The White Prince
Doug Prince's famous nymph is as popular in the UK as it is in the United States. As a general seaching pattern, it produces the goods time after time and as a speciifc stonefly imitation it is as good as most.
This fly follows Doug's recipe except that I have substituted materials of a different colour.
Dressing
Hook | Scorpion Long Shank nymph, size 8 to 14 |
Silk | Black 6/0 |
Tail | Two white goose biots tied in back to back to form a V shape |
Body | Peacock herl, 3 strands wrapped over lead wire underbody |
Rib | Fine silver tinsel or wire |
Wing cases | Two white goose biots tied flat across back of fly in V shape |
Hackle | Genetic silver badger or similar pale hackle |
Step by step instructions
1) Start by winding about 8 turns of lead wire on the hook. I always wind the lead so that the rearmost turn is going in the same direction as my tying thread when I'm wrapping the body. This ensures your thread catches and holds down the lead wire.
2) Cover the lead and hook shank with silk. Try to taper the silk so that the edge between lead and shank is not so evident. This will improve the look of your body.
3) Tie in two goose biots on the sides of the hook extending rearwards for one third to about half of a shank length. Ensure you tie them in with the natural curve facing away from each other or you'll never get them to seperate.
4) Tie in the rib.
5) Take three strands of peacock herl, reverse one of them and then clip about one inch off the end with two tips. Tie in by this end and wind a neat body to just short of the eye. Ensure you gradually taper ther body to hide the step between lead and hook shank.
6) Counter rib the body.
7) Tie in 2 more goose biots on the top of the hook so that they lie flat across the back extending sideways in a V shape. Make them about half the length of the hook shank.
8) Tie in and wind a soft hackle. I like Whiting black laced hen or a soft silver badger saddle hackle. About two turns is plenty. Do not use an over large feather as it will mask the biot "wings" which probably doesn't matter but doesn't look as sexy.
9) Whip finish and varnish the head.
Black Prince
Exactly the same as above but change the colours of the goose biots to black and I used black bleached and dyed peacock for the body - see my materials for sale.
Fishing notes
The amount of lead underbody is decided by the depth of water your fishing. At Flanchford, the depth is only up to six feet so eight turns of fine wire is plenty and the fly is fished on a floating line and 12 foot leader.
Fish this fly deep and slow, takes are often savage so angle your rod tip at 45 degrees to the direction of retrieve to aviod getting smashed off on the take.
Fish it as a crawling nymph, as slowly as possible allowing it to creep along the bottom. The exception to this is when fishing in a fast flow - in this case allow the current to tumble the fly along at dead drift as if it was an insect washed from its home.