Woolly Bugger

[minitube]

Anyone else use the woolly bugger for Atlantic salmon? White Trout put me on to it. He had some cracking fish on it to about 17lb. All black one works really well, long shank lure hook No10 and a very small silver conehead. Small bit of krystalflash sandwiched in the tail. Must do one in McCormicks shrimp colours for next season.

[altmor]

Never tried it minitube, but sounds effective - black with a touch of sparkle.

If you're tying one, any chance of a pic in the flytying section, would like to see it in the flesh as it were.

Anyone else had sucess with more "traditional" trout flies for salmon, ie a cat's whisker, ace of spades, viva or such. Have never really thought that way when arriving at the bank for a day's salmon fishing, but would be interesting to know.

Altmor.

[mo]

I have come across a few anglers who have tried fritz type lures for salmon but to my knowledge they were not successful. A wooly bugger type fly in the colours you describe, has been used with success on Welsh rivers for sea trout, albeit with a shortened marabou tail.

Sorry to change subject slightly, but i have never heard of a McCormicks shrimp, and would be very greatful if you could post a picture along with the dressing.

[acw]

mo said:

I have come across a few anglers who have tried fritz type lures for salmon but to my knowledge they were not successful. A wooly bugger type fly in the colours you describe, has been used with success on Welsh rivers for sea trout, albeit with a shortened marabou tail.

Sorry to change subject slightly, but i have never heard of a McCormicks shrimp, and would be very greatful if you could post a picture along with the dressing.

Stan Headley reported the other day some malcontent catching a South Uist salmon on a black blob and thats FRITZ in capitals .

[minitube]

The McCormicks Shrimp dressing is as follows

1st inner tail: Claret dyed bucktail (straight hair) approx 1.5 times overall hook length. Either gold or pearl Krystalflash sandwiched in the middle of the hair, (hair tied in in two bunches - hair, synthetics, hair).
2nd outer tail: cloaked around the first tail is a wound G.P. feather dyed claret or more usually a long soft chinese cock hackle dyed claret, about three turns and the fibres then tied back with the tying thread to cloak the hair tail.
Rear Body: Claret floss
Rear Rib. Oval Gold tinsel
Middle hackle: Long claret chinese hackle tied sloping back
Front Body: Claret Floss
Front Rib: Oval gold tinsel
Wings: Jungle cock
Front Hackle: Hot Orange
Head: Black

The claret is a ruby claret (wine colour that glows in the sunlight) as used in Northern Ireland on the Mourne and Roe systems, not the normal matt claret version of navy blue. It is a mix of Veniards dyes, 1 part scarlet, 1 part crimson 2 parts light claret and 2 parts dark claret. Some include a touch for want of a better word of fluorescent red, perhaps a quarter part.

The woolly bugger is a standard black dressing but with some pearl krystal flash sandwiched in the tail and a small silver conehead at the front on a 10 long shank lure hook. The veniards ex small silver conehead. Have to work out the technology for submitting a photograph.

I believe the details are somewhere on the board.

Off to an Irish Wedding now, that'll be two days out. At least he had the sense to organise it for after the fishing season.

[mo]

Thanks for the dressing for the McCormicks Shrimp. Came across a picture of it too, in the May issue of the Irish Angler.

[dunbar]

I have no doubt the cats whisker, dog nobbler or any other trout lure would take salmon. If everyone fished a cats whisker, I don't think catches would suffer much, if at all. I find salmon are not pattern selective, but probably are size selective.....

It all boils down to the fact that most of us are conditioned to use 'conventional' salmon patterns. The salmon doesn't 'know' one pattern was designed to take rainbow trout. With a few notable exceptions, I think most salmon anglers are too unwilling to think laterally and experiment......myself included.

[castslikeaghille]

dunbar said:

I have no doubt the cats whisker, dog nobbler or any other trout lure would take salmon. If everyone fished a cats whisker, I don't think catches would suffer much, if at all. I find salmon are not pattern selective, but probably are size selective.....

Stan Headley caught his first Thurso salmon on a dog nobbler and felt that it was somehow wrong becuase it wasn't caught on a 'salmon' fly. Up on the North Coast the orange dog nobbler is one of the key patterns for estural sea trout and salmon.

I'd be more than happy to fish the rest of my life for salmon with a Sweeny Todd provided I could have it in lots of sizes and weights. 50 years ago in Salmon and Sea Trout fishing (Elliott Press 1957), W E Davies talked about using American Streamer flies such as the Black and Grey Ghosts for salmon in the UK. Strangely, they never took off for salmon, but became big hits on the resevoirs.

As a complete aside, Davies was one of the first people to advocate the use of Dry Fly for salmon. His short book is a fascinating one and shows an approach to salmon fishing far more creative and thoughtful than any of his contemporaries. He also wrote about using plugs and fly spoons, and was one of the first people in this country to use a plastic floating fly line. Interestingly enough he was a competition fisher and also authored text books on sea angling and coarse fishing. So he probably wasn't hampered by Tweedie convention in his approach.


Regards

CLaG

[severnfisher]

A mate of mine caught a salmon on a Grey Ghost this year on the Severn. So they still work!

[kiki]

Hi Robert,
Keith McD here. I hope all is well, White trout is definitely on to something with the woolly buggers
I often think we are reluctant to try modern flies/tactics from other countries in favour of the old reliables- after all the steelhead guys in the states are using alot of marabou, zonker etc in their flies.
I'm looking forward to trying more of these kinds of flies particularly coneheads with rabbit strips. Earlier in the season I arrived at a salmon river in Donegal with no water and little chance of a Fish. We discovered that there was an escapee rainbow trout problem and pulled out the streamer box It turned out that the seatrout took a fancy to these flies in bright sunshine (pulled on the bottom on a teeny200 )
Ive also had great success with streamers for river browns in Ireland.
I also think from talking to Mick that there maybe a cause for more experimentation with standard down eye streamer hooks in favour of traditional salmon singles as he lost some great fish this year on standard salmon hooks and any hooked on trout hooks were well hooked!?
Anyway I didnt get much fishing done this year as I have a six month old fish bum in training and I never got around to the aapgai stuff either. I'm hoping to get up to you for some casting before Christmas as Ive really become interested in DH casting
All the best
Keith

[minitube]

Hi Keith,

Good to hear from you. Know what its like with the young one but still you wouldn't change it for the world.

Look forward to the casting. Just tied an interesting Finnish Streamer pattern for December's Irish Angler.

Best wishes

Robert.