Back Lake Hex Hatch Update: 6/22

Be careful what you wish for, folks … We finally had a nice, calm, still night for pursuing our fishy friends and while you would think those conditions would be perfect for casting to rising fish, it was not as easy as you would think.

They were, by all accounts, more difficult to catch for a number of people around the lake, myself included. That was not the case for everyone in my boat however, as my wife did quite well and I did hear another successful angler report as well. Why the difference from our success last night from the two days prior?

A couple things. There was a slight to moderate wind on Wednesday and Thursday night, and while it wasn’t a pleasure to cast in, it perhaps helped conceal our leader/tippet combinations those two nights, leading to us catching a lot of trout and bass. Last night there was almost no wind, which meant that we may have been lining or alerting the fish to our presence, especially when our casts were errant. The first two nights with the wind, a 2x or 3x leader would have worked just fine, while last night would have been better served with a 5x leader. Those big flies are hard to cast with 5x leader however, so maybe a larger diameter leader would still be the right choice.

Karen was using the Emma Nymph (I don’t know who Emma is, and it’s really not a nymph, so I’m not at all sure how it got that name) all night, her “go to” hex pattern when fishing Back Lake at this time of the year. Her success was instantaneous, and kept up for most of the night with a few lulls in the action from time to time. The Emma Nymph is actually a dry fly pattern – large, but certainly not as large as some other hex dun patterns, and made almost entirely of the breast feathers of a ruffed grouse. The hackle is of elk hair, and the more the better, as that is what keeps it riding high on the water’s surface. The grouse feathers bear a striking resemblance to the discarded shuck of a departed hex, which must be one of the major factors in its success. Next time you’re on the lake, look at a shuck and compare it with the Emma Nymph – it’s amazingly accurate.

I’m always astonished when she gets the Emma Nymph out, but there is no denying that it works, even when other patterns are stuck in trout limbo. The patterns that worked so well for me the previous two nights (Hex Usual and Foam Hex) were not as predictable last night (even with my 4x tippet), and I noticed that they were riding lower in the water, even after drying and an application of desiccant. Compared to the Emma Nymph, my flies looked pitiful on the water – no wonder why I caught half as many fish as the “top rod” in my boat.

The weather looks unsettled the next couple of nights, which isn’t always the doom of the hatch that you think it might be. High winds and heavy rain is bad for the hex hatch, but if there’s a partial clearing or slowdown of the weather, the hatch will come off, it’s just a matter of whether we will be out there to check it out.

Please remember that if you’re practicing catch and release, please pinch down the barbs on your hooks – the fish will be easier to release and perhaps you’ll catch them again later on down the line.