Knotted umbrella fly [Disheolier Skoulmet]

A bigger contrast was almost not possible at the Dutch Flyfair yesterday. Yann Youenn Bouglouan from Brittany (NOT France) sat there at a fly tyers demonstration with minimalistic materials between two heavily equipped fly tyers. As a micro fly connoisseur I was immediately drown to his flies. Because his Dutch was as good as my French, we spoke in English about our passions about tying small flies, entomology and catching mullets with #16 nymph patterns. Without wasting words: a great guy!

Yann is the mastermind of the Disheolier Skoulmet fly. He explained that Disheolier Skoulmet means literally umbrella knotted. The "knotted" refers to knotting the hackle. This is just a overhand knot with one or two hackle feathers. Yann prefers the Grizzle hackle because it has a strong shaft (or ragis).

He demonstrated two versions of this minimalistic fly in a nymph and a dry fly.

•  The nymph version: This fly concept is used in shallow streams were nymphs float just under the surface in their emerging process. Tying: Take one (1!) hackle feather and tie a over hand knot. Put a drop of varnish on the hackle knot to keep it in place. Then strip all the barbs of the shaft from the knot to the desired length. The result is a thin thread like shaft. Then attach the shaft to the thorax of a nymph. The nymph a separately tied. All is shown in the picture above. Another picture of this fly can be found on this page of Fly tyer Ad Hoogenboezem.

•  The dry fly version: For the dry fly you tie the umbrella knot to the hook without the shaft (like on the nymph). For the umbrella you use two (2!) parallel hackle fibres to tie the overhand knot (also varnish!). This gives you more hackles to float and two wing like tips sticking out of the hackle. On the dry fly Yann first ties in the tail, body and rib of the fly. Then he ties in the knotted umbrella and a thorax with a little dubbing. See the picture below on a #16 hook. Yann noted that this fly will survive a few trout attacks, so it is more an innovative "fly-tiers fly" than a commercial long lasting pattern. Another tip from Yann came from an old (Brittanic?) man who did not use tying thread. He used to tie the hackle to the hook with only overhand knots of the debarbed feather shaft! That is really minimalistic. Perhaps useful in a survival situation when you only have a hook and a feather (and nylon and a high end rod reel etc :-)).

Yann at work, tying the dry fly as shown above:

Thanks Yann!!

An more comprehensive story and tying sequence of this fly can be read in the article "Vissen onder een parasol, Disheolier Skoulmet & umbrelle by Ad Hoogenboezem en Leon Links. This article can be found in issue 97 of magazine "De Nederlandse Vliegvisser".

Scientific evidence for the duo rig or "klink 'n dink"

To fine polish your stream crafts, it's recommendable that fly fishermen (while not standing in a stream) habitually visit the site of Troutnut.

Source: Troutnut.com

I just did and found this brilliant article about the Drift Model Project! This project is about a group of University of Georgia ecologists studying the drift-feeding behaviour of fish. "Drift feeding is a behaviour of fish in moving water that hold a steady position, facing upstream into the current, and dart back and forth to intercept passing items of food" (Drift Model Project). 

Fortunately the ecologists shared some key results on their Youtube channel, while still analysing all the data. The video shows a fish surrounded by dots. These dots are the food items the fish is likely to attack.

More specific: the project enhances the understanding in which area/region a drift-feeding fish detects its prey: OUR FLIES! Troutnut gives some preliminary thoughts about insights into fly fishing. Have a look at http://www.troutnut.com/fly-fishing-trip/on-2016_03_31/Some-animations-on-how-fish-react-to-prey.

Reading this (and Roger Smith's article in FF&FT june 2016) triggers me to use more micro fly duo rigs: a dry fly with a nymph on a dropper: a "kiwi klink 'n dink" setup.

The men who stare at midge !

"OMG! Dad is gonna wash his hair in the pond!" were my kids joking. This fly fisher was lying streched out on a pond dock. My face just a few cm from the fishless murky water surface. I was schizophrenically frustrated and happy at the same time. Frustrated because we found out that the pond in front of our holiday bungalow was fishless (besides one stickleback). And happy because I discovered -while staring at the water surface- a fascinating insect life just under my nose. This is a strange phenomenon. As a sort of mental escape, I start hunting for aquatic insects as soon as fishing seems hopeless. Paying attention to detail gives you always an opportunity to learn. So "every disadvantage has its advantage" (reversed quote from Johan Cruijff).

In this case I stared at the live hatching of chironomid midges, also known as buzzer, bugs, muggies (whatever). Initially my attention was drawn to some lazy khaki/light gray midges on the water surface. I thought that their arrogant demeanour had to do with the absence of fish. Staring a little longer I discovered some light khaki protruding periscopes growing out of the water.....turning into a midge. I ran for my camera! 

....more photo's and a video will follow soon.