RE: WAFF fly pattern poll

[Medick, Jim]

Good point, I always marvel that when I do get the chance to try a new water, the recommended pattern is most often a Wooly Bugger.  Sort of why I stopped getting Fly Tying magazine, I figured out that the new patterns were really targeted at me, not fish.

 

Jim

-----Original Message-----
From: Kent Lufkin [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Friday, January 12, 2001 10:27 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: WAFF fly pattern poll

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:

"...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