Part Three: The Fly by Bob Shirley

When I think of fly fishing, I see beautiful casts, pristine beaches, rivers, lakes and much more. However, one of the most interesting and pleasing aspects of the sport for me are the lures or flies which imitate live prey species. I see shiny silhouettes of shrimp – brown shrimp, grey, snapping, mantis, and pink. Redfish love them, bonefish chase them, permit attack them and tarpon inhale them. Shrimp patterns may be weighted to sink slowly or rapidly, or may be built with foam to buoy them at the surface to make noise and splash when retrieved in front of tarpon. Complete with eyes, waving antenna of sparkling plastic, and with bodies tied to collapse and expand as you retrieve them which gives them lifelike action, they get fish.

Similarly, crab patterns, baitfish imitations, and a host of other fly types attempt to imitate natural fish food and are tied by commercial tiers and amateurs alike. I have two friends (PJ & Jim) who loved tying and did it for many years before they ever fished a fly. Tying combines art and science to imitate life. Good tiers usually like to demonstrate, too, which is good news for us. We get to see the creation of a feather and tinsel jewel in real time.

Selecting a fly to cast depends on a number of variables and, even in saltwater, we are trying to “match the hatch.” The fly should obviously imitate a known and favorite available food source. It should match the conditions – shiny in bright sun light, darker in overcast situations. Also, to some extent, it should match the general bottom color. This last is often overlooked, but is important in fooling a wary target. After all, only well camouflaged creatures matching the surrounding weeds and bottom would be present as the fish forages. A blue crab in the right conditions can be deadly or obviously a fake depending on their surroundings and the local availability of blue crabs as an example. A pink shrimp when none are normally present will likewise send out an alarm signal.

Size matters too! Sometimes a bigger fly than the average size of the prey which is normally available in nature triggers aggressive strikes, sometimes not. Likewise, a fast retrieve is good for barracuda, but not bonefish. No retrieve or soft short tugs entice permit to bite crab flies. Remember, we are imitating prey species with the fly so our retrieve and size selection should mirror naturally occurring flight response and prey shapes.

A few years ago I fished Los Roques National Park – an atoll off the coast of Venezuela. It was there that I learned just how many of my preconceived ideas and helpful tips from my buddies about fly selection were not necessarily true. I was targeting bonefish and was throwing bonefish bitters, Gotchas, Crazy Charlies, and other “standard” bonefish getters. The fish were big (averaging 4-6 pounds), were not leader or fly shy because of restrictive fishing rules limiting the number of anglers per day. I believe only twenty anglers per day get to fish the three hundred islands and hundreds of square miles of flats there. I know I was casting to fish which had never even seen a fly before and I was doing well, but not spectacularly as I had hoped.

Then I talked to another American who happened to be there hanging around and waiting for a guiding job. I told him about what I was experiencing and, as his grin deepened and his head nodded, he said “the bonefish here key on the minnows.” He showed me some of his hand made Gummy Minnows in various sizes and colors. I asked if I could buy a few. And that’s how I learned he was a hard man to do business with. What could I do, though? We were eighty miles off the coast of Venezuela, and an eight hour flight from a fly shop in Dallas. He could name his price. And did!

Sure enough, those bones loved the minnows! Gummy minnows, Clouser minnows, any minnow imitation would take fish. As an added bonus, the juvenile tarpon liked minnows, too. In a pea soup lagoon, tarpon from 10 to 25 pounds just hammered large Gummies, blind cast as far as you could throw them onto the soup. Leaping repeatedly, the hooked tarpon’s gill plates rattling; bow to the leaping fish – tarpon on a fly!

I almost forgot to mention that the Jacks (Blue runners) liked those Gummies too. Everything there eats the minnows. I mean everything – one afternoon upon returning from a great day of fishing, the cook served fried minnows as an appetizer. They were great! I have absolutely no idea what species I was eating. Might have been anything – I was a human bonefish.

The point is, if logic and perception don’t work, ask a local, and then pay the price.