Home Forums Fishing Flyfishing Identifying what fish are feeding on

OK, Im stumped. Other than stopping at your local flyshop or "watering hole" how do you identify what the fish are feeding on.
I was out the other night fishing miracle mile and for the life of me could not get the fish to take my fly. They were feeding like crazy on the surface or right below it. There were several bugs flying around that I had patterns for but the fish wouldn't have it.

So how do you do it? Identify what insect the fish are feeding on? I am realitivly a novice and could use all the help I can get.

Thanks

Hemi

Other than a stomach pump it is really tough to tell. After trying all I could think of to closely imitate the bug I would throw on a woolly bugger or a stimulator. Something big that could catch their attention. It definitely won't work every time but as long as you have tied on 20 other flies, what difference does a couple more make?
Good luck

Yes, a turkey baster type stomach pump. The tough part is acquiring the sample.

A lot of it is trial and error. Even finding the "right" fly might not matter if its too big or too small. You could narrow it down (a little) by checking out a hatch chart for your stream. That might help, but in the end, I doubt it would make much difference. On most of the stream I fish, with a few exceptions, I use just a few patterns throughout year, varying only by size. Certain generic nymphs can look like many different insects. You might try investing in a guide for day that knows this stream, even if its water you've fished many times before. Keep a close eye on what's going on and ask a lot of questions, you might find out that only one or two fly patterns/sizes work throughout the season.

Read the menu on the wall above the ORDER counter.




(That's the best help I'm able to give. )

1. They were feeding on emergers. Or,
2.Tie on the prevalent fly on the surface, except go down in size...they will always take one smaller than a natural, they will almost never take one larger than the natural.


Ingwe

what ingwe said, sounds like the fish were taking emergers. If you don't have any the next time you see this simply take a spinner or dun and on the dun in let's say size 12, chop off all but the last 1/8th inch of wing. Put floatant ONLY on the wing and voila, you have an emerger. With a dun chop alost all the spent wings off and again apply floatant only to the wing stubs and head. You want that tail section to hand down into the water, not lay across it.

one other possibility-- try a smallish streamer and work it just under the surface. There will be minners feeding on the things along with the trout, and trout do like their minners!

90% of people who use a stomach pump on fish don't know how to properly use them and inevitably kill fish.

Hemi, there are some great fish in the Mile. I have always had my best luck there with smaller flashback orange sow bugs. That section of the Platte is an odd section to figure out for matching the hatch though. Most of the time, I fish tandem sow bugs, one #8-10 and #16-18 adding and dropping split shot until I find the correct depth. You need to fish deep and get loooong drifts.

They will take those sow bugs on the swing too.

Here's what I'd do in that situatation.

Try and find what it is they're feeding on by looking at the edge of the streambank. See what washes up to the edge or crawls out on sticks or brush.

Go down in leader size if they're finicky.

Or, go way off the board and use something totally different. Try and get a reaction bite with a wet fly, streamer and change tactics. Ski, drag, strip or fish the swing.

Fishing a dry on a dead drift that doesn't match the hatch makes it tough when they're focused on one pattern and especially when they're focused on emergers. They'll eat emergers but not always the adult pattern.

Sometimes they're just so selective that you have to match the hatch exactly.


HuntKY,

HAPPY BIRTHDAY !

I like your advice based on actual experience.

Here's another idea too. Get away from the slicks where the fish are focused in on one thing if you can't hookem'. Fish the riffles or edges or ..... with different patterns and techniques.

Quite often it's the rainbows that get finicky. The browns, sometimes, not so much.


PS. If anybody wants to get together for some fishing there, pm me. I never fished there and have been wanting to give it a go.

Thanks FishHead.

You should put the Mile on your "to do" list. It isn't easy fishing. Tough wading below Kortes Dam, swift water and steep drop offs. Further down stream, long slower runs, which make for good streamer fishing. There are some absolute HOGS in there, but it can be a humbling experience too, when the wind gets honking, and it does.

Below Grey Reef, the later part of April and on is great too. Once, we did a spring turkey hunt on Casper Mtn and fished the rest of the day below the Reef.

As mentioned go one size smaller and fish emerger patterns or swing soft hackles. Soft hackles are my go to fly. A lot of times fish are not taking insects on the surface and using a dry fly is a futile proposition. Pay attention to the type of splash fish are making. If you see fish rising. Stop and observe them for at least 5 minutes. Will learn a lot and improve your fishing

That's great advice.

I've learned far more by just watching fish and other fisherman than just flayling away. It makes it far easier to spot "patterns". I've sat watched without ever wetting a line and have discovered what I then needed to know on how, what, when and why, it takes to get hooked up. I've spent hours looking through binoculars observing new waters to try and figure things out. It pays off in the long run, BIG TIME.

Wise, wise, wise advice ribka.

+1 on that....

Watch the fish very carefully...if they are taking emergers they will more "bulge" the surface, than break it, as in a dry fly rise...

ingwe

Well if you have rising fish and can't tell what they are taking, put on a size 22 Griffith's Gnat. You should be able to pick up fish. Works for me a lot. Don't be afraid to try different things. In the more popular spots the fish see the same old same old. I been known to go all the way down to 28 with the Gnat. One evening on the West Branch of the Farmington we had fish all over and nobody gotten so much as a hook up. I on a hunch re tippet down to 8x and put on a 28 gnat and put floatant on my leader all the way just 6 inches short of the fly and I started picking up fish on every drift. It was one of hottest 90 min I ever had on that river. It was a blast with an 8 foot Scot 2 wt. Warm but 54 deg water. this was in Mid August a few years back.

Are you able to cast and get your leader off to the side of the fly line with your technique? sort of like '7' so the line is not landing right on top. Stealth is an often overlooked skill. Are you skylined? Is your presentation gentle or are the flys slapping the water just a tad too hard? Just a few thoughts.