[donkeybreath]

I have always wanted to catch a fish on a mouse fly. Ive toyed with it a few times on the banks of rivers and structure on lakes...but no success.

Can anyone give me good insight as to when, where and how to preent this fly to catch a fish on a mouse rat in Colorado?

 

[Don In Denver]

On a stream/river cast your deer hair mouse downstream and across - as near the far bank as possible, and strip back in short strips so it looks like it's trying to swim as it swings across the current. Than....KABLOOEY! And the fun begins! Obviously it works best on bigger water with bigger fish. I've never fished one in a lake except for bass.

 

[fishbreath]

i guided up in alaska for a few years on the aniak river system and no fishing evoked more excitement than taking a big rainbow on a mouse pattern. i found a number of factors that were usefull in getting the fish to take the mouse. the first being the pattern. a high floating pattern with a definate tail is essential. the tail must be flexible so that when you twich the line in a mouselike swimming retreive, the tail needs to snake along behind the mouse. if you ever see a mouse swimming along in the water you will see the little sway of the tail from side to side. if you are in alaska you will also notice the nervous look on his face. stick with natural colours and not the bright colours that some of the bass guys use( allthough these work great for pike. gotta figure how smart a pike is when he goes for a lime green rubber mouse) my most succesfull pattern was a tube fly pattern which was basicly a cork composite about the length of your thumb and about the same size. at the head end we tied a collar of squirrel fur around the end and at the tail end we tied in a brown chenile tail a little longer than the body. we driiled a hole down the centre and inserted a tube down the hole and glued this in place( a ballpoint pen ink tube works great). to fish the fly you simply slide the tippet through the tube from the head side through to the tail and tie on your hook. i prefered to slide the eye of the hook into the tube and get a nice firm seat for the hook so that it doesnt drop away from the fly. the big advantage of the tube fly is that if you get bust off the fly will simply float to the surface and you can use it again. just tie on another hook.the fact that this fly is fished near structures also makes the tube arrangment good because if you snag you simply break the line and the fly drops from a tree or floats up from a log jam and you retrieve it. your hook needs to be a pretty decent size in order to clear the cork on a strike but depending on the size of the fish you dont want to go to big because you want to avoid hooking the eye. i found the best time to fish this pattern was at night or in low light. it seems the mice are nocturnal and do their swimming in the dark. casting the fly near overhanging structure is ideal. let the fly land with a definate plop(like a mouse dropping from a tree or completing a backflip ) and then wait a while and give the line a twitch or two. this will often get the fishes attention. he might check it out for a while and then when you retrieve at a mouse swimming speed he is gonna hit it hard. of al the fishing ive done this is the most exciting take. no nudging here. they knock the hell out of it. fish will often clear the water. i think they try and stun the mouse. dont set the hook to soon as they often let go to get a better grip if they have a bad purchase on the mouse. then its time to set and scream. i hope this helps. my camera sucks so i cant take a pic of the fly but if you really need to see the pattern i will make an effort to post one. ludwig

 

[donkeybreath]

Thanks for the feed back on the mouse rat. I will certainly give it a try...it sounds as exciting as I hoped it would be.

 

[roadkill]

id start out in the same spot slayer baged theat bigun!