The Picasse pattern will always have a special place in my fishing history.
Initially designed for Atlantic salmon by Marc LeBlanc, the name translates to “anchor” for its ability to sink. The fly fishes beautifully on just a long leader and a dry line. The variations of this pattern landed me my first and second lake-run rainbows in the heart of winter on a dry line in my home waters.
I remember exchanging messages with fellow speypager Mike Papais about his thoughts on fishing a dry line. The previous fall, I had been experimenting with fishing lighter and lighter sink tips and hooking rainbows in shallow water while trying to avoid foul hooking spawning salmon. The previous spring, I had one specific outing where a fish grabbed my General Practicioner patterns almost immediately after they hit the water. These “clues,” so to speak, pointed me toward fishing a dryline to winter fish and having them rise in the water column. This idea is contradictory for Great Lakes fishing and the typical techniques used on these waters. At this time, I also started to learn to cast longer lines, so everything fell into place for a journey into dryline fishing. I had acheived enough success.
“I would be ok with not getting any more grabs in hopes of chasing a true challenge: a winter dryline fish.”
Steve Szeliga
One morning, while logging into speypages over coffee and browsing the classifieds, I noticed a notification from Mike. He recommended tying up a few Picasse patterns for the swing and shared his productive variations to his waters. I had never heard of the pattern, so I researched and developed a suitable variation for my river. Looking back, I see that my pattern was conceived using the materials I had on hand. Instead of the D ribbing for the body, I used tinsel with clear mono wrapped over. The wing was bucktail, and the collar teal. All the components were materials that would make a successful, natural-colored pattern for pressured fish. From November through December, I had been experimenting with traditional spey patterns from the kings series, utilizing turkey strips instead of bronze mallard for the wings. I would look at them in the water, but I wasn’t confident that a fish would eat them. I now know that it wasn’t even the pattern that made a difference; I had bitten off more than I could chew by attempting to learn to cast a 54′ Gael Force and chase a winter dryline fish simultaneously. The information provided unknowingly by Mike deserves all the credit for my first fish. His recommendations gave me enough confidence that I had a proper pattern on my line; I now needed to fish it hard.
I would read Bill McMillan’s Dry Line Steelhead book nightly, hoping to discover some magic tidbit of information I passed over from his deep wet fly swing method that would result in success. I also regularly exchanged information with Todd Hirano, asking about his methods of fishing the deep wet fly swing in the winter. I needed to adjust my approach slightly to get the fly down. At that time in fishing, the key to my success would be to get a fly to the stones to get a grab. I became less focused on depth and needed to edit my water better. If I could find a 2 1/2′ to 3ft deep run that I knew was productive, would it be out of the question for a fish to move 6-12″ to take a fly?
On January 25th, I woke up and tied a Picasse variant with a copper body of tinsel (it would become the basis for the Charlie Muddler), olive and yellow bucktail wing, and a sparse amount of hackle. A few hours later, I was standing in the lower end of the Salmon River in NY in the tail out of a slower pool. I remember it being a drizzly 38 degree morning with some wind. Miserable conditions to most people, but exactly what I looked for to go fishing. I was learning to cast a longer head, so winds impacted my ability to present a fly consistently. I could cast just the head of the fly out and was confident I was putting the fly in front of the fish. Instead of casting longer distances, I would cast the head and allow additional shooting line to feed out while I took my three steps down the pool to sink the fly.
I concentrated on getting the fly deep and applying the methods I had learned from my conversations with Todd and Mike, as well as the writings of Bill McMillan. I was so focused on the casting, slipping the additional line, and stepping down the tail out that I forgot about “fishing.” I had a pattern that I trusted, and I continued the process until the sound of my reel snapped me back to reality. Startled, I began to palm my Hardy Perfect as a fish began ripping line downstream. I was shocked. It happened: a winter fish on a dry line. I was wondering what to do. Should I pull out my phone to document what had to be a fishing milestone event? I began to reel frantically to land the fish. A few minutes later, its tail was in my hand for a quick photo, and off the fish went.
I fished for less than an hour that day. I released the fish and went home to tell my story to my wife and anyone else who would listen.
Little did I know that when I got home to tell my wife my story, she also had one for me. While I was gone, she took a pregnancy test; the day I landed my first dryline fish, I found out that we would become parents; it was truly one of the happiest days of my life.
