The bead question?

Tom Butler · Tuesday at 10:26 AM

Just how much interest does a trout show in the bead? Gotta find out. Normal fly base of FM 5045, 3.8mm gold bead, 8 turns wire covered in white.

Anyone else been curious enough to experiment?

rancid waders · Tuesday at 10:33 AM

Troutbitten blog has some good info on it.

Tom Butler · Tuesday at 10:55 AM

rancid waders said:
Troutbitten blog has some good info on it.

Kinda how I was thinking. We used to crimp split shot to a size 8 baitholder for a rolly polly as kids and fish ate it. Heck, they eat my swivels!
I think the fish want to at least try to eat what comes along, but not if they are "put off" as the article said.

tkww · Tuesday at 1:55 PM

Well, we caught fish before beads where a thing. So I doubt they are the only thing, even if at times they might be the only thing needed.

GAT · Tuesday at 1:56 PM

A friend of mine was able to catch cutts with a bare hook at Mann Lake in Oregon. He was a hell of a fly angler and we joked that he could probably catch the trout with just a fly hook. Just for the heck of it he gave it a try and did catch fish.

Seems to me if something is at the correct water depth and moving in a manner that a fish determines is edible, they will attempt to eat the object. With that in mind, most likely if you meet the criteria, a beaded hook will fool something.

Smalma · Tuesday at 7:05 PM

Naive trout are just that!

As a teenager some 65 years ago, my Aunt took my cousin and myself into a remote Cascade stream (the trail) had been closed for several years and we were likely the first party to fish this meadow stream in several years. The fish were so naive I bragged that I could catch a fish on a bare hook. My cousin of course challenged me to prove my brag. In a couple hours I caught a limit of trout on a bare # 10 hook. That feat had nothing to do with my limited skills.

Chucker · Wednesday at 8:51 AM

Some of the best chironomid flies are just a hook with a wrap of thread, so why wouldn’t they eat a bare hook?

I once caught a permit on a bare hook. But that was in the 1970’s when they were pretty much just trash fish, before they became smarter than fly fishermen like they are now….