Saturday, December 04, 2010

The Doc Spratley

One by one I’ve begun rebuilding a steelhead box that was recently stolen. Although other items were taken that box of faith and hope represented a quarter of a century of steelhead fishing; a collection of flies tied, bartered and gifted over the years.  Of all that was taken, it was the most significant loss.   

Several weeks passed before I sat down at my bench to begin the arduous tying process that would fill some of the voids left by the absconded box knowing that I would be unable to simply replace, or recreate that which was lost overnight. In doing so, I’ve found a renewed sense of excitement in tying those patterns that have proven their worth over the years and a renewed interest in tying a few new ones.

Greg Pearson stopped by the other day and naturally we spent a fair amount of time discussing our steelhead season; waters we had fished, successes, failures, flies and other related matters. He’d found great success in a pattern I’d heard of, but never fished or tied, the Doc Sprately.  What caught my attention was the fact that it had a green butt.   Those that know the patterns I prefer when steelhead fishing, know that a number of my flies quite consistently have a green butt.

Shortly after Greg left I was perusing the internet looking for samples of this fly and stumbled upon one that was of interest, the Doc Spratley Spey.   It is a beautifully dressed low water fly, and one deserving of a steelhead.   After a slight modification to the wing, there now lies a nice little gathering of these in my new box adjacent to those freshly tied patterns that are the foundation of my offerings.  Come next season, I’ll be looking for a reason to fish this fly.  It won’t take much knowing that any respectable steelhead would find it hard to resist.  

2 comments:

Jeremy Christensen said...

Who would grift a box of steelhead flies? That's insane. Obviously a steelhead fisherman would never do it, lord knows we need another karmic reason to not catch any fish, and they're basically worthless to your petty criminal, but unquestionably valuable to you. A heinous crime.

Steve Schmidt said...

You'd don't know the half of it, but that is another story. Kind of felt like a kick in the B...s. Killer looking fly though, can't wait to straighten some mono with it. Wish it was sooner than later however.