Do You Remember These?

I received some nymphs from Stan (of Nymphevolution fame) a couple of months ago - he was experimenting again! As soon as I opened the box, they brought to mind the above sweets from my childhood - Tooty Frooties.

It's always dangerous to start thinking about food part way through the day - Top Tip: Always go food shopping when you're not hungry - it costs much less!

My appetite piqued, I called in to my local newsagents on the way home to buy some of the above sweets - and to my surprise, they were nowhere to be found - after chatting to the newsagent (a fellow club member) it became clear that they were not available anymore.

I found it a little odd, so I started poking around on the internet to find out why - it turns out that Rowntree's discontinued them back in 2019 with no real reason given - I suspect it's due to the sugar content, virtually 100%!

This led me down a bit of a rabbit hole as far as discontinued sweets from my youth are concerned - and I was most upset to find that the Texan Bar (the dentist's best friend) is also no more!

But back to flies ...

I took the samples to the river to get them wet, it was up a bit and tinged the colour of a craft IPA - it's pretty peaty up here. To my surprise, in the first hour of using them, I picked up four Grayling - virtually unheard of in August on our river.

A little later I had a friend in the shop who is a bit of a Stillwater addict, so I gave him a few to try - he called me later that week, to say how impressed he was with them - I had my order in to Stan within the hour - and here they are ...

Let us introduce you to Stan's Tooty Frootie Shrimp Selection which includes 3 vibrant colour combinations:

• Bubble Gum Tooty Frooty Shrimp
• Kiwi Tooty Frooty Shrimp
• Halloween Tooty Frooty Shrimp

Each of these shrimps is tied with a translucent body of colour-matched glass beads which are then coated on the top only with a tough UV resin - making these nymphs very long-lasting and virtually indestructible. These nymphs can imitate the gammarus nymph and also do a very passable impression of a maggot!

These shrimps seem to work really well in slightly coloured water, with the Bubble Gum one being especially tempting to Grayling. Just remember to fish it as near the bottom as possible.

When using these Tooty Frootie shrimps on a Stillwater you will need to fish them as close to the bottom as you can, so they will perform better on a short leader and sinking line - just gently tweeked back.

Also, fish these around any inlets that feed water into the Stillwater, fish often wait in the current and feed from the shrimps washed into the water.

These Tooty Frootie Shrimp imitations are ideally used as a point fly in any nymphing setup (and great for sight nymphing). Don't forget about using these on stillwaters also (over half of shrimps are found in stillwaters). These Tooty Frootie Shrimp imitations are all tied on strong size 14 barbless hooks.

The tying specification for these nymphs is:

• Fly Name: Tooty Frootie Shrimps
• Hook Size: N°14 Firehole Sticks 316 Barbless Czech Nymph Hook
• Body Composition: Coloured Glass Beads with a UV Hard Shell
• Body Materials: Translucent Vibrant Dubbing
• Latin Name: Gammarus
• Weight: Medium - 0.09g

We are only making these shrimps available as a selection of 15 - five each of the three colours (just click on any of the fly images or buttons below to view more detailed images of each individual nymph). This selection of 15 nymphs is priced at £30.00 - we do understand these are at the pricier end of the spectrum for flies, but the quality is outstanding.

We only have 20 selections available for sale - I'm keeping some to use myself. So you will need to be quick!

Until next week, tight lines.