Fountains of Youth – Classic trout flies that have withstood the test of time … flies that remain “forever young”

by Rusty Dunn

Emergence is a time of great peril for mayflies, as nymphs must ascend to the surface in full view of ever-watchful trout.  Nymphs that survive the ascent accum­ulate just under the surface, where they molt and tran­sition from the juvenile to adult stage.  The nymph’s thorax pierces the surface film, its skin splits, and the winged adult crawls atop the water, leav­ing an empty shuck behind.  Adults then expand their wings, wait for them to dry, and fly off to the safety of stream­side bushes.  Hatching can take several min­utes or more, and emergers are highly vul­nerable to trout the whole time.  The layer of water extending from the sur­face to a few inches be­low the surface is emerger coun­try.  Trout know it well, and so should you, for it is the most productive place to be during a hatch.

Trout sometimes feed recklessly on emergers, but more often they are maddeningly selective.  Sur­face feeders will key on a fleeting and utterly elu­sive fea­ture or stage of the emergence and reject anything less than a close match.  Iden­tifying the correct stage du jour is part of the challenge and reward of fishing emer­gers, but rejec­tion is a way of life.  You’ll need an assort­ment of low-floating flies, quick fingers, and a sense of urgency, because the hatch could be over any minute.  Finding the right emerger fly makes all the fly swap­ping worth­while, because you’ll catch fish after fish seem­ingly effortlessly.  The thrill of vic­tory is mag­ni­ficent, but be prepared also for the agony of defeat.  If your flies are not quite right, you will stand among rising fish, yet you will be fishless.

Parachute-style flies float low in the water and are especially good imitations of late-stage emergers.  Para­­chute flies developed in the 1920s and were pat­ented in 1931 as the ‘Gyrofly’ by William Brush.  They were not widely popu­lar, however, until publication in 1971 of Selec­tive Trout by Doug Swisher and Carl Richards.  Their in­fluential book emphasized the importance of imitating emerg­ers and argued persuasively that low-floating flies are needed for the task.  Their ‘Paradun’ dry flies are para­chute pat­terns that imitate winged adult may­fly duns.

Dutchman Hans van Klinken developed in 1984 one of the all-time great parachute flies, the Klinkhåmer Spe­cial.  A Klinkhåmer is a parachute fly tied on a curved-shank hook, such that the wing post and hackle float atop the water, the thorax rides flush in the film, and the abdomen and tail sink below the surface.  Being par­tially submerged, Klink­håmers imitate emer­gers at an earlier stage of hatch­ing than do parachute duns tied on straight-shank hooks.  Van Klinken devel­oped the Klinkhåmer as a caddis imita­tion for Norwe­gian gray­ling but, with an added tail, it is an excellent mayfly imitation as well.  The posture of Klink­håmers on the water closely matches winged mayfly adults climbing from their nymphal shuck at the surface.

Match the sizes and colors of Klinkhåmers to the may­flies you en­counter, and fish them dead drift over rising trout.  Don’t be misled by those great big wings!  Most naturals are smaller than they appear, so capture one and have a close look at the size of its body.  Be careful to treat only the wing post and hackle with float­ant.  The abdomen must be soaking wet, or it will not sink as intended.  Any float­ant on the abdomen – even from residue on your fingertips while tying on the fly – will cause a Klink­håmer to flop over on its side, leading most assuredly to the agony of defeat.

A properly floating Klinkhåmer rides majestically down­stream with its wing post upright and visible to the angler, while its abdomen hangs subsurface and is vis­ible to trout.  Hatching is a perilous time for mayflies, but it can be a time of plenty for anglers with a pocket­ful of emergers and a curve in their hook.

Copyright 2020, Rusty Dunn

Klinkhåmer Special

Van Klinken’s original imitates caddisflies and has neither a tail nor rib.  When imitating mayflies, add a sparse tail of ginger or light brown sparkly nylon (to imitate a trailing shuck) and a rib of thread or fine wire.