What is an intruder fly?
An Intruder fly is meant to trigger aggression when invading, or intruding into the territory of a sport fish, thus eliciting a strike response. The most productive “Intruder” fly patterns trigger the fight response without triggering a flee response by scaring the fish away from its territory.
What does an intruder fly imitate?
An Intruder is something that anadromous fish respond to – other small fish in their redds hanging around to eat their eggs. Large flies tied in an Intruder Style can also represent food like squid and shrimp that steelhead and Salmon have foraged on in the ocean.
What do spey flies imitate?
When we use Spey flies, we are usually attempting to imitate any of several Crustaceans, aquatic insects or, just putting something “buggy” in front of Salmon and/or Steelhead. These flies often require long, soft barbed hackle to imitate the legs, pincers and antennae of shrimp.
Who invented the intruder fly?
Ed Ward
The intruder style of flies was most likely originated by Ed Ward, a US west coast angler, who developed the pattern for Alaskan salmon as well as his local steelhead in the early 90’s.
When do you need an intruder style fly?
Intruder style flies are all the rage these days when targeting sea-run fish in cold water, or in any other situation where a large profile is desired. However, the cost of materials needed for many intruder style patterns can discourage the average tyer from tying their own, particularly those getting started!
Who was the inventor of the intruder fly?
The Intruder Fly originally tied by Jerry French, and Ed Ward, was a concept pattern. The concept was to tie a large fly pattern with a small trailing hook. Before the Intruder, large flies were tied on large hooks.
What are the colors of the intruder fly?
Intruders have developed into a very large family of flies, and while some still maintain the duller colors of the original, many have taken on the colors of more traditional salmon patterns in the blue, red and black specter while others have donned the colors of modern flies for steelhead and Pacific salmon, mainly pink, purple and orange hues.
What kind of hooks do you use for intruder flies?
The concept was to tie a large fly pattern with a small trailing hook. Before the Intruder, large flies were tied on large hooks. These hooks damaged the Steelhead for release – they were tied on large ott (1/0, 2/0 3/0…) hooks that were cutter hooks that kept slicing into the fish’s mouth.