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FishnPhil

Bug Buffet

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I went fly fishing recently and there was an absolute buffet of bugs for the fish to choose from. I've never seen caddis so small, size #18-20, mixed in with big midges, size 12-14, and chironomids of various sizes mixed in, mostly 12-14. I'm positive there was some BWOs even though it was sunny. Oh, then there are the baitfish situation, minnows everywhere in the shallows, and the standard scuds in normal abundance.

 

Whew. With a smorgasbord like that, what was I doing out there with my pitiful offering? wacko.png wacko.png wacko.png biggrin.png

 

Thought these pics (taken with my Samsung S8+!) turned out ok:

 

ftj7ft.jpg

 

faas1f.jpg

 

291gh8m.jpg

 

cnrlt.jpg

 

Nature is amazing, isn't it?

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I love days like that, and having to figure out what the fish are eating. Were you on a lake, those mayflies looks like callibaetis spinners?

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spiralspey, yes this was at a well known lake in Colorado, and yes callibaetis were there as well.

 

Piker20, I believe the last picture is a female chironomid (Chironomidae: Chironomus). I'm no entomologist, maybe someone that is positive will chime in. When I look on Google images the pics that come up are almost spot on.

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Nice pictures. I've ran into those microcaddis. One of the first times I went fly fishing on the local wild trout streams. I was all set with what I thought were the right flies and these size 20 black caddis were hatching in waves. I didn't catch any trout that day. Speaking of unknown insects, has anyone ever run into a white mayfly, size 20? A group of us were fishing Pine Creek in north central PA during the green drake hatch, and these mayflies were hatching in large numbers to a point that the trout were ignoring the drakes. There were several experienced fly fishers in the group and nobody had ever seen this mayfly before. I had 3 white midge patterns with me and got 3 takes but the fish broke off the 7x tippet I was fishing.

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I think they were mentioned, as a possibility. I think what threw everyone off was they were completely white. Didn't have that dark patch on the thorax. The hatch was interesting. It looked like a fine snow raising from the creek.

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Woolly aphids are small and white, but to me they don't look like Mayflies.

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