A fly designed to represent "any of the black stuff that appears from time to time on the river

by Richard Fieldhouse

You may remember from Tuesday's email that we had quite a few flies arrive with us earlier this week.

We we really excited to receive three of our most popular patterns for this time of year (September & October) - The Endrick Spider, Ginger Tom v2.0 & The Milroy.

I will give you an in-depth look at each of these patterns - they are perfect for this time of year, so grab yours while you can before we run out again (it's the first time we have had The Milroy back in stock for nearly 2 years - we had a very large waiting list for them and lots have gone out already)!

For those of you who are short of time ...

TL;DR - Too Long; Didn't Read

I know that some of you are pressed for time and save our emails to read later in the day, by this time our selections are sometimes sold out (I get lots of emails from customers pointing this out to me).

I've put this section at the beginning, so you can grab your flies now - and save reading my musings for later, safe in the knowledge that you have already secured your chosen flies.

This email is all about the restocking of three of our mosts popular fly patterns at this time of year:

Grab yours today, before we run out again!

Let's start with the one we get asked about most - The Endrick Spider:

The Endrick Spider

This fly pattern was originally devised by John Harwood, and used extensively in the larger sizes on the river Endrick (hence the name) to tempt Salmon and Sea Trout.

Most anglers now recognise this pattern in the smaller trout sizes, it is a fantastic pattern to use in September and October, either as a part of a team (used as the point fly on a Spider rig) or as a single nymph to explore pocket water.

Here we present our Endrick Spider Selection, the selection contains three each of sizes 12, 14, 16 & 18 - all tied on strong barbless hooks.

As we're pretty anal about our nymphs, we've even weighed them:

  • The Endrick Spider in a size 12 weighs 0.15g
  • The Endrick Spider in a size 14 weighs 0.11g
  • The Endrick Spider in a size 16 weighs 0.09g
  • This Endrick Spider in a size 18 weighs 0.07g

That's a total of 12 Endrick Spider's at a heavily discounted price of only £15.00 (bought individually these would be £18.00), supplied in our eco-friendly packaging and includes FREE delivery.

Next up on the fly pattern conveyor belt (there's a Generation Game reference for you) is:

The Ginger Tom v2.0

Originally designed as a fly pattern to tempt Grayling, I've always found that the version of the Ginger Tom that we supply works wonders for trout, I've never personally found it as successful for Grayling - especially on the coloured waters we have up here in North Yorkshire.

So, one day early in the Summer I set about refining it (very slightly) for our more northern river conditions ...

For me, I always prefer fishing Grayling nymphs on a jig hook - so that was the first change.

The next change was to try and make the fly stand out a little more in coloured water - so I added some ginger flash to the body material, and "Hey Presto", we have the Ginger Tom v2.0 ...

The original Ginger Tom was devised by Steve Skuce (and featured in his excellent book - Grayling Flies - do get a copy if you've even a passing interest in The Lady of the Stream. I don't know Steve (and to my knowledge have never met him) but he certainly knows his subject - in this case Grayling flies.

In coloured water, they were (as Steve says in his book) "sheer magic". Last week I even caught a Grayling on one where I never even thought they existed - I was only testing the fly out to check how fast it sank and a fish took it near my feet - and no, I didn't land it as my line was wrapped around my leg at the time!

We've just received more of the finished pattern from our tyers in all the usual sizes (12 to 18), so our shelves are now groaning under their (tungsten) weight - and they're all looking for a new home.

So here it is - our Ginger Tom v2.0 Selection (and best of all, they're only £15 for the full set of 12):

Our Ginger Tom v2.0 Selection contains three each of sizes 12, 14, 16 & 18 - all tied on barbless jig hooks (in total there are 12 tungsten Ginger Tom's v2.0's in this selection).

As we're pretty anal about our nymphs, we've even weighed them:

  • The Ginger Tom v2.0 in a size 12 weighs 0.44g
  • This Ginger Tom v2.0 in a size 14 weighs 0.30g
  • This Ginger Tom v2.0 in a size 16 weighs 0.25g
  • This Ginger Tom v2.0 in a size 18 weighs 0.17g

That's a total of 12 Ginger Tom v2.0 tungsten jigs at a heavily discounted price of only £15.00 (bought individually these would be £19.80), supplied in our eco-friendly packaging and includes FREE delivery.

*** I've already got mine safely stashed away in my fly box, otherwise, we would have had more! ***

And finally, there's the pattern which all 'late-season' anglers have been asking for:

The Milroy

This is another fly courtesy of Steve's wonderful book on Grayling Flies - and this is a dry fly which works just as well with those late-season trout.

Originally devised and developed by Lee Hooper on the River Wylye in Wiltshire, it was tied to represent:

"any of the black stuff that appears from time to time on the river"

Our Milroy Selection​ contains three each of sizes 14, 16 & 18 - all tied on the correct fine-wire dry fly hooks.

That's a total of 9 Milroy dry flies at a discounted price of only £12.50 (bought individually these would be £13.50), supplied in our eco-friendly packaging and includes FREE delivery.

Get out there and have some late-Summer fun.

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