Tackling the Trico Spinner

By: Levi Opsatnic

Not too long ago, we discussed the Trico hatch and how much fun it can be fish in the summer months. And below, you’ll find the recipe and tying instructions for my favorite Trico pattern. Don’t let its tiny size frustrate you, as the pattern is quite simple and, after a bit of practice, you’ll be flawlessly pumping them out by the dozens.

Materials:

Hook: Tiemco TMC 100 sizes 20-28 (for this fly, I’ll be using a size 24).

Thread: White 17/0 UNI-Thread.

Tail: White Microfibbets.

Body and Thorax: Black Superfine dubbing for the male and white Superfine dubbing, with a black thorax, for the female.

Wings: White Polypropolene yarn.

 

Tying Instructions:

1. Begin by crimping down the barb (yes, these little hooks do have barbs that should be crimped down too) and wrapping your thread across the shank of the hook. With this fly, it is important to keep your number of thread wraps as low as possible as it decreases bulk.

Trico Blog Image 1

2. Now tie the wings in flat across the top of the upper third of the hook and cut them to size. Secure the wing by wrapping over the thorax. If you’re having trouble with this, try to wrap in a figure eight motion until the wings are secure. To give you a good idea of what it should look like, this image show the wings from the top so you can see their flat appearance.

Trico Blog Image 2

3. Wrap a small ball of dubbing at the end of your hook to splay the tails and then tie between three and six Microfibbets in. For this fly, I have used four. Tricos have fairly large tails and their representations should match this quality. With this fly and its dubbing, less is definitely more, I use very, very small wisps of dubbing to tie this fly as you can always add more, but taking bulk away isn’t as easy.

4. Dub the entire body and thorax. Be sure to make a pronounced thorax, and once again, less is more with this dubbing.

Trico Blog Image 3

5. You may now tie your fly off with a few half hitches or a whip finish.

Trico Blog Image 5

The Finished Fly:

Trico Blog Image 6

This fly should be fished like most other dry flies. Since the fish seem to rise to the Tricos quite regularly due to their size, it’s best to target a single, rising fish and cast above it and let your fly float into their feeding lane. And if you can’t fool the particular fish you’d like to, move to the next fish as it’s not uncommon for a pool to be boiling during this fall. Also, just because these flies are so small doesn’t mean that only small fish eat them. I’ve seen some pretty large fish gorging themselves on Tricos. Good luck tackling this little fly, and hopefully, it becomes a favorite for you like it has for me.

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