As part of my latest disaster adventure in the piney woods, it’s been my custom to stop at a couple of the largest fly shops in California to restock materials and eyeball the flies offered. Those deep and cavernous bins now someone else’s responsible to keep full, so I can approach them without fear.

They’re a good indicator of material trends and tying styles as most vendors attempt to limit stock to the fast movers; flies that sell themselves many times over, standard patterns intermixed with contemporary materials and styles mirrored in our angling media.

For years I’ve been carefully monitoring the ratio of sunken flies to bead heads variants, and will suggest that bead head flies now comprise 90% or better of all the nymphs and sinking flies in these shops. Using them as an indicator for the industry at large, and I’d suggest you’re looking at similar dominance in your shop’s offerings.

There’s no more Zug Bugs or Hare’s Ears, no Pheasant Tails – but there’s plenty of each in the bead head style.

Jokingly, I’d always assumed that their path to prominence was their elimination of the need for the delicate tapered head. Most tier’s lack the skills to make that happen even if they tried, given that it’s one of the last skills mastered. That big barrel of bead makes the delicate whip finish a thing of the past, replacing tiny and precise with some heavy-handed collar of questionable integrity.

Swab a big squirt of lacquer in the cavity of the bead and call it good.

While I might be partly right, we’ve had a number of quasi-issues that lend themselves to the subject; including the National Park Service ban on lead last year, the rise of tin and antimony and its availability in most fly shops, and the dominance of “high sticking” and nymph-bobbercator fishing taught by guides hired for Fishing 101 …

While some partisans have been horribly offended at the idea that gossamer and feathery has been reduced to chuck and duck, and that proponents of beaded flies are mostly molesters of infants, not real sportsmen, what has been completely missed by pundits and our media, is the lack of supporting insect parts, and how we’ve moved markedly away from Match the Hatch …

(Big intake of Breath …)

No phase or type of Mayfly, Caddis, and Stonefly, possesses anything 4mm in diameter and smelling of shiny copper or bright gold …

… and while the pipe smoke and old Scotch ran thick at the clubhouse, you still missed us taking the boots to Ernie Schwiebert and his hoary old tome.

I’d wager that we’re in the beginning throes of the next big move towards attractors. Evidenced by nearly 100% of the nymphs sold at shops being the bead head variant, coupled with the recent dominance of the Czech nymph craze, all of which feature bright attractor colors, pinks, oranges, and reds, to depict a family of caddis nymphs that lack any such markings or color.

During the same time most steelhead flies have moved from the traditional ranges of #8’s – #4’s, have abandoned their characteristic northwest “bucktail” shape and style in favor of enormous hunks of bright feathers, trailing hooks, and palmered with ostrich strands to make the fly move and undulate like something living, yet nothing in Nature resembles its vibrant “anger” colors.

Thoughts of seduction now being a thing of the past.

… and with all those guides yelling “SET” in your ear while learning, and knowing how much effort it was to yank bobber, split shot, and beaded fly to his satisfaction – are you as an angler preferring the Sage mold of extra-fast tippy rod as a result?

Toss all those effete dry fly only types out of the mix and I’d suggest that the average fellow fishes nymphs and dries in about an equal mix. Throw in the 5% of Czech nymph devotees, another 10% of the high-stick crowd, and another 5% for those feeding the dry fly as nymph indicator, the dreaded “Two Gun” or Rake rig … and you’ve got about 60% of the crowd fishing something significantly heavier than a hook with a couple of chicken feathers attached.

A heavier fast rod would be just the ticket, knowing split shot and bead headed flies can’t be cast – but the “lob” would feel better on a fast action tippy SOB …

In short, we’ve booted His Holiness to the curb, you couldn’t tie a tapered head if you tried, and it’s no longer fashionable to be shy around Lemon-Yellow or Orange-Orange …