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lacewings....the overlooked terrestrials

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Lacewings are a landbound, predacious insect that is used widely in the South and Midwestern Farnbelts as a beneficial insect in coombating insect infestations of crops, particularily by aphids. The Lace wing is also known as the Aphid Lion because aphids are it's favorite prey. They are bred by farmers and released into thier fields, orchards, and surrounding areas. Now, you may be asking yourself, what does this have to do with flyfishing?.....Let me explain.....

 

 

The South and the Midwest do not typically experience huge hatches as do our neighbors in the West and North. And terrestrial hatches and thier activity make up a lot of the bug life on local streams from the spring to the fall. And the Lacewing is abundant in these areas. Fish will readily take lacewings when blown into streams and ponds. The lacewing in its adult stage closely resembles adult stones or caddis' and has the same tent styling to its wings. Thier life cycle is relatively fast, with many hatches occuring throughout the spring and summer.

 

On a mountain stream in Eastern Ky, the stone and caddis hatches have not been great by any means for several years, however, terrestrial hatches like that of the lacewing are great and seemingly growing every year. Stray lacewings are gobbled up by trout and gills and everything in between. I fish one stream that runs adjacent to a rare mountain area farm that raises thier own lacewings for strawberry fields. During the spring, you can fish an imitation on these waters and catch more trout than using any typical stone or caddis pattern.

 

I tie this imitation by using the same body style as an adult caddis, using tent style wings and a blended dubbing body make of green Lifecycle dubbing and raccoon. For the wings, I use Turkey wing quills colored with a chartruese Sharpie pen. The summer action can be explosive!

 

Lacewings are not a typical terrestrial in the flytying/flyfishing world, but if you live or fish farm land areas, do not overlook them. They may just be your secret weapon this year!

 

For more on Lacewings, check out the link below!

 

http://www.nysaes.cornell.edu/ent/biocontr...hrysoperla.html

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