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Golden Stone Nymph
A nymph, tied #6–12, carried year round. It is tied against 1 named insect in this book, and stands in when nothing is hatching — June–July.
A heavy bottom nymph tied to the golden stonefly, which spends three years underwater before emerging, so a version of it is in the drift in every month of the year. It is tied on a 3X long nymph hook in sizes 6–12 with tan 6/0 thread: two amber goose biots for the tail, a ribbed body of amber and brown mottled dubbing, a two-segment mottled turkey wingcase, brown-mottled hen legs, and flattened lead wire to get the profile down and keep it there. The insect it matches, Acroneuria, is on the water in June and July in temperatures of 55 to 68 degrees. The fly is fished in riffles and broken water in early summer, weighted enough to tick along the bottom through the drift. It is also carried for stoneflies generally and as a searching pattern when nothing is hatching, since a nymph with a three-year life cycle is never out of season. Trout are the target.
- #6–12Hook size
- nymphType
- AllSeason
- 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.
It is also tagged for stoneflies generally, no hatch at all — a searching pattern.
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 | 3X long nymph hook, sizes 6–12 |
|---|---|
| Thread | Tan 6/0 |
| Tail | Two amber goose biots |
| Body | Amber and brown mottled dubbing, ribbed |
| Wingcase | Mottled turkey, two segments |
| Legs | Brown-mottled hen |
| Weight | Lead wire, flattened |
When to fish it
Riffles and broken water in early summer. Fish it heavy and let it tick the bottom.
Carried all year. The insects it matches are active june–july, in water from 55°F to 68°F.
Target species
- Trout
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
- 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
- Abb Run the Virginia mountains · July mean 77.1°F
Related patterns
Same type of fly, or tied for the same insects.
- Pat's Rubber Legs nymph · #4–10 — Ugly, heavy, and the single best searching nymph in high or coloured water.
- Black Stonefly Nymph nymph · #12–18 — Dead-drifted along the bottom. Stonefly nymphs are always present in rocky water.
- Copper John nymph · #12–20 — Heavy enough to be the anchor fly. Gets the whole rig down in one cast.
- Girdle Bug nymph · #6–12 — Rubber legs on a chenille body. The cheap ancestor of Pat's Rubber Legs.
- Egg Fly nymph · #10–16 — Behind spawning salmon and steelhead in fall and spring. Not a hatch — a food source.