Simon Lidster

In general the most vulnerable time for a nymph is when it's leaving the river bed, swimming to the surface and emerging. These will be mature adults, so at their largest stage. If the fish are feeding on immature nymphs on the river bed they might well be immature and smaller. Depends on the emergence stage for size! As the nymph reaches the surface it's no bigger, but as the adult fly emerges you've got fly and shuck. so probably nearly twice the length of either individually. Hence Klinks are big flies. Just been to Iceland and observed midges hatching dragging the shuck for a long time before flying off. The trout were incredibly selective and seemed at times to only take these, ignoring all the other stages of hatching! Simon

Ok Crackaig, I'm totally intrigued. How did you tie those Cluster midges? Love all your patterns Simon

No Danica on the Derwent yet, they're taking tiny midge pupae. A size 26 simple pupa works a treat but its so small the hook-up rate is only about 1 in 3! Even so, I love that micro-fishing. Just tied up some Klinks on 24 curved hooks to swim later. Might even suspend a pupa New Zealand style from them. Tight lines, Simon

Anyone see A River Somewhere? A series by a couple of New Zealanders I think, looking for wild unfished rivers. Brilliant! Simon

Depends also on the width of the post. A very thin post will need more wraps to get the same number of hackle fibres as a thicker one. Simon

http://www.jsonsweden.com/en/jsons-fly-fishing-fly-tying-products/anti-twist-swivels/ Not tried them but their nymph legs are excellent! Simon

San Juan worm: Simon

For the Derwent I'd want: Baetis nymph sizes 18 and 16 Flat stoneclingers same sizes Griffiths gnats 20 and 18 parachute BWOs size 16 and 14 Danica dries size 12 and 10 for a few weeks round duffers. Maybe a size 30 greenfly and black gnat. That's 12 patterns. I often take 10 fly boxes! Makes me think. Simon

Preferences § 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 - = Backspace Tab q w e r t y u i o p [ ] Return capslock a s d f g h j k l ; ' \ shift ` z x c v b n m , . / shift English Deutsch Español Français Italiano Português Русский alt alt Preferences My tongue flopped out, drooled all over the keyboard!

Preferences § 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 - = Backspace Tab q w e r t y u i o p [ ] Return capslock a s d f g h j k l ; ' \ shift ` z x c v b n m , . / shift English Deutsch Español Français Italiano Português Русский alt alt Preferences Woohoo!!! Can't wait for mine to arrive then! Simon

Hah, should have posted the recipe! Hook Daiichi 1270 size 10, adhesive lead underbody Thread yellow nano-silk up to thorax, spiderweb for thorax tails olive ostrich herl tips body march brown fly-rite dubbing taken from thorax back to tail back olive dyed pheasant tail, segmented with nano-silk running back up to thorax gills CDC tips tied on top of back Legs Jsonsweden mayfly legs N1 wingcase medallion sheet cut to shape. Simon

Mayfly season round the corner in the UK. Those Ephemera Danica nymphs are getting ready, and so are the trout! I intend to post all 5 stages in the lifecycle - nymph, emerging adult, sub-imago, imago and spinner. Nymph first! Enjoy! Simon

We'll let them in! Dont know whether USA lets you take them out. I've never had a problem taking flies in checked luggage from the UK. Simon

I have a full set of Oliver Edwards essential skills DVDs and have probably learned more about fishing and fly tying from them than anything else. Every time I watch one I see something new! Also been on a river craft day with him, got another one booked for May - he knows more about trout fishing than all our club members put together! I can thoroughly recommend them to anyone fishing for trout in UK rivers, and I'm sure the methods translate to anywhere in the world. Using spiders (soft hackle wets) upstream dead drift when there's a hatch going just makes sense. They must look like emerging nymphs or drowning cripples in the film or just below it. All adds to my growing desire to catch fish with very realistic flies fished just as the naturals behave, rather than flashing something at supersonic speed across a trout's nose! Simon

Moving on from the things that bug me topic, how do people like to fish? I'm confident I can catch trout on our local river with 'normal' patterns. I've kind of got to the stage where I'd prefer to catch fish on very realistic flies behaving like the naturals, i.e. drag-free drift most of the time. I've got some semi-realistic nymph patterns, so it's just a case of getting them down to where the trout are feeding. Dries are another thing! It's not just about catching fish! If that was the prime aim I'd probably fish streamers all the time! As time goes by, I feel that catching numbers of fish is less important than catching them how I want to. Having said that, the hunting instinct still overtakes me sometimes! So what's your favourite method? Have you changed how you fish to make it more difficult? Simon

Just had our monthly fly tying club meeting at my house this evening, and it made me think about the weak spots in our patterns. For a dry fly, we can create very realistic tails, bodies, wings and thoraxes (thoraces?). But legs are my problem. Hackles really don't look like legs. There are too many of them. That's one reason I tried tying sparse snowshoe hare hackles in a foam groove. Anyone got a solution they'd like to share? I know the proof of traditional patterns is that they catch fish, so the trout don't mind that the legs aren't realistic, but I do! Simon

You could try applying an inch of varnish to the thread before you whip finish as per Davie McPhail. Might work! Simon

Oliver Edwards Heptagenid flat stoneclinger nymph is the hardest I've attempted so far. Enough to test my skills to the max! Followed by a size 30 aphid parachute. Simon

I have a Sage one 9ft 5 wt with Lamson Litespeed 11 reel. It's loaded with a DT 5 Cortland Sylk line and I love it! I have a Phoenix DT silk line on a spare spool, which is even better (thinner and less wind resistance) but it takes a lot of care, cleaning, drying and dressing etc. Definitely try some different lines, everyones casting techniques are unique so there'll be the perfect line for you out there somewhere! Simon

Finally found a Heptagenid pattern I'm fairly happy with though need to work on consistency of body/head shape. Thanks to Oliver Edwards! Hook 18/16 grip nymph Spiderweb Adhesive lead underbody Mono eyes/scaffold Raffia head cover Badger tails (or similar) Ostrich gills (or goose biot) SLF dubbing thorax Brahma hen wing case Json sweden nymph legs Enjoy, Simon Tried to send the video, but I think the file's too big, so here's the Youtube link.

This is what I've come up with so far: Size 16 Grip Nymph hook 3x 1.5mm tungsten beads Badger tails/antennae stripped hen hackle body Raffia thorax cover/wing buds JsonSweden stonefly legs, small. Simon

The trout season's round the corner, and there are a few patterns I've really struggled with over the years. The first is the Heptagenid nymph (flat stoneclinger) but I think I've got that one cracked with Olly's pattern (I've submitted a video of it). The second, which I still need to crack is tiny stonefly nymphs. On the Derwent they are mostly less than 1cm, probably size 18, 16 at the biggest. I could easily use GRHEs, Baetis, BWO patterns etc, but I'd like to make them as close as possible to the natural, with the 3 distinct thorax segments. Anyone got a semi-realistic pattern? Thanks, Simon

Morten Oeland Davie McPhail Oliver Edwards Alan Bithell From this side of the pond! Simon

Both, there's nothing like seeing an insect on the river then trying to imitate it back at the bench! Then using it and catching a trout! Simon

1. Yes, 50s or 100s no problem 2. Brass and black, (preferably matt black) 3. 1.5mm, 2mm and 2.5mm 4. In the UK, up to £10 for 100 Maybe not too helpful as the shipping of heavy metals would be pretty costly! Simon