3 Flies for the Week: July 14, 2025

#1: Tails Up Trico - Black sz22

With the combination of warmer water temperatures and low flows seen on the South Platte, the tricos have arrived early! Fish are keyed in on them and want nothing other than the tricos when they’re hatching. If you don’t know, tricos are a small mayfly species that hatch in warm river temperatures typically seen during the late-summer months (this can fall anywhere between July through September depending on where you are). Something about these little black flies drives trout crazy; while they’re hatching you can visualize almost every fish’s head in the river on top eating away on the spinners.

Tricos will begin hatching early in the morning, leading to great nymphing action on black RS2’s from 7-10am(ish). During this timeframe you’ll see thousands of tricos dancing along the riverside, while more continue to hatch and join them. The trout reap the spoils and munch away on the easy meal of hundreds of trico nymphs. Once the adults mate, they inevitably lay their eggs and pass away. This form is called a spinner, and this is the adult stage that leaves them incredibly vulnerable to predation from trout. This typically starts about 10am (it’s almost on the nose!) and will last until that day’s hatch is all eaten or washed away. I’ve had days where the dry fly bite lasts for a full four hours! Other times lasting only 45 minutes or so.

I digress, the tails up trico is an ultra-realistic pattern that is perfect to fish during the spinner fall! Fish as small as you can see because these bugs are ultra small. If you can’t see your fly on the water, which is typical with the vast majority of high producing trico dries, we recommend running a more visible dry fly two feet above the trico. Or, our new favorite option is running an extra-small Oros indicator two or three above the dry!

#2: Keller’s Henneberry Hopper - Grey sz12

The Henneberry Hopper has quickly taken storm on our Front Range fisheries! This is a very realistic, yet durable hopper pattern that trout have a hard time refusing. This fly is built of a primarily foam construction, so it floats incredibly well and can be fished alone or in tandem with a dropper. Right now we’d recommend the smaller options because it’s still early in the growing season for grasshoppers, so not many of them have reached the larger sizes yet. Don’t get too hung up on the color, we chose grey just as a general suggestion. Grasshoppers come in an endless number of colors and trout eat all of them! On one stretch of river I’ve witnessed hoppers that were bright green, natural brown, grey, and tan with a pink belly. So don’t be afraid to go outside of the “standard” hopper colors!

#3: Split-Case PMD - sz16

The PMD hatch continues to hold strong throughout the state and will hopefully continue for a few more weeks. There are two distinct PMD hatches we see in much of our fisheries. A larger form that will begin to hatch in late June-early July and will last for two to four weeks. As this larger hatch dissipates, their smaller counterparts will take their place and hatch for another two to four weeks. In order to meet somewhere between these two hatches, we recommend carrying sz16 PMD patterns (if you’re looking for only one size that is). The larger hatch is generally sz14-16, while the smaller are generally sz18.

The split-case PMD has already been a killer for us over the past few weeks. We’ve been running it as a lead or second fly option on our nymph rigs, as well as a third fly on our hopper-double dropper rigs. This is one of those few flies that can be fished all day and continue to produce regardless of the time. Something about that yellow crack drives our trout crazy!