We are excited to have received these limited edition Dry Fly Tins tied by guide on the Bokong, David Taylor. These flies have been created and evolved through David's time spent observing, fishing and guiding on this incredible piece of water in the Lesotho Highlands. These dries have been tried and tested on the Bokong's yellows and rainbows, they will have you covered for your next mission.
Each tin contains 15 beautifully tied dries made up of :
3 x Comparaduns: Tied on #16 hanak all round hook. A small, but surprisingly visible fly that works wonders on selective fish. It comes into its own in low water on the Bokong in the late evening, especially when the fish have decided they want only midges
3 x Flying Ant : Tied on #16 hanak dry fly. This is really a Lesotho special where the yellows will often lock onto flying ant hatches in the early to mid-season; however they will be a good addition to any fly box to be kept for ant hatches.
3 x CDC ant Klink: These are tied on #14 Hanak dry fly hooks. A CDC Klink is always deadly, no matter where you go in the world. Make it suggestive of an ant and, well you have an effective Lesotho yellowish dry. Simple, minimalist and buoyant. Good luck finding a stream where trout won’t eat these !
3 x Shuttlecock: In the timeless words of Russ de la Harpe: “No-one refuses the cock!”. His words ring true every time David tied one on and they have saved him from blanking on numerous occasions. Whenever getting too many refusals one of these makes it onto his tippet and almost invariably the fish start to commit. Effective during both midge and mayfly hatches and are surprisingly visible for their size. These are tied on #14 hanak all round hooks. These shuttlecocks are deadly in almost every trout stream in the world. Fish them in mostly slower water as rapids will sink them. They really come into their own on spooky fish in slow runs.
3 x Caddis Hopper Hybrid: Tied on #14 or #12 hanak dry fly. A slightly larger fly suggests a large caddis or a small hopper. Nice for fast water or for suspending a small nymph. Good option on a windy summer day
Bio
David Taylor is an entomologist working as a fly fishing guide for African Waters with a few seasons under the belt at one of Africa's finest dry fly fishing locations, The Bokong.
David tied his first fly at the age of about 9 or 10 before he even touched a fly rod. These first flies involved putting a bait holder hook into his dad’s bench vice and tying feathers onto it with string before coloring them in with highlighters or whiteboard markers. At the age of 11 he saved up and bought a Stealth Start 4/5wt combo and started thrashing the dams on the farm he grew up on for bluegill. He was absolutely hooked, far more so than the fish he was inexpertly attempting to entice. About a year later he bought his first fly-tying vice and the rest is history. He learned a lot from his own mistakes as Youtube was not yet an effective learning tool, receiving input from time to time by Chevaan Patience and a couple of his primary school peers. Later this evolved into learning from teammates in the Boland junior team, people like Jean and Francis Malherbe, Aidan de Jager and Josh Pictor. Eventually, he met Gordon Van Der Spuy. Gordon's attention to detail, advice and standards has been instrumental in advancing David's tying quality and thought processes around tying, especially dries.
