There are times you may encounter a few different insects hatching and other times when it appears there is nothing hatching. There are a lot of different insects that hatch during the Fall and Winter seasons. Most hatches take place during the Spring and Summer months of the year. Of course, this varies greatly with the section of the country you fish and the type of water you are fishing. A freestone stream, tailwaters, spring creeks and lakes may have a few different hatches.
    It is a fact that many anglers don’t really know how to go about fishing hatches, or for that matter, what is important about them. This article isn’t going into any detail on how to fish any specific aquatic insect. It is intended to point out some of the most important tips about how to go about fishing the Fall and Winter season hatches.
         1. Why Hatches Are Important
        When an aquatic insect hatches, it must come out of its hiding place – from underneath a rock, crevices between rocks, out of a grass or moss bed, or in some cases, a burrow. In order to hatch, meaning emerge into an adult insect, it must develop its wing pad and either accent to the surface of the water, or crawl out of the water to emerge. When it emerges to the surface, it becomes directly exposed to the trout, or a sitting duck, you might say. When the insets emerge to the surface, they are very easy for the trout to acquire during the hatch. The emerging insect will have to get through the surface skim to dry their wings and fly off the water. It may be on the surface of the water for a few seconds for a minute or more. Those insects that crawl up the bank, a rock or boulder or anything else are exposed to feeding trout but not as easy for the trout to acquire as those emerging out in the water.
After the insect hatches into an adult, the males and females of the species much breed in order to produce new generations. This is usually done above the water they came from allowing most of them to fall dead to the surface of the water where they emerged from. Females mate with males, fertilize the eggs just prior to oviposition, and drop or lay them on the water and in some cases, the banks of the stream. Of course, when they land on the banks or anything other than the water, they won’t hatch. A few insect species are bi-brooded and become a factor for anglers to match at two different times during a calendar year, but this is a one time event per year for the great majority of aquatic insect species.
2. What Flies Should You Have During Hatches?
You should have flies that imitate all stages of life that trout eat of all the aquatic insects that may hatch while you are on the water. For mayflies, that includes nymphs, emergers, duns and spinners. For stoneflies, that includes nymphs and adults. For caddisflies, that includes larva, pupa and adults. For midges, that includes larva, pupa and adults.
3. When To Fish Nymphs or Dry Flies (Below water or on the surface)
I’m often asked, when to fish a nymph, or larva, or dry fly during a hatch. It depends somewhat on the particular insect, but in general, you should fish a mayfly or stonefly nymph, or a caddisfly or midge larvae during the morning hours, and a dry fly to imitate the mayfly dun, adult stonefly, or adult caddis or midge, during the afternoons. Early in the season, most of them hatch during the warmest part of the day. During the mid to late afternoon, most mayfly spinners return to the water to mate, deposit eggs and die. Caddisflies and Stoneflies usually deposit their eggs from the middle to late in the day.
4. What Fly Should You Fish First?
It depends on the time you start fishing, but always the one that imitates the most plentiful and available insect at the time. In the case of multiple hatches, and there is often more than one insect that may hatch the day you fish, and assuming you start in the morning, fish the nymph or larva of that insect, or in the case when other types of foods are plentiful and more available, such as terrestrial insects, crustaceans, or baitfish, fish imitations of that food. If you are not sure which food or insects are most available for a given stream and time, you can always email or call us at Perfect Fly, and we can help you.
5. Where Should You Fish The Stream?
Some trout streams are ninety miles or longer. Most all are at least five to ten miles. Whatever insects are hatching at the time, rest assured they are not hatching in the same place on the stream. They are usually hatching only in a small section of a stream ranging from a few hundred yards to maybe as much as five miles. In cases where the elevation of the stream changes a lot, they usually start at the lowest elevation and move upstream each day, remaining in one section for only a very few days.
6. The Type of Water Is Also Important
Different types of aquatic insects hatch in different types of water. Burrower, crawler, and swimming mayflies live and hatch in slow to moderate water. Clinger mayflies live and hatch in fast water. Stoneflies mostly all live and hatch in fast water. Caddisflies hatch in different types of water depending on the species. When you are fishing a stream and a certain insect is hatching, spend your time only in the type of water that insect lives and hatches in.
There is much more you should know about hatches, but hopefully, these tips will help make your next trip more productive. Each of our Perfect Flies has a page of information under the info link on our website on how, when and where to fish them. If you are planning a trip and don’t know what insects are hatching at the time you will be fishing, send us an email, or call us and we will be glad to help you.
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