A call to Bruce Wankle at the Virginia Creeper Fly Shop in Abingdon produced a quick rundown on flies that are working.
“You know we’re always supposed to have new fly patterns,” Bruce said. “And we’ve got some new midge patterns that run just underneath the surface. We’ve got some new tiny midge dries. Hopefully we won’t have to be using those blamed things for very much longer but it will run through March.
“I think that the things that people are looking at are the new Simms Vibram soles.”
The impetus for the new technology has been the spread around the world of an invasive algae known as Didymo. Spores and cells of Didymo or Rock Snot are believed to hitch-hike in the felt of traditional wading boots, surviving several days out of the water.
Their presence there has allowed them to colonize waters far from their native habitat. Trout Unlimited is calling for the phase out of felt soles by 2011. New Zealand has banned the use of felt soled wading boots entirely.
That ban led Wankle to nobly sacrifice his personal pair of specially ordered size 13 boots to another fly shop that had a customer leaving for a trip to New Zealand.
If you want Wankle’s recommendation on what’s working now, drop in and see him.
Mike Adams at Mahoney’s Outfitters in Johnson City said, “We have the new line of A-3 Scott rods, a pretty wide selection. And we have the Blackfoot line of Simms waders on the way.” Blackfoot waders are a lightweight, economy priced boot-foot wader that is scheduled for a March introduction.
Adams offered this advice when asked what was working on the Holston: “Little Blue Wings size 20 and 22. And there was a report of a gentleman that absolutely cleaned up on size 14 flies last Saturday.”
Maybe a personal chat with Adams will reveal what size 14.
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