A little over a month passed, and I had not fished since my first winter dryline fish. It was the equivalent of winning a gold medal in the olympics for me. Where do I go from there? It was such a high to have dry line success that I was worried perhaps it was a fluke. I had a snow day in late February and was off from work. I tied another Picasse variant, a silver tinsel body with a white and yellow bucktail for the wing. I needed to prove it wasn’t a fluke. I checked the hourly forecast, and it was one of those snow days where we had freezing rain that transitioned to rain by 11 am. Perfect, that’s fishing weather. I took my fly out of the vise and grabbed my stuff. The hourly forecast and radar led me astray. I drove to the river in absolutely terrible road conditions.
When I got to Pulaski, the rain that was supposed to be changing over was freezing rain, and I questioned my ability to get back home. I remember texting my wife, saying I might have to stay up here; she was not amused by my stupidity to drive up in the first place. “Well, I’m here, so I might as well fish,” knowing I had the entire DSR to myself. I opted for a shorter walk and headed upstream from the welcome center to a pool I thought would fish well with a long leader.
As I hiked to my spot, I thought about other things; I hoped road conditions would clear up. The rain stopped, and I needed increased temperatures to help the roads. I was even more disappointed when I got to the pool. The water was slushy, with large ice chunks floating down the pool. I had a cigar and flask in hand, checked my phone again, and decided that if nothing, I would at least get to enjoy both while watching and waiting for the water to clear. An hour and a half later, the slush had cleared enough to fish. My first few casts revealed another frustration I had never experienced: a full floater with slush on the surface involves constant little tugs as the fly swings. I had multiple hangups with every cast, from when the line hit the water to the hang-down.
I had mentally checked out and decided to give myself the benefit of the doubt, fish the run-through, and then give myself plenty of time to drive slowly home. The primary current of the pool began to shift toward the far bank, taking most of the slush with it, leaving a slow swing over a few boulder crops near the hang-down. I was no longer concerned with letting the line slip to sink the fly; I was more about fishing the run as quickly as I could since my walk back was heading in that direction. If I have to wade through it anyway, I might as well fish the water to start the walk back to my truck. My line approached the boulders and stopped; I yanked back on my rod, thinking I had hooked another ice chunk. The line came tight and pulled back, making me believe I had hung up on a boulder until a fish splashed and broke the surface. Given the conditions and my desire to get home safely, I had entirely written off the possibility of getting a fish. As my rod buckled and headshakes started, it took a few moments to realize what was happening. I had another grab in 33-degree water, the epitome of winter fishing. I landed the fish and was in total shock. My extra slow ride home allowed me to ponder the sparseness of fly, depth, and presentation. I now had two experiences to draw off and compare as I delved further into winter dry line fishing.
Materials :
Hook: AJ 1.5 or Blue Heron #3
Body: Copper tinsel
Wing: Yellow over olive bucktail
Hackle: Legal Heron
Collar: Teal
Optional: Jungle cock cheeks
Step 1: I trim the flat tinsel to a point, wedge it into the return eye, and tie it off with three wraps of thread. With touching wraps, I wind the tinsel back to just in front of the hook point and then forward to the tie-in, then tie it off.
Step 2: Measure a sparse clump of olive bucktail to just shy of the hook bend. Tie in with three well-waxed wraps. Measure a clump of yellow bucktail slightly longer and tie it on top of the olive in the same manner.
Step 3: Prepare a heron hackle and tie it in on the far side of the hook. Make two wraps of heron folding the barbules as you wrap and tie them off.
Step 4: Strip one side of a teal flank feather and tie it on the far side. Make 1-2 wraps and tie off.
Step 5: Whip finish and add head cement to complete the fly.
Additional Thoughts:
Although this variant isn’t true to the original materials list it has become an important platform for my fishing and tying. This pattern taught me the importance of sparseness when tying as well as the importance of confidence in a pattern when fishing. I suppose that with the right water levels and a few color variations one could have an entire wallet of these patterns and do quite well on a dry line regardless of the season. I also think this is a good pattern to experiment with. I’ve caught fish on this pattern with both a broadside swing as well as a slow, fine and far off presentation. When the water temperatures are in the low to mid 30s here in the Great Lakes and fishing pressure is extremely high, this is one of the patterns that will regularly be tied to my tippet. I stick to natural colors but have no doubt traditional steelhead color patterns could be effective too.
