I would like to let everyone know of a new fly I developed last year at Minipi.  I used it during the last part of last season when we were fishing the brooks and rivers chasing the brookies that were heading up to spawn.  I called it the “Dog Collar” because it has a sort of collar on the fly and it is as effective as an actual dog collar for snaring big brook trout.  When Jeff ‘Bear’ Andrews was at Minpi last year we affectionately referred to using the pattern as ‘walking the dog’.  Ask Bear how effective the fly was and he will tell you that it worked pretty well. He landed his biggest fish of the trip, a 7 pounder on it at Ten Pound Brook.
The fly has a clippped deer head with the back half of the head sticking up over the rest …

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The Minonipi Wullf is certainly one of the essiental flies for fishing the Minipi watershed. Lee Wulff designed this pattern to mimic both the Green and Brown drakes in one simple pattern. Although not a popular pattern elsewhere in the world, it is a staple in the Labrador anglers’ flybox. In a recent conversation with David Brandt from the Wulff School of Fly Fishing, he gave me the recipe to “cook” up some of your own Minonipi Wulff’s. By the way, Dave knew Lee Wulff and if you look in the Photo Gallery you’ll find a picture of Dave and Lee together. So this is from “the horse’s mouth.”

First of all, the original Mustad hook Lee used for all of his Wulff’s has been recently discontinued. The Daiichi 2421, however, is a good substitute. Most of the Wulff’s tied by Dave for my fly shop fall into …

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Check out the article, “Trigger Flies,” by Kelly Galloup in the May 2007 issue of FLY FISHERMAN magazine. While Galloup doesn’t mention big brookies, any of the eight flies he describes would work in Minipi waters. I’d suggest you tie up a few for your next trip to Minipi. And to whet your fly-tying appetite, here are pictures of a few of Galloup’s flies. (The first is the Circus Peanut.)

I just put a “mouse/lemming” fly in the Photo Gallery and thought it might be interesting to include this note on the lemming.

Mouse flies work because there are plenty of little lemmings in the Minipi watershed.

Lemming

“Any of 20 species of small rodents, some of which undertake large, swarming migrations. Lemmings are found only in the Northern Hemisphere. They have short, stocky bodies with short legs and stumpy tails, a bluntly rounded muzzle, small eyes, and small ears that are nearly hidden in their long, dense, soft fur. The wood lemming (Myopus schisticolor) and steppe lemming (Lagurus lagurus) are the smallest, measuring 8 to 12 cm (3.1 to 4.7 inches) in body length and weighing 20 to 30 grams (0.7 to 1.0 ounce). The other species are larger, weighing 30 to 112 grams, with bodies 10 to 22 …

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