FLYMPH FORUM

Came across this pattern recently. New to me. Often called the Rena caddis. Swedish river? It's a dry fly and the original uses hackle not hare. I was really drawn to the ease of tying and generalist look of the pattern. Original has a dubbed body, Antron type material for the wing and hackle tied parachute around the base of the Antron. The Antron post is then forced back like a caddis wing and glued down to hold it there. I saw it as a great emerging caddis pattern. I tied the Antron on extending out over the eye then added English hare to the thorax with a dubbing loop. For the final step, I pulled the Antron back tightly and place a small amount of UV cement to the top of the thorax and it holds great. Clipped the wing to shape. Super easy.

Cool Hat, that is a nice version. Rena is a Norwegian river with a good stock of fish. You can see another version here http://www.rakkenes.com/rena-caddis/



On this same site you find Gunnar Bingen's renowned caddis 'The Animal' aka 'Dyret'.

dd

Yeah that's the original design I was looking at. Its very nice...for a dry fly.

Joking aside, it really is a very attractive design to me. I am also a big fan of the Dyret. I used to tie them at the shows years ago before the pattern was as well-known in the states as it is today. In fact, I have been tying one of my Dyret variations lately. I tie them on #8's and #10's. I feel it is one of the best functional hopper patterns I've ever fished. Easy to tie and buoyancy is very similar to a natural grasshopper. I keep the full hackle for faster water and trim the bottom hackle on stream for slower flows.

Man, those are all very "fishy" patterns (sincere compliment). They all looks super effective.

Thanks for the inspiration guys.

Old Hat,

Love that hopper design. Been using a parachute hopper for a few years, but I'm planning to tie a bunch of these this year for the hopper hatch. Our hoppers aren't quite so robust as size #10, but #12 & #14 should work!!

Lovely fly!

Paul

Glad you are going to try it Paul. It's such an easy hopper pattern. The hardest part is knotting the pheasant tail for legs. But a tier could use whatever makes it easier for the legs. I tie knot the pheasant tail in pairs. I can use one pair on either side for smaller flies. Or if I need larger legs, I just UV cement pairs together at the joints. I usually use six fibers or 3 pairs together for each leg on these.

carl.. do you do a "how to" of that hopper?

I don't have one Ron. It is pretty straight forward.

Tie in the hair on top of the hook. Helps to not trim the head until the very last step in order to lift it and tie off underneath.

Tie in the hackle at tail.

Dub forward to the where the legs are to be. Keep dubbing bulky.

Tie in the legs.

Continue dubbing to the front.

Wrap the hackle forward burying it into the bulky dubbing.

Tie off.

thanks Carl... the obvious seemed just too simple for my simple mind to grasp...

Hi,

as daring duffer also mentioned, the Rena river is in Norway, close to Elverum and it confluents with the Glomma river at the little town / village Rena. The proper name is Rena elva - elv meaning river in Norwegian.

The river is dammed on both ends. It holds good stock of brown trout and grayling, both in good sizes. Its one of Norways most famous rivers for trout and grayling fishing and sees a very good number of fishermen from Europe every year.

The Rena Caddis - correct name is Renaflua (Rena fly) is a design by Norwegian Fly tier Staffan Lindstrøm. His flies are all very effective and buggy. He is also known for coming up with his own solutions and techniques for fly tying as well as his very high level of casting of tuition. The fly shown is tied as I know it from Staffan. You can see him tie the fly on youtube here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSqpaSe9lVI

He mentions that he got the idea from the Swedish Rackelhanen, a design from the 60ies based on purely using Antron as material. Another fly based on the Rackelhanen is the Klinkhamer. Hans did not force the signpost downwards as Staffan shows it and for some reason used a grub hook for the fly.

The other fly, the palmered fly is called "dyret" - Norwegian for animal and supposedly represents just that - fish food. This fly was developed by Gunnar Bingen in 1991. Gunnar lives in Rena. To my knowledge he does not add hopper legs to this fly. I personally have never seen this being done. A good idea though. The original idea fro the fly was to solve the problem imitating swimming caddis pupae.

You can read about his fly here. I did an article about it some years back - https://www.sexyloops.com/index.php/ps/ ... t-27-dyret

The fish in the Rena feed extremely close to the bank, especially in late summer and fall when the nights are dark again. I mean really close. They almost lean into the bank. Often the only chance one has is to fish downstream and let the fly drift into the bank right in front of the fishes nose.

So both the wake and the silhouette are important. The first implications of the "dyret" sport a bunch of deer hair as underbody. Peter versions sport an underbody made of foam. May own version is tied with a bunch of fibres from the artic hare feet. The body can bed dubbed and than palmered with a hackle. The hackle is often clipped on the underside.

Another ly which is often used with great success is Borgers devil bug and the Swedish "super pupae", also a paltered fly not unlike the "dyret". However, the "super pupae" Creates less of a wake but I s also often fished downstream in the the same manner as the dyret of the devil bug.

Talking about caddis patterns. I made another one based on Staffans technique using yarn as an extended body. https://www.skalestrommen.no/ff/carpet-yarn-caddis/

A propos Staffan. Check out how he ties a Streaking Caddis ... I guess you´d call that a muddler minnow. https://youtu.be/3B4UllglydQ

Cheers & tight lines,

TZ