Skip to main content

OEDDS

How many of your flies work both in salt and fresh water? How many of these actually look like something real? The Deep Diving Shrimp is such a fly. Oliver Edward's allround Gammarus imitation works equally well everywhere you find this very widespread animal.

14 commentsBy

Oliver Edwards needs no further introduction. He has been developing flies and contributing to the scene for years now, and his considerations and explanations have attracted my attention from time to time.
In the mid 90s I bought his book Flytyers Masterclass, but when I recently saw one of his DVDs, I looked at the Deep Diving Shrimp with new eyes.

Lady of the stream, brownies, rainbows and several other species like the taste of a Gammarus. You find it in very different environments from smallest fresh water streams to salt water.
This is a pattern as all round as Red Tag. The silhouette, the speckled legs and the shell back makes it become alive both in the vice and at the end of the tippet.

Last year I tied some in two different colours. A warm orange and a pale green. This was the first super impressionistic imitation, which I dipped in salt water in hunt for the shining sea trout.

It was a bright and sunny day. Almost no wind and crystal clear water. Not perfect for fishing, but probably good for the hunting trout. I stood on a sand covered flat in hip deep water. 4-5 meters in front of me, it became deeper. A few rocks were lying at the bottom covered with bladder wrack.

Suddenly, 4 trouts patrolled along the edge. I was fishing in another direction and just below the surface. These trouts swam just above the bottom.
They disappeared as quickly as they emerged.
Five minutes later, the area was patrolled again - by two smaller trouts. That made it. I changed to the new, heavy gammarus imitation. I extended the leader and waited. And waited. Or at least I felt so. I think I waited for five minutes when 2 more cruised the area. It was like looking into an aquarium.
I dropped the fly and saw it sink. It was one feet above the bottom, when one of the trouts made a calm acceleration and sipped in the fly. I lifted the rod...

A rare experience when fishing for sea trouts which is normally done under more rough circumstances.

Now, I have tied 10 more, which will be suitable when it is cold, and when the trout become more selective. Maybe I will tie some for my friends or just send them the link to this page.

OE Deep Diving Shrimp

Nymph
Oliver Edwards
sea trout (sea run)
steelhead (sea run)
Materials
Hook Kamasan B100 or Mustad CZ Authentic Czech Nymph Size 10-18.
Weight Lead free foil.
Thread 8/0, color to match the dubbing.
Tail Barbs of brown-grey partridge hackle.
Antennas As tails, but smaller clump.
Rib Clear nylon mono, 4-6 lbs.
Shellback Flexibody, clear.
Body Fine dubbing, like MC 14.
Legs Barbs of brown-grey partridge hackle.
  1. Add weight 6-10 wraps. Make two layers, the upper one shortest. Secure it with some super glue
  2. Tie in tail well down the hook shank.
  3. Take the thread to the eye. Tie in the antennas.
  4. Take the thread back to where you tied in the tail.
  5. Tie in the rib.
  6. Cut out the shell back. It should be oval or shaped like a long drop stretched in both ends.
  7. Tie in the shellback.
  8. Make a dubbing loop.
  9. Dub the body.
  10. Prepare 6-8 partridge hackles by removing the fluffy parts.
  11. Wax the dubbing loop.
  12. Get the hackles into the loop.
  13. Make sure they do not come out or move. Align the points and ajust them to the final lenght of the legs.
  14. Cut off the stems 1-2 mm from the dubbing loop.
  15. Spin.
  16. Take out the hackle points.
  17. Spin again.
  18. Turn the dubbing loop towards the eye in nice equal turns.
  19. Secure it at the eye.
  20. Moisten your fingers and make the fibres point down.
  21. Pull the shell back towards the eye.
  22. Secure the shell back.
  23. Whip finish.
  24. Rib the fly in nice turns.
  25. Whip finish.
A little difficult

Since you got this far …

A money box
The GFF money box

… I have a small favor to ask.

Long story short

Support the Global FlyFisher through several different channels, including PayPal.

Long story longer

The Global FlyFisher has been online since the mid-90's and has been free to access for everybody since day one – and will stay free for as long as I run it.
But that doesn't mean that it's free to run.
It costs money to drive a large site like this.
See more details about what you can do to help in this blog post.