How To Catch More Fish On Wet Flies And Nymphs

Have you noticed how often fish take a wet fly or nymph as it swings at the end of a drift? Or when you pick up for another cast?

The most life-like action an angler can give a nymph is to start it moving rapidly towards the surface. Such motion suggests an emerging insect and is almost a sure fire way to trigger a fish's feeding instinct.

Aquatic entomologists tell us the surface film is as hard for an insect to penetrate from below as above. They must strike it with considerable velocity to burst through.

Fish also take on the retrieve. They may follow a sunken fly for sometime before deciding to see if it is good to eat. This is especially true in still water like ponds or pools. Actually anytime your nymph is submerged, it is working for you. That is one of the advantages of this kind of fishing.

In most all of these situations the fly is taken going away. It is likely to be snatched from them when you try to set the hook.

Fish don't have hands so they use their lips like we would a thumb and finger to ascertain if something is edible. If it turns out not to be, it is ejected, usually with considerable force as we might throw away a wormy apple.

This is the "tick" we sometimes feel and find nothing there when we try to set the hook.

There is a growing interest in nymph and wet fly fishing and much to be relearned about it. Years ago, kirbed, snecked and reverse bend (all trade names for off-set points) hooks were very popular with fly fishers.

To understand why, insert a hook in your vise and pull on the eye enough to bend the shank slightly towards you. You have just off-set the point. Take another hook and grasp it between a thumb and finger like a fish would bite down on a fly. See how it turns on its side?

Pull on it like you would if you were trying to set the hook in the fish's mouth. See how easily it slips through the fingers.

Now do the same thing with the one you bent in the vise. Gently though, it will want to dig into a finger right away.

See why off-set points used to be so popular? They went out of style when light wire hooks for dry flies came in. Any deviation from a straight line greatly increases the chances of fracturing such hooks.

Nymphs and wet flies customarily are tied on extra stout wire so for them this is no problem.

For fifty years the emphasis has been on floating flies. Most tyers and anglers have forgotten why off-set points were once so widely used. Because the demand isn't there, it is very hard to buy them today.

I usually use Mustad hooks for sunken flies. They aren't tempered as hard as English or French ones, so it is easy to reshape them without breaking. After I clamp one in the vise I bend the shank sideways to get the off-set I want, then tie the fly. I also make sure the hook point is very, very sharp. This is important because with an off-set bend, the line pull isn't parallel with the point.

Remembering these two things can make you a reputation as a nymph fisher: off-set bend and very sharp points.

Dry fly fishing is different. Most of a fish's enemies are from above. It's really kind of worrisome for a fish to come to the surface after food, so when it rises to take a fly, it immediately returns to its station before even pausing to see if what it took is edible. Most of the time it is hooked going away from the angler so there is little chance the fly will be pulled out of its mouth.