Christmas Island special | fishonfly.com.au

{{+1}}Christmas Island special{{-1}}

If I could only carry one type of fly when fishing for bonefish on Christmas Island, Aitutaki, The Bahamas, tropical Australia or other Pacific Islands or The Seychelles or other Islands in the Indian Ocean it would undoubtedly be the Christmas Island Special.

The recipe is very much a tropical upgrade of a crazy Charlie which is a fly that has stood the test of time in temperate waters.

A wide range of colour variations have been developed for this fly but from my experience and from research and discussions with other bonefish fly fishers you can not go much past a selection made up of the following colour and material combinations of flies.

As to the absolute best colour to tie on you need to keep in mind that CXI and other guides bring to the flats a lot of cumulative personal experience and experience passed on from other guides and anglers so if the guide suggests a particular colour selection or size of fly, and a particular size hook and a particular dumbbell eye weight that should be considered as highly persuasive.

If you don’t have the benefit of a suggestion from a guide I think the next best approach is tie on a fly that closely proximate the colours that make up the terrain in which you are targeting bonefish. If the size of fly can not be resolved through this methodology my preference is to lean toward smaller rather than larger flies and a fly with the least weight possible to allow the fly to hold bottom.

Finally from my own experience and those discussions with guides I have fished with in the past and bonefish fly fishers I have talked to I have, ordered by consensus, what looks like to me as being the 7 best colour combinations of CXI flies with the best flies to use closer to the top of the list.

Before moving to the colour selections I note that for each colour selection you decide to take on your trip work toward, having on hand, appropriate dumbbell eye weight and hook size for the actual fishery you visiting.

Size #6 and #8 seems to be the best for CXI and #4 and #6 for Aitutaki.

As for dumbbell eyes I suggest that if your tying say 10 of each of 7 colours in 2 sizes (140 flies) that for each coloured fly you tie, from the list below or from you own colour preference, that you tie them in three weights being: 50% be 5/32” dumbbell eyes, #25% be a little heavier with 3/16” dumbbell eyes and the remaining 25% be a little lighter with chrome coloured bead chain eyes.

So these are the seven colours of Christmas Island Special flies that I tie. All are based on exactly the same recipe with the only variables being the hooks, the eyes, the materials within the parameters I have set out in the recipe and of course the colour of the materials. Despite those variations the proportions I have tried to remain truthful to the proportions outlined in the recipe for the flies below.

Also have a look at My tropical sand flats fly box for fly suggestions for other species you may encounter on tropical Indo-Pacific sand flats.

1	Christmas Island Special - Pink In the absence of advise from a guide this is the first fly that I tie on when fishing for bonefish on Tropical Indo Pacific sand flats.