Tying Tuesday: Confidence Flies

Tying Tuesday is back and ready for some more trout-focused goodness! A theme throughout the flies I selected for this week’s post is the confidence anglers have in them. Tim Cammisa swears by the X-Caddis, the folks at Mainely Flies love the Squiggle, and Higa’s SOS is the definition of a confidence fly. It’s an interesting concept to think about, in that I reckon we fish better with flies we’re more confident in than those we aren’t.

The first fly is from Tim Cammisa, and it’s his take on the X-Caddis. Tim thinks the X-Caddis might be the ultimate “confidence dry fly.” He even says if he had to pick just a single dry fly to fish with the rest of his summers, it’d be this fly! Tying it isn’t too complex, although working with deer hair can be a challenge. Tim walks you through it, though, and if you’re like me, you’ll probably put a few of these in your box for the upcoming summer.

Up next is a fly that the folks at Mainely Flies say “breaks the rules.” I’m not sure if there are any “rules” to be broken in fly tying, but the Squiggle is an interesting take on the classic Squirmy Worm. It looks like it might be more durable than the standard Squirmy, as well.

Wrapping up is a sort of follow-up to a video from our last Tying Tuesday, where we learned how to tie Higa’s SOS. In this video from Fly Fish Food, Spencer Higa himself gives all the details on the origin of the SOS. For anyone looking to design their own flies, there might be some insight here.