Don's Fly Tying - the Caddis Crawler
Don Haaheim presents one of his favorite patterns, "The Caddis Crawler", and talks about fishing this pattern in Buck Lake, located on the Douglas Plateau. He also provides instructions to tie the fly, and a few extra tips for maximum success.
Note: Don says this pattern has also worked well on White Lake. This map is available from our web site at no charge.
The wind blew in spurts on a chilly October day at Buck Lake. The gray day beckoned of snow soon to come in the Douglas Lake Ranch plateau. There were no obvious hatches in the cool weather to provide a hint of what the larger rainbow and occasional brook trout might be feeding on in the lake depths. On a hunch, I changed to a sink tip fly line and a weighted caddis crawler to search the bottom near the small west edge island. After a few casts, my line suddenly tightened with the unmistakable pull of a heavy fish. Several minutes later I was rewarded with a rainbow trout just over 2 pounds, clean and silver as they come! The recipe for this excellent lake nymph is below.
Materials:
Hook-Mustad 33960 streamer size 10
Tail-None, but use a short copper flashabou tag
Body-Dark olive swannundaze, small
Ribbing-None
Thorax-Hareline dubbin, March Brown #2
Hackle-Brown hen hackle feather
Head-A single strand of peacock herl twisted with a strand of green crystal hair
Wing-None
Thread-Invisible mending
For best success, I have found that several wraps of thin pencil lead just back of the hook eye will help to keep the fly near the bottom where it has proven to be most effective. Then wrap a copper flashabou tag through to about half the bend of the hook. Next attach and wrap your thin dark olive swannundaze starting at the hook bend and up the shank through to the lead near the hook eye. At this point, make a dubbing loop with your tying thread and insert a small amount of the March Brown material into the loop, twist and form a short thorax not more than 1/4 the length of the hook shank. At the thorax head near the hook eye, apply two or three turns of short brown hackle feather and clip the top. The final step is a couple of turns of the twisted peacock herl and green crystal hair for the head, taking care to push the hackle back to the hook point as you complete the head. Cement, tie off and you have finished the western caddis crawler.
