i agree with fisherboy0301. tilapia are not strictly herbivorous, i live in south africa and i've caught hundreds of them on fly. In my opinion redbreast tilapia are the most aggressive, and fight super hard! one technique is to chum with bread, and then, once they're feeding, cast a bread fly or a large DDD or adams irresistible into the feeding area. a more "pure" technique is to find them and cast to a sighted fish. on a very hot day, they will often sit just below the surface of the water. any well presented fly will be taken. in the evenings they can be super fun on dry. however, the best way to catch them, and the most fun, is to target them on their beds in spring, twitch a large streamer over their bed and they'll attack viciously! try use a streamer that swims inverted, such as a small closer, to avoid snags. their beds will often be over rocky or sandy/muddy bottoms, the beds just look like large, dark circles on the bottom of the dam. my favourite flies are: slow sinking bread flies and adams irrisistables for the chum technique; white deaths, bloodworms and PTN's with long, micro rubber legs. (the PTN's work super well); para adams', small foam hoppers (#14) and small foam beetles work well in the evening rise; for bed fishing i like a small clouser or strip leech, in sunfish or bass colours.
Ive heard good things about berry flies but have never tried them, if none of the above conditions prevail, then blind fishing with a small woolly bugger or rubber leg PTN also works well.
