Spring Flies

[s2ary]

In the spring I usually wait for the apple trees to bloom before hitting the salt. Early fish and holdovers are like hunting unicorns, I'd rather spend the time wraping up winter projects around the house and tieing smallie flies for June.

But when the fish do finally make it here, I like to hit the marshes with a box of only three flies in an assortment of colors. These are great flies for beginers because you can't tie them wrong.

The first is the Ray's fly which works great as a silverside and sandeel immitation. I tie it in the traditional colors and vary it for dirty and clear water, and sometimes I add a rattle.

YouTube - Tying a Ray's Fly

[FinzUp]

Very nice! I used to live in those parts, and always had some luck with a Gartside Fish Head fly in white/chart and in white/pink. That fly was especially good off the Kennebunk jetty. Another good easy tie that seemed to work well in the Mousam rip was a 4" length of silver tubing tied in on top with a thin wing of white bucktail. About as rudimentary as you can get, and wicked ugly, but they liked it!

[s2ary]

This is Page's tying sequence for the Slim Jim.

Slim Jim -- fly tying patterns