Hickman’s Party Boy

March Fly of the Month
A tasty treat for a big, bad-ass winter steelhead.

Guide Jeff Hickman came up with this killer leech pattern for winter steelhead. The seductive movement of the rabbit strip combined with a stinger hook design and heavy lead eyes make this pattern extremely versatile. Hickman likes to fish the Party Boy with two different sink-tip configurations. For slots and boulder gardens, he fishes 6 feet of Rio T-14 with a 5 foot Rio intermediate cheater looped the front of his Airflo Skagit Compact shooting head. He casts almost straight across the river and delivers a huge back-mend. Once te fly is to depth, he makes a secondary mend to slow the fly’s swing speed and brings the fly into tension. The short, heavy sink-tip allows him to steer his fly through technical holding lies with total precision. For larger runs and flats he changes his sink-tip over to 12' of Rio T-11 with no cheater. When using a longer sink-tip, he uses a more traditional down and across presentation. [View More]

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March Focus

This is the time we’ve all been waiting for. Although cold fronts continue to pound the Northwest and the Great Lakes, the days are longer and warmer now... [Read More]