By Rick Stahl

How do you separate the men from the boys when fly fishing streams? Simple, give them only nymphs to fish. No doubt dry flies is the most exciting form of fishing offered to the fly angler, but lets face it, 90% of a trout’s diet is delivered to them under the surface.

Nymphing is the more difficult way to master the stream but also is the most effective way to consistently take more and larger trout. Dry flies can be seen and studied, the adult bugs you are imitating are usually readily seen and obvious where as aquatic nymphs have to be collected from the stream bottom or fish’s stomach and its tough to know exactly what your nymph is doing as it drifts along.

Like most fly fishing for trout the first and most important rule is to „match the hatch”. This means to try to mimic with your fly what the trout are eating. Some homework should be done before heading out to the water. Visit the local fly shop and ask what should be hatching at that time of year and which patterns are most effective to imitate the naturals. Also there are volumes of books and videos available to help you with stream identification of insects and the timing of the hatches.

Before tying on a fly at the waters edge, the seasoned nympher will take a few moments to try and figure out what should be on the trout’s diet. First take a good look at the waters surface and the shoreline shrubs. Watch for adult insects fluttering about or resting in the shade. This will give you a good idea of what’s been hatching lately and therefore which nymphs should be readily available to the trout. If no insects have been emerging, or to take a closer look at the actual nymph, try holding a small piece of
window screen against the current at the bottom of a riffle and shuffle the gravel upstream. This should send some of the streams aquatic nymphs tumbling downstream and into the waiting screen.

Have a good look at the nymphs and/or adults you have collected. Take particular notice first of the size and then the shape and thirdly the color of the bugs. Next have a look at your fly box and try to match the nymph as close as possible in the order listed. This should give you a good basis to start your fishing with confidence.

When no one bug is prevalent, which often occurs in the mornings before the sunlight has triggered a hatch, try using searching nymphs. The most effective ones I have found are usually of the stone fly variety. In many waters, particularly ones that do not receive much pressure or are nutrient poor, a general searching nymph may be all that is needed to fool the trout on any given day.

A stomach pump can be invaluable to the angler. This tool allows the angler to extract what the fish has been eating with out killing or harming the fish. Of course a fish has to be caught first and remember that just because you are catching fish on a certain fly you may be able to catch more if you can mimic the natural more closely.

The most common method of fishing nymphs is to use a strike indicator, weight and fly. This outfit closely resembles the old bobber and worm technique we all used as kids. The strike indicator is basically an over glorified bobber, and performs the same functions as one. The size of indicator that you use, should correspond with the amount of weight that is need to get and keep your fly close to the bottom with out sinking the indicator. The amount of weight you use will be dictated by the depth and
speed of the water. As a general rule, when in doubt add more weight. You can also usually achieve deeper depths also by lengthening the lead between the weight and indicator; this is most effective in slower water.

The distance between the fly and the weight will vary depending on water speed. The faster the water the less chance a trout has at closely inspecting a fly, hence the faster the water the closer your weight can be to the fly. The closer the weight is to the fly the quicker the indicator reacts to a bite. In riffles and quick water one can often run their weights within eight inches of the fly, the furthest one would ever need to go would be about two feet.

After attaching all the gear to ones leader and adjusting the indicator and weight so as to ride the fly close to the bottom cast the entire contraption slightly up stream at about 35 degrees. As soon as your fly settles make a strong enough mend so that the indicator and weight are riding upstream of the fly. Now allow the indicator to float along the surface with out any drag, making small mends and shaking out line to keep it going. This will allow the fly to float along freely just like a natural. Usually I try to not to
drift further than 50 feet downstream of my location for at that point often you will lose control of the drift and have little hook setting power due to the slack in the line. If the indicator wiggles the wrong way or goes under this is the indication that a fish has inhaled your offering. You will snag bottom, in fact if you are not losing the odd fly than you’re probably not close enough to the bottom, and it will take practice to tell the difference between a fish and a rock.

Another popular method of nymphing is called high sticking. This is quite a simple technique but also fairly tough to truly master. All that is needed is heavily weighted nymphs and a long leader. Most high sticking is done very close to the angler so the best water for it is usually pocket water or riffles, as they will allow you to get extremely close to the fish without spooking them.

Position yourself so that you are slightly upstream and within 20 feet of where you expect the trout to lie, the closer the better. Flip your fly far enough upstream of the fishes lie to be able to let it sink. As the fly drifts towards you lift the rod to collect the slack and as the fly drifts below you lower the rod to achieve a drift. Keep a fairly tight line to your fly, this is what makes it tough, too much tension and the fly rides up and unnatural, not enough and your snagged on the bottom or cannot detect a strike. Good high stickers seem to have a sixth sense to them to know when a fish has eaten their fly, if you see your line twitch the wrong way or feel something odd set the hook.

Another method, and probably my favorite, is fishing the emerger or swinging a fly. You are trying to imitate the nymph as it travels from the bottom of the river to the top on its way to hatch. Stoneflies do not emerge in this way, they crawl onto the shore to hatch, and there fore they are not a good choice for this technique. Mayfly and caddis nymphs are the best for this application.

Even, slow flowing runs are usually the best for swinging a fly and the less seams the better. You will need enough weight on the line or in the fly to get it to sink close to the bottom. Cast the fly straight across or slightly up stream. Make a strong enough mend so that the fly is leading the line and
leader through the drift. Make smaller mends as the fly drifts to try and keep it sinking and as the fly reaches about 45 degrees below you start holding slightly back on the line, this will force the fly to „swim” slowly to the surface. In faster water conditions you may have to feed some line out as you hold tension on the fly so it doesn’t rise to fast. Fish will eat the fly at almost any stage of this presentation, be ready, during the free drift portion it may be tough to feel a take but while holding back on the fly it
is usually quite obvious if not down right exciting.

This is only short over view of nymphing. There are literally hundreds of books and videos dedicated to this general style of fishing. The best teacher you will find is always experience and practice. Remember you will never find yourself on your deathbed wishing you had fished less.