XL Flies for XL Fish: A One-Way ticket to Monsterville

Even when fished at ultra slow speed, the fly had a sinuous, erratic living action that was unlike any fly that my friends the guides had ever seen. Bill, a likeable veteran American angler, was also looking on. He laughed infectiously and pronounced with a grin: “You got yourself a one way ticket to Monsterville right there!

By Matt Harris

In a two part article, Matt Harris looks at how fly-tying pioneers like Bob Popovics, Blane Chocklett, Paolo Pacchiarini, Charlie Bisharat, Tomasz Bogdanowicz Alex Rook and Rupert Harvey have changed what we can do – and what we can catch – with a fly rod.

A box full of heavy duty artillery - Big flies rarely catch small fish

Photo: Matt Harris

I tied on the biggest Deceiver we could find in my box, a seven-inch pink and white monster constructed from the best part of half a chicken.

Ten years ago, I was lucky enough to fish at Agua Boa Amazon Lodge, deep in the Amazon Jungle. On my first morning at Agua Boa, I learned a lesson that has stayed with me ever since. After tearing up the river for close on two hours in the skiff, my guide, Netto, finally brought us to a gentle stop and motioned for me to grab my rod. Netto asked if I’d just make a cast or two into the shadows of a large and broken-down old tree that had slumped into the water. I tied on a four-inch streamer, a big, brassy orange & yellow eyeful on a 3/0 pike hook that had worked well for me on my first foray into the Amazon, catching small “fogo” peacock bass at Thaimacu Lodge, far to the South. Netto frowned, clearly unimpressed.

I asked if the fly was too big and had to laugh out loud at my guide’s poker-faced response: “No, no, my fren’, eees too SMALL” I tied on the biggest Deceiver we could find in my box, a seven-inch pink and white monster constructed from the best part of half a chicken. Netto nodded with approval as I sent it skimming low in under the dead and dying branches and into the shadowy lair beyond. As the fly came pulsing out into the sunlit waters, ten pounds or so of red, green and gold came dashing out from the darkness to inhale it. I set the hook and was savagely re-acquainted with the astonishing power of Cichla temensis, as my rod was wrenched round into a frighteningly contorted horseshoe.

Road to Damascus moment... Matt’s guide Netto holds up the first of many huge peacock bass caught at Agua Boa in 2009

Photo: Matt Harris

A fabulous flamboyant rush of colours fresh from a child’s paint-box lit up the shadowy canvas of the jungle as my foe flipped up into the air and went crashing back into the water. “Big one!” I shouted excitedly to Netto, and was intrigued by his less than enthusiastic response: “Eees Ok, but no eees BEEEEEG one” We went at it for a while and my eightweight rod buckled and groaned, proclaiming itself wretchedly inadequate for the week ahead. Finally, the pugnacious tucunaré was under control. As it skulked a few inches beneath the surface, clearly not willing to come to the hand of my guide, I admired the handsome creature, shimmering in the morning sunshine. Despite catching a million little “fogo” Peacocks at Thaimacu Lodge, this first fish of the trip was by some distance the biggest I had encountered to date.

My reverie was suddenly shattered: an impossibly large peacock ambled out of the shadows, hovered theatrically for a moment or two and then opened its vast jaws and unceremoniously t-boned the fish that I was attached to. There was a brief and violent tussle and then the leviathan was gone. I was struck dumb, and into the intervening silence, Netto explained helpfully and with emphasis: “THEEES EEES BEEEG ONE!”

Now I understood Netto’s eagerness to tie on the biggest fly in the box. If I was going to catch the really big boys, I needed something REALLY substantial to offer them. I suddenly remembered the wallet of Giant Trevally flies that I’d thrown into my tackle bag at the last minute. They hardly mimicked a ten-pound fish, but they certainly represented a serious mouthful. While Netto revived the badly shaken up ten-pounder, I fished them out - huge, 10-inch flashy profile flies tied from non-absorbent synthetic materials on 6/0 hooks.

When I showed one to my guide, Netto murmured his approval and stroked the giant lure with something approaching reverence. This was clearly the talisman he had been looking for.

Twenty minutes later, Netto was cradling an eighteen and a half pounder for the camera. “BEEEG ONE!!!” he grinned, as I composed a quick picture. We took the Agua Boa to bits that week, fishing monster flies on a ten, and then, when I finally smelt the coffee, a twelve weight rod. I landed two spectacular peacocks of over 20 pounds, and any number between 15 and 19 pounds. It was an unforgettable week, but it was also a fly-fishing lesson that has stood me in good stead ever since. Put simply, on the whole, BIG fish like to eat BIG stuff – that’s how they get BIG. Now, obviously, this is a huge generalisation - trophy fish don’t ALWAYS eat big stuff. Just as cows eat grass and whales eat plankton, big predators will sometimes gorge on tiny baifish, shrimps and even daphnia. However, it’s frequently the case that big fish – especially REALLY big fish - eat quarry that is as big or bigger than the very largest flies that we can hope to cast. This presents the fly fisherman with a few conundrums.

The obvious dilemma is how to design flies that are five to twelve inches long that can be cast with a fly rod. This means creating flies that give the impression of volume but that are actually light enough to cast. That is actually the easy part – hollow-ties and synthetic materials that shed water help a great deal, and if you can master double-haul techniques to create high line speed and fine-tune the length and make-up of your leader, then modern steely, fast-actioned rods, combined with aggressive short head lines like the RIO Outbound Short can cast almost anything. Almost…

This opens up a whole new world of possibilities, but, as I say, casting these big flies is actually the easy part. The BIG problem is this…. The bigger the fly, the easier it is for your quarry to get a good look at it… and recognise that it’s not the real thing. Think about it like this – if your life depended on it, what you would rather imitate with fluff and feathers– a mosquito or an elephant? It’s simply much easier to pass off something small than something big – in a small imitation, it’s impossible to study the detail, and thus a simple impression of what you are imitating is often good enough. There is simply less to find wrong with the fly. For instance, New Zealand trophy trout will often take a size 18 nymph when they have rejected a size 12.

