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Adult Damsel
A dry fly, tied #10–14, a summer pattern. It is tied against 1 named insect in this book — all year.
- #10–14Hook size
- dry flyType
- SummerSeason
- 1Hatch matched
What it looks like
A drawing, not a photograph, and not traced from one. Its proportions were read off 5 independent reference photographs of the pattern and written down as 5 measured characteristics — wing angle, tail length against the shank, how far a hackle fibre reaches — every one of which had to hold across more than one of them before it could be drawn. What survives across many photographs of a fly is the fly.
What it imitates
Each of these is the same hatch record the app's own panel reads, so a pattern recommended on a river card in the app is recommended for one of the insects below.
Tying recipe
In tying order. This dressing is the standard one — these patterns have been in the publicrecord for decades — and materials substitute freely: the proportions and the silhouette are the pattern, not the brand of dubbing.
| Hook | Standard dry-fly hook, sizes 10–14 |
|---|---|
| Thread | Blue or olive 8/0 |
| Body | Extended blue or olive foam or braided cord |
| Wing | Sparse white or grey synthetic, along the body |
| Post | Foam |
| Hackle | Grizzly, parachute |
When to fish it
Midsummer afternoons on slow weedy water, particularly where a pair has fallen in coupled.
A summer pattern. The insects it matches are active all year, in water from 55°F to 78°F.
Target species
- Trout
- Bass
- Panfish
Rivers it fishes well
Rivers with a page here that sit in the regions where the insects this pattern imitates are recorded. It is a claim about coverage, not a report of a fish caught.
- Au Sable River northern lower Michigan · July mean 72.1°F
- Catawba River the North Carolina mountains · July mean 76.7°F
- Jackson River the Virginia mountains · July mean 66.3°F
- Muskegon River northern lower Michigan · July mean 71.0°F
- Escanaba River the Upper Peninsula · July mean 68.3°F
- Saint Croix River northern Wisconsin · July mean 77.2°F
- Smith River the Virginia mountains · July mean 51.9°F
- Tygart Valley River the Virginia mountains · July mean 74.6°F
- Kalamazoo River southern lower Michigan · July mean 71.3°F
- Aaron Creek the North Carolina mountains · July mean 76.7°F
- Aaron Run the Virginia mountains · July mean 77.1°F
- Aarons Run the Virginia mountains · July mean 74.2°F
Related patterns
Same type of fly, or tied for the same insects.
- Adams (Catskill) dry fly · #12–20 — The original. Rides higher than the parachute in broken water.
- Adult Cranefly dry fly · #10–16 — Long trailing legs, sparse hackle, skittered rather than drifted. Autumn and spring evenings on the bank side.
- Brown Drake dry fly · #10–12 — Dusk in early June on Michigan and Wisconsin sand-bottom rivers.
- Brown Drake Spinner dry fly · #10–12 — Spent wings, dead drift, in the dark.
- CDC Caddis dry fly · #14–20 — Lower in the film than an Elk Hair. For flat water and educated fish.