How To Fly Fish Nymphs

Nymphing is, arguably, the easiest way to catch trout. Trout do most of their feeding subsurface on aquatic insects. Nymphing is the act of presenting fly fishing flies beneath the water surface to imitate nymphal or larvae stages of aquatic insects and, on rare occasions, sunken flying insects. By using weighted flies or flies intended to sink, the objective of nymphing is to fish your fly fishing flies beneath the surface whether it is suspended within the water column or rolling along the bottom of the stream.

Usually, you’re not actively retrieving your line when nymphing but rather leaving your line in the water to represent an insect drifting lifeless in the water, called “dead-drifting.” There are instances where twitching or adding movement to your nymph flies may be effective, but don’t confuse nymphing with retrieving streamer flies such as swimming baitfish or minnow imitations. Instead, nymphing takes a more passive approach to fly fishing where you let the current do the work for you.

What Is A Nymph?

• In simplistic terms, a nymph fly is a sinking type of fly fishing fly that imitates the naturally occurring insect larva and nymphal stages of aquatic insects commonly found in streams, rivers, ponds, and lakes.
• Insect nymphs and larvae are commonly found under or on rocks, in aquatic vegetation, fallen tree branches in the water, and even in gravel, sand, or loose sediment.
• They do not have wings nor can they fly in this insect stage. Instead, they scavenge and hunt for food by crawling along the streambed, which means they constantly live underwater. Because of this, all nymph patterns found in fly fishing are used to sink and to be fished under the water.

Most fly anglers use two different ways to fly fish with nymphs. They either have some sort of strike indicator or fish with a tight-line technique. These strike indicators can be manufactured like the Oros strike indicator or it’s some sort of buoyant dry fly like a Chubby Chernobyl with the nymph flies below. Strike indicators are great for fishing from a distance and covering more water.

Now the alternative option, tight-line nymphing or Euro nymphing, does not have an accessory strike indicator (bobber) attached to the line. Instead, they focus on the ‘feel’ of the rod and watch the tension of their line to indicate a strike, which is far more sensitive than using a strike indicator accessory.

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