A smaller fly can come out of nowhere and become hard to find.

Permit, as many of us know from bitter experience, are often almost impossible to catch, but if you have a fly that is virtually invisible – like a small Flexo crab or a Squimp – then the permit often lose it against the background of the seafloor. In the moment when they find it, they are in danger – they are relieved they’ve found their prey, and also very keen not to lose it again. So, they eat it!

This is also great in terms of presentation – small flies are easy to cast and land quietly. Unfortunately, BIG is often BEAUTIFUL.

Big fish often won’t expend their energy on a small morsel – they want something substantial.

Big flies are often also selective – small fish are often intimidated by big flies. – and big fish will often muscle their smaller brethren out of the way if the reward is worth the trouble. The Peacocks of the Agua Boa are a classic example. So, in a nutshell, use the smallest fly you can, to disguise the imperfections of your imitation, and to improve stealth and presentation. But if your quarry DO want a big fly, get out the big guns - you need to show that fish what it wants.

There’s a caveat to this - because it’s easier to recognize that a big fly is NOT the real deal, you need to SHOW your quarry the fly without allowing them to get a good LOOK at it. If they get a good look at your fly, they’ll know - it just a bunch of fluff and feathers…

Payara are Amazonian predators that will sting, slash and damage preyfish before finally inhaling them.

Matt Harris

So how do you achieve this goal? In fast currents, the stream will do the work for you. The big Payara of Beto Mejia’s FishColombia operation on the mighty Orinocco will smash a big fly with savage abandon because if they don’t, its gone, whisked away in a second by the powerful currents. However, fish rarely hold in such heavy, fast-flowing water.

In slower and still water, one way to induce a fish to take an ultra-large imitation is to move the fly super-fast yourself. If you do, the fly becomes a blur, and the fish doesn’t get that chance to really examine it. If you can put the rod under your arm and fish hand over hand, you can move that fly REALLY fast, and you may then fool the fish, but you DO need a fly design that tracks perfectly and doesn’t skate on its side.

When the freakishly large tarpon at Tapam Lodge in Nicaragua are busting up on the mullet, they are vulnerable. If they jump six feet into the air and FAIL to catch the mullet that they are intent on eating, they are momentarily enraged, and in that state, for a few short seconds, they WILL eat a fly. However, these are big, wise old fish, and if the fly is presented too slowly, or doesn’t track straight but skates onto its side, they will almost certainly reject it.

My great friend Tomasz Bogdanawicz at Pike Terror Flies has evolved a perfectly consistent method of tying. His “Tarpon Mullet” tracks straight, no matter how fast that I fish them. And they work! Roosterfish too like a fast-moving fly, and this means that if you can master the ultra-fast retrieve, you really are in the game with these incredible fish. My friend, all-round killer fly angler Alex Rook’s killer take on the Gym Sock pattern is perfect for roosters, and once again, crucially, it doesn’t skate on its side

However, sometimes the fish that you are targeting prefer a slower presentation, and now you have a problem. If the fish can follow a slow-moving fly and take their time to examine it, they will most likely reject it. So how do you fish the fly slowly but still prevent the fish from examining it? One way is to create erratic movement in your fly: one second it’s here and now it’s over there.

Tigerfish are known to tear big preyfish completely apart - and they are often triggered by big meals.

Matt Harris

Erratic movement can drive fish nuts, because they can’t get a fix on the fly. If you have ever teased a cat with a spot of sunlight reflected off of your watch face, you’ll understand what I’m talking about. Once you create that frustration and subsequent rage, you are well on the way to inducing a take.

Weighting the fly head, jig-style, is a proven way to break up the predictable, straight-line travel of a fly, but how to make the fly move side-to-side, in the classic, wounded-fish, “Zara Spook” motion, which I believe is often much more attractive to the fish.

Big Gts crush big popper flies - read all about fishing them in the second part of this article in the next “In the Loop” Magazine.

Matt Harris

Erratic movement is easy to create with spinning lures but until recently was considered impossible with flies, apart from simply weighting the head of the fly. Then, a handful of pioneers started to find ways to make really big flies that were castable, and that move side-to-side, with that all-important erratic movement.

Bob Popovics is one of the great innovators in fly design, and has come up with many revolutionary ideas and patterns. His book “Pop Fleyes” is essential reading for any progressive fly-tyer. Bob realised that big fish often want - insist – on BIG prey, and he set about creating functional flies that could fit the bill.

Bob Popovics’ brilliant book Pop Fleyes is essential reading for the aspiring fly designer

Matt Harris

Bob’s Poplips fly was one of the first patterns to create undulating, side-to side movement, and it changed the way that many of us think about fly-tying. It is no exaggeration to say that Bob Popovics has redefined what we can do - and what we can catch - with a fly rod. In the next issue of In The Loop, I will look at how Bob and other brilliant pioneering fly-tyers, including Blane Chocklett, Paolo Pacchiarini Charlie Bisharat Tomasz Bogdanowicz Alex Rook and Rupert Harvey have influenced a generation of fly-fishermen, and have helped us target monster fish that were almost uncatchable on fly a few short decades ago.