that by August many browns and brook trout are moving upstream to spawn.
Trout will hit a well-placed hopper imitation reflexively on the first presentation or not at all — that’s the nature of the relationship of trout and hoppers. Hoppers usually occur individually, not in multiples, and often they’ll hit the water with audible splats. They represent substantial meals for opportunistic trout and fish will often leave their feeding lanes to engulf them.
All this adds up to run-and-gun fishing. Cast to each feeding lie once and move on; when trout are responding, you’ll take more trout if you make 100 casts to 100 lies than 100 casts to 20 lies.
When I expect to be fishing hoppers, I choose streams with a lot of feeding lies, where trout are well distributed rather than isolated in a few large pools. Meadow streams with overhanging grass, undercut banks, woody cover and an abundance of pockets and runs are ideal for hopper fishing.
Many fly tier/anglers will swear that hopper imitations must have prominent “legs.” I dispense with legs altogether and tie my hoppers with clipped elk hair head and flared elk hair tips extending over a cock pheasant saddle feather, covering the rear two-thirds of the fly. I never hackle hopper imitations so that they float flush to the water’s surface. On small streams, I fish small hopper patterns — #10 or #12 on a 3XL dry fly hook. If the trout are refusing yellow bodies, I switch to flies with green foam bodies ribbed with yellow floss.
CRICKETS
Crickets are more active than hoppers at dawn and dusk, on rainy days and in the shade — excellent reasons why you should b ring cricket imitations during the summertime. A jet-black cricket body is a bold silhouette even against a darkening sky. During low light, you might skate a cricket imitation against big, slow pools where large trout lurk.
Cricket patterns are “fatter” than hopper imitations and have prominent wings. For bulk, I lash a wide foam body to the hook at the “thorax” point of the hook shank, rather than wrapping a form strip around the hook shank. I make legs for my cricket imitations by knotting the long fibers from a black hen saddle hackle. A broad, flat head of clipped deer hair or elk hair completes the squat body profile. Extend some short hair tips rearward to cover the body tie-in point and to represent forelegs.
Tree canopies produce a variety of moth larvae and when the wind blows inch worms wind up in the drink. In fact, if you notice an increased surface feeding tempo after a gust of wind, you can be reasonably sure the trout are eating terrestrials. My fly of choice is a simple chamois worm in natural tan or chartreuse. Tie the chamois strip on the hook at thorax position so that it wiggles freely in the water. I catch more fish on flies fished just under the surface than on top.
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As I knelt in the riffle of a small brook trout stream, I mopped my head with a wet bandana for coolness. Within moments, the jaws of a deer fly clamped into the flesh at the back of my neck. I slapped at the fly and it fell stunned to the water’s surface. The little bugger drifted downstream. It began to revive, tried to lift off then disappeared in a swirl and into a trout’s mouth. How satisfying was that?
A black Elk-hair Caddis can represent various biting aquatic flies that pester us during the summer. It’s a tough pattern that can be flicked with precision in close quarters and rides high for easy tracking. I carry the pattern in #16 for prospecting trout waters and fish it like a hopper — casting to likely looking holding lies as I move along.
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Fishing terrestrials strategically, rather than haphazardly, can pay big dividends. As summer heats up, explore the headwaters of the streams you fish. Pick a pattern and a fishing pace appropriate to the water and conditions and go after the trout your seeking with gusto.
Rich Osthoff is a regular contributor to Midwest Fly Fishing™ magazine. His new book, No Hatch to Match, Aggressive Strategies for Fly Fishing Between Hatches, Stackpole Press, can be ordered by calling (608) 847-5192 or by writing the author at N6868 Sandstone Dr., Mauston, WI 53948. This article appeared in the summer 2002 issue of MFF.
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copyright Midwest Fly Fishing™ magazine 2003
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