Red Clock

[skunkaroo]

Although mainly terrestrial, these often fall on water, and may be taken eagerly by the fish. There are some aquatic versions it seems, but they are little known.

The aquatic versions can be found on some of our Western NA streams, although in truth I've never managed to dig up a nymph in those waters. After coming across them in my reading of UK mags, I started to experiment with "Daddies". Over the past three years I've found them to be killers along the margins of several streams, and while painful to prepare, I always try to have at least a few on hand.

I've general tied them with a body using my "special blend" (brown, grey and claret) with a rib of pearl and found this to be a reasonable facsimile of the original. However, after looking at the above photos, I may have to branch out and try introducing some yellow. In the absence of an actual Western green drake hatch, I suspect that the paradrake is sometimes taken as a daddie by our local trout.



Aaron

[skunkaroo]

Sorry Mike,

Not my fly. I'm actually not very fond of the paradrake, although I do like extended body mayflies.

Aaron

[Soft-hackle]

Hi again, Mike,
I could not agree with you more about fishermen looking for patterns rather than looking at the insects. This is especially true of new fly tiers. I admit, it gives them a starting point, however, I always thought the purpose of fly tying was to help the fly fishermen match local insects, which often vary from watershed to watershed. In fact, I did a fly tying demo on this very subject this past January at the Oak Orchard Fly Shop. It was called "Creating Your Own Flies". It dealt with various hook profiles, tying materials, and I used some of Han's photos from his site to show some examples of some very creative tiers. I then tied up some of my own patterns. The shop was packed, and I think it went over well, and some of the novices learned something.

Mike