Ginger Guys Called Tom & Stan

by Richard Fieldhouse

Who says the fun stops when the river season closes?

Not us. It’s time to think about stillwaters, or maybe a little grayling fishing - my favourite time of the year - and with it, our first 'Grayling-specific nymphs' of the season are ready to go:

But first ...

An 'Office Move' Special Offer

As I mentioned in Tuesday's email, over the weekend we moved our office & warehouse a couple of villages along. Prior to the move, both Jack and I had to go through all of our belongings and box them up. as a part of this, we found 2, unopened, full boxes of our 2023 River Almanacs - that's 48 books in total.

We were going to get them recycled, but a customer (who took one with him) said they were far too good to throw away - we should give them away - so at least people could learn a little, even if the calendar pages inside are 2 years old!

So, that's exactly what we're going to do. As we ship everything for free anyway, if you would like a FREE 2023 River Almanac, just place an order today for £20 or more, and we will include one with your order free of charge.

The Ginger Tom v2.1

Let's start with the Ginger Tom (version 2.1):

We sold out of these in just a few hours when we originally had them back in October last year. For this year, we've made a couple of very small design tweaks (hence, they are now version 2.1), and from recent reports, they are working wonders on the very early-season Grayling.

I've never personally found the original Ginger Tom successful for Grayling - especially on the coloured waters we have up here in North Yorkshire. So, one day early last year I set about refining it (very slightly) for our more northern river conditions ...

For me, I always prefer fishing Grayling nymphs on a jig hook - so that was the first change.

The next change was to try and make the fly stand out a little more in coloured water - so I added some ginger flash to the body material, and "Hey Presto", we have the Ginger Tom v2.1 ...

The original Ginger Tom was devised by Steve Skuce (and featured in his excellent book - Grayling Flies - do get a copy if you've even a passing interest in The Lady of the Stream).

In coloured water, they were (as Steve says in his book) "sheer magic". We've just received NEW stock of our Ginger Tom v2.1 patterns from our tyers in all the usual sizes (12 to 18), so our shelves are now groaning under their (tungsten) weight - and they're all looking for a new home.

So here it is - our Ginger Tom v2.1 Selection (and best of all, they're only £17.50 for the full set of 12):

Our Ginger Tom v2.1 Selection contains three each of sizes 12, 14, 16 & 18 - all tied on barbless jig hooks (in total there are 12 tungsten Ginger Tom's v2.1's in this selection).

As we're pretty anal about our nymphs, we've even weighed them:

  • The Ginger Tom v2.1 in a size 12 weighs 0.44g
  • This Ginger Tom v2.1 in a size 14 weighs 0.30g
  • This Ginger Tom v2.1 in a size 16 weighs 0.25g
  • This Ginger Tom v2.1 in a size 18 weighs 0.17g

That's a total of 12 Ginger Tom v2.1 tungsten jigs at a heavily discounted price of only £17.50 (bought individually these would be £21.00), supplied in our eco-friendly packaging and includes FREE delivery.

*** Go on, treat yourself this Grayling season ***

Next up on the fly pattern conveyor belt are:

Stan's Gallic PTN's - Individuals

Since we launched Stan's Gallic Pheasant Tail Nymph Selection last week, I've had loads of phone calls asking if customers could buy the flies individually - at the time we had virtually sold out, so couldn't split up the selections, but a quick call to Stan had him working over the weekend and we've just received 50 more of each colour, which I've now setup so they can be bought individually.

This nymph imitation is ideally used as a dropper fly in any nymphing setup (and great for sight nymphing in slower flows). Don't forget about using these on stillwaters also - a figure-of-eight retrieve on a floating line keeps them moving naturally. These imitations are all tied on size 16 barbless Hends BL454 hooks.

The tying specification for these Gallic PT Nymphs is:

  • Fly Name: Gallic Pheasant Tail Nymph
  • Hook: Hends BL454 N°16 Barbless Wet (2x Strong)
  • Head Composition: 2mm Coloured Glass Bead
  • Body Composition: Specially Selected French Pheasant Tails
  • Body Rib: 0.1mm Copper Wire
  • Latin Name: Baetis
  • Weight: Light - 0.04g

These are one of the most common nymphs found in virtually all waters. They are found on rocks, sand and all types of gravel, so Stan (inspired by Frank Sawyer) decided to try and make an imitation as realistic as he could.

These nymphs are tied as a general representation of the nymphs commonly seen at the bottom (and rising through the water column) of both rivers and stillwaters.

*** Go on, treat yourself - £2.50 is good value for a piece of art! ***

 

Tight lines.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back to 2wheels1rod
}