Effective Flies – The Roy

To complement his article on pulling wet flies, Craig offers one of his favourite patterns for doing just that.

All flyfishers love casting dry flies to rising fish. However, there are many times through the course of a fishing season, when, whether due to the weather or time of the year, the bugs are not on the surface and the fish don’t rise. In this situation, anglers must go subsurface to catch a trout. There are many different wet fly techniques anglers can employ, and especially if it is early or late in the season, pulling wet flies is one of the most effective methods. More information on the techniques, tackle and flies to use are covered in my ‘Pulling Wets‘ article hereabouts, but in this column, we will focus on one of my go-to pulling flies, the Roy.

On a wet late autumn day when nothing was working, the Roy turned things around with this beauty, and another soon after.

I am not sure who invented the Roy. It is one of those flies which has been used, both locally and internationally (in particular by competition anglers), for many years. This pattern has many things going for it. Its marabou tail gives the fly plenty of enticing movement. The metallic sparkling body makes the fly stand out, catching trout’s attention. And the Roy is very quick and easy to tie.

Materials

Hook – Size 10-12 short shank wet fly.

Thread – Olive 1/0

Bead – Gold brass 2.5mm

Tail – Olive marabou

Tail flash – Red holographic tinsel.

Body – Gold Tiewell microflash dubbing.

Tying instructions

  1. Thread the bead onto the hook.
  2. Tie in a good clump of olive marabou for the tail.
  3. Break some of the tail off, leaving it approximately 35mm long.
  4. Tie in one strand of red holographic tinsel down either side of the tail.
  5. Dubb in a body of gold dubbing and whip finish.
  6. Finally, scruff out some dubbing fibres with Velcro or a dubbing brush.

The fly can be jazzed up with a collar of soft hen hackle or CDC. In clear water, another colour combination that works well is a black marabou tail, with silver dubbing rather than gold.

How to fish it

In a team of two flies, I usually fish the Roy on the point, combined with an unweighted pattern, such as a Blob, on the dropper. I like to fish this fly fast, using long, steady strips or a roly poly retrieve. And don’t be afraid to fish this fly on heavy tippet like 2X or even 1X, as takes can be very aggressive.