Nymphing depth

[Rapala]

Can anyone tell me how deep i should fish the nymphs? right on the bottom?(i hate getting snagged)

And do u guys use dry flies only when the fish are rising? and what

characteristics of a river should be fished with dry flies?? riffles?runs?pools??

Any tips are much appreciated:love:

[Yellowtail]

In rivers you should place the strike indicator roughly 1.5 times the water depth above the nymph. In current, the line from the indicator to the nymph will be at an angle and this length ensures your nymph is close to the bottom. You will catch the most fish this way as most fish are very close to the bottom. You will also get snagged sometimes this way, this is no getting away from it. That is just the price we pay to catch fish.

Can't help you with the other two as I have trouble finding a good enough hatch to justify fishing drys. At this time of the year you can try hopper patterns close to the shore.

[fishstix]

I mainly use dry flies . If there is a hatch and the fish are rising; i watch to see what it is that is hatching, and try to imitate it. Sometimes if you can get the size right, you may be rewarded. You will know when a hatch is happening because the fish will be splashing all over the place. This is what we call "happy hour" Today on the highwood there were only a few small hatches. but the fish were hungry. I started my day out with a 18 inch rainbow, followed by a 19 inch rainbow. Both of these were caught on an HL varient. sive 12. We stopped at a small waterfall and i noticed a fish rising. A few casts with the HL and i could see that the fish were not buying it. I switched to a size 16 green drake. One cast and another 19 inch bow came up. This fish jumped out of the water two feet in the air. he did this three times. Three big rainbows before noon. Not bad. Later in the day i wasnt seeing and surface action, so i tied on a large white streamer. I actually tied it to fish for pike so it was big. Size 4 hook and a 5 inch strip of white rabbit fur and some silver tinsil. We were at a beaver dam and i could see a big bull trout waiting at the bottom. My fishing friend was going to have first crack at this hole but took too long. I thought "i'll just throw in once." well on my first cast the bull looked and followed it. He returned to his resting spot and waited. on My second cast it looked like he was going to let it go past,and then BAM. fish on!! Big fish on. It went nuts. Stripping line off my reel coming back at me. 23 inch bull trout. No problem. I had a couple more on after that but didnt land any more. So to answer your question about when to use a dry or a wet. A dry when they are rising. A wet when they a re not and a dry also when they are not. My first two bows today were on HL varients(dry) and at thet time i would have to say there was no hatch going on at the time. Just a good solid float. Strip your line fast. Not so fast you drag your fly, but fast enough to keep the line from floating behind you and hindering your hook set. The best way to figure this stuff out is to go out and do it. After your done doing it , go out and fish.

[winged1]

if your dry flying flowing water, work from tail out to head slowly, watching upstream for the risers. They'll tell you what they prefer as far as rifle, eddy, etc.

The smaller guys typically move around in the tailouts, and will splash when rising. The larger guys will hold at the head of the pools and will only break the surface with their backs, so watch carefully. When you've identified one rising, don't cast straight to it, but consecutively cast closer coming in from the shallow side, and yes, you need to be positioned on the inside, or shallow side of the flow (wading).

As the waters drop from now till Oct, your going to find that the hatches take place during an ever decreasing window of time during the day. This is when the fish will feed voraciously and will readily hit a well presented dry fly.

When I fish nymphs on a lake, I'll give my sinking line plenty of time to hit the bottom, then retrieve with short jerks. When I use spinning gear on flowing water, I'll pinch on small lead wieghts until I feel it bounce on the bottom.

In either case, make sure your hooks are sharp and your knots/line are secure. And remember that a nice fish can be caught again in a few days if released quickly.

[slingshotz]

When fishing nymphs, the 1.5x the depth is a good rule but you should be looking for your bottom nymph to just nick the bottom every so often causing your indicator to pause or bob. Depending on how heavy the nymph is, it can take quite some time for them to sink so be aware when you are fishing in a faster current that you may run out of distance for the drift to let the nymph actually get to the bottom.

A lot of the times the indicator will dip and it might only be the bottom but many times it's a fish so you have to learn to set the hook no matter what. Fish can have a lot of time to mouth the nymph to figure out if it's real or not and spit it out depending on how deep you are fishing. Depending on the current and conditions there can be a 1-3 sec delay in the nymph getting eaten and the indicator getting sucked down so you really have to be quick when you see anything odd happening with the indicator.