My estuary fly box

There are obviously a lot of flies that have been designed for estuary species and in the right conditions and on the right days most work. Whilst the standards like the crazy charlie, baited breath and clousers are all good flies and might work for you I found that they don’t work consistently form me in the places I fish. This led me to modified and tweak various styles of flies and come up with a couple of new fly patterns to develop a range of flies that consistently take fish in estuary waters along the eastern seaboard. I now carry just eleven fly patterns in my “Estuary” fly box and I have detailed them below.

Bread fly – sinking

All sorts of estuary fish respond to bread berley and will take a sinking bread fly suspended or slowly sinking through the feeding zone.

Bread fly – floating

Well if you put a burley trail of bread out have a look at a bits of bread floating around they really doesn’t have any one single form – there just bits of bread. They do however have function in that they float in the water rather than on the water and they are off white rather than pure white. This fly matches the form of a piece of bread floating and has the added advantage of being highly visible so it can be used as an indicator if for example you want to fish a second weighted fly below.

Combo crab

Whilst not as realistic looking as my Leather Crab pattern the Combo Crab is my preferred crab pattern because it casts so much better and as a consequence you get more fishing time. You may notice that the fly has only three sets of legs plus claws whilst the natural has four sets of legs plus claws. You can add an extra set if you like but I have found that it is much easier dealing with only three sets of legs and it doesn’t appear to diminish the quality of the representation.

Crazy charlie

There have been many variations and adaptations. My version is based on the original tailed version and works well in estuaries on bream, whiting, flathead, taylor etc. I tie all my cray charlie flies much fuller with translucent materials rather than sparse with solid materials. I also tie my crazy charlie flies and about twice as long as the hook shank and trim them down on the water if a shorter fly is needed.

Estuary fly – Chatto original

This fly has now accounted for bream, flathead, whiting, trevally, mullet, tailor, flounder, bass and trout. I expect it will be attractive to many other species also. My preferred colour is green but of course other colours work very well also.

Mud prawn – Chatto original

The mud prawn is my first choice of fly for general prospecting in estuary waters or for targeting, whiting, flathead and bream. In water of only a meter or so fish it on an intermediate line. In deeper water I prefer to fish it on a sinking line. The best retrieve is a jerky but slow retrieve leaving plenty of time between strips for he fly to settle back on the bottom. used in this way it’s a good representation of a prawn fleeing from its sandy retreat after being disturbed.

Ripper

This is a great fly to rip through the water in front of Taylor, Australian Salmon and other pelagic estuary fish. With legs it also works well on flathead, bream, whiting and EP’s.

Salty BMS

This is a inexpensive fly to tie that works well on bream as a specific targeted species or as a second fly fished about a meter above a say a mud prawn or estuary fly.

Soft Plastic

As the name implies these flies are built using a soft plastic lure body. I like to use 2″ and 3″ crescent tail type soft plastics as they tend to have a little more movement than some of the alternatives. For general prospecting or when targeting bream and whiting I use the 2″ version and when I am targeting flathead I use the 3″ version.

Weed fly – wet

The same tie is used for both of the above flies. The only difference is that the bread fly is dubbed a little heavier and then trimmed to shape. These flies should be weighted enough to sink but not so weighted that it becomes unnatural in their action. It is often often useful to suspend these flies under a floating bread fly or other buoyant fly so that you can detect any bites.

Wiggle minnow

By varying the materials used, the colours and size I have accounted for trout, bream, flathead, mangrove jack and even barramundi on wiggle minnows. The recipe I have set out below is just one version of this very adaptable fly and I would encourage you to individualize the fly to your own requirements.

My estuary fly box

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