Fly Fishing Insider Podcast
On spring creeks like Penns Creek, a 7 to 7.5 foot leader gives better control than the standard nine footer: less line is exposed to wind and conflicting currents, and heavier 4X or 5X tippet survives big trout that run for rocks. Land the dry about four feet above a rising fish, not ten.
Rick Nyles owns Sky Blue Outfitters in Pennsylvania, where he guides dry fly trips and runs a staff of nine guides who each specialize in a niche, from swinging wet flies to small-stream brook trout.
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Why use a short leader for dry fly fishing on spring creeks?
A 7 to 7.5 foot leader keeps enough fly line outside the rod tip to control the cast on a stream 40 feet wide, which a 9-foot leader on a 9-foot rod does not. A short leader also puts less light tippet in the water for wind and crossing currents to grab, and it lets a dry fly angler fish 4X or 5X instead of 6X. That heavier tippet matters on Penns Creek, where big brown trout run into the rocks and rub through fine tippet. A cheap way to build the short leader is to buy a 9-foot mono leader, cut it back to about six and a half feet, and add roughly two feet of fluorocarbon at the point.
How far above a rising trout should you land a dry fly?
About four feet above the rising trout, not ten. Casting ten feet above a rising trout and letting the dry fly drift ten feet past it burns twenty feet of water for a single pass over the fish, while four feet above and two feet past gives three passes over the same trout in the same stretch. More drifts over a feeding fish means more chances at an eat. Rising trout often settle into a rhythm, sometimes coming up roughly every thirty seconds, and timing the cast to that rhythm produces more than covering water does.
How do you tell a big trout from a small one by the rise form?
A splashy rise is not proof of a small fish. On a 20-inch trout feeding just under the surface, the dorsal fin shows first and the tail slaps as the fish turns back down, so the head never actually breaks the surface. Anglers who read that tail slap as a mouth misjudge the size of the trout badly. A rise where the head stays under the surface is a signal to stop fishing a full dun and put on an emerger.
What rod and leader setup works best for Penns Creek?
Rick Nyles fishes a fast, stiff four weight himself for the backbone it gives, but recommends a five weight for visiting anglers because a day on Penns Creek may include heavy nymphs under an indicator or woolly buggers, not only dry flies. The leader is short by design, seven to seven and a half feet, with a mono butt and about two feet of fluorocarbon at the end. He does not fish full fluorocarbon leaders, and he is untroubled if the fluorocarbon point pulls the dry fly down into the film.
What cast gives a dry fly the longest drift?
Overcast past the target, then pull the rod and line back quickly while the fly is still in the air so the line lands in loops rather than flat. That slack lets the angler mend without dragging the dry fly and buys a longer dead drift, and because the line is pulled back toward the caster, the target has to be overshot to land the fly on it. Releasing the cast higher above the water also helps twice: the dry fly settles softly and floats high, and the fly is far easier to pick out against a green background of trees on its way down than it is in glare on the water.
What dry fly patterns work during a spring creek hatch?
Cripples and emergers, not clean textbook duns. A single sulfur hatch will put half a dozen visibly different insects on the water at once: true duns, insects half out of the shuck, wings crumpled, bodies bent over. Tying deliberately scruffy patterns with a trailing shuck and bumpy dubbing matches what the trout are actually eating better than a tidy fly does. An old trick for converting a dun into a cripple is to slip a small scrap of nylon stocking onto the hook as a trailing shuck.
How do you rig a dropper off a dry fly or a nymph?
Start the dropper long, 30 inches to 3 feet, because shortening a dropper is faster than adding tippet and knots to get deeper. Do not tie the dropper to the hook bend when the lead fly is a barbless jig or euro nymph, since the tag will slide right off; run the tag end of the connecting knot long instead, or tie the dropper to the tippet in front of the fly. When nymphing, aim to ride six to eight inches off the bottom rather than dragging bottom, because a fish rising to take a nymph moves the indicator cleanly while bottom ticking creates pauses that hide real eats.
Key takeaways
- Cut a 9-foot mono leader back to about six and a half feet and add two feet of fluorocarbon for a spring creek dry fly leader.
- Fish 4X or 5X rather than 6X on water holding 18 to 22 inch brown trout that run into rock.
- Land the dry fly about four feet above a rising trout and let it drift two feet past, then recast.
- A rise where the dorsal and tail show but the head never breaks the surface means a large fish feeding on emergers.
- There are no bad casts, only bad pickups: let a badly placed cast drift out instead of ripping it off the water above a feeding fish.
- Fish light-colored streamers, such as a white or yellow bugger, so you can see swipes and adjust the strip.
