The Best Flies to Use when Fly Fishing

The best fishing flies are simply the ones that have stood the test of time. For a fly to stand the test of time in fishing it only needs to do one thing, catch fish. There are a handful of flies that have caught fish since fly fishing's early days and are still effective today. In no particular order all fly fisherman should have some of the following, wooly buggers, Adam's, pheasant tail nymphs, gold ribbed hair's ear nymphs, elk hair caddis, and stimulators.

I have introduced many people to fly fishing and have guided many beginners. Normally I start all of them fishing with a wooly bugger. Mainly because there is no wrong way to fish a wooly bugger and it catches most species of fish. While the wooly bugger directly imitates nothing it resembles many things. It somewhat resembles a large aquatic insect, a crayfish, a minnow or baitfish, a leach, or a worm. Simply stated, no matter what species you are targeting you can't go wrong with a wooly bugger.

The Adam's fly, elk hair caddis and royal coachmen are all dry flies. These flies match three of the major aquatic insects that fish feed on. The Adam's imitates most mayfly hatches, the elk hair caddis matches caddis flies and the stimulator does a great job imitating stoneflies. Again, while none of these flies are direct imitations of a certain species they do a good job of imitating most species of aquatic insects. Besides being great imitations of certain insect families these three dry flies imitate other things as well. An Adams can be used for caddis as well as mayflies, the elk hair caddis also imitates terrestrials like moth's and beetles, and a stimulator can pass for a grasshopper or a hellgrammite.

There are no better choices for imitating the subsurface insects that fish feed on then a pheasant tail nymph and a gold ribbed hair's ear nymph. These are two generic nymphs that produce results in all types of water. The pheasant tail nymph imitates the mayfly nymph and the gold ribbed hair's ear imitates the caddis nymph, but in essence they just look buggy. By buggy, I mean they look a lot like a variety of insects found beneath the waters surface.

There is a reason all of these flies have stood the test of time, THEY WORK! These flies have been proven to be successful in all types of water and under most circumstances. I would be surprised to find any fly fisherman who would tell you these flies don't work.