Pattern that's been working for me

[jskowron]

I have had a lot of luck the past few years in both the Westfield and the Housy, as well as in several stillwaters, using a soft hackle streamer. It is a pattern designed by Jack Gartside (you may recognize him from the famous picture of him fishing in Boston Harbor in a giraffe shaped "float tube"-see cvff.org/speaker_03.htm). The pattern can be found at www.jackgartside.com/step_sh_streamer.htm I add some lead under the body, and tie in the flashabou at the front so it creates a stripe down each side. I have also tied with a cone head. I have found the best colors to be all white, or a combination of olive and shell orange. For the patterns with two colors, I tie in one clump of Marabou as a tail, and then palmer the second color for the body.

Fish these across or down and across and let them swing, slow strip them in. I get some hard takes on the swing, with more subtle takes on the slow strip, and some occasional MONSTER takes as I'm lifting the fly out of the water for the next cast. I caught a few nice browns in Lee last week- this pattern is going to win me the Poker Run this year!

If you go to Gartside's page, check out the Gartsides Gurgler- it's a nice topwater striper pattern that also makes a good frog imitation.

[Mark Patenaude]

I tie these also, mostly for Smallies.

The marabou give them alot of movement when when swinging/stripped create the "perfect" minnow shape.

If I may suggest use tan marabou for the body and top it with olive dyed wood duck and white body with grey dyed wood duck. These color combinations imitate minnows across the spectrum.

You may also opt to put some eyes on them. Especially true of Smallmouth, they will target the head of the fly when taking and the eyes cause them to hit the front of the fly, thereby increasing your hooking percentage. Eyes are a great "add on" for any streamer, where possible.

Mark