With sedges starting to hatch throughout June, its worth having a few patterns in the box just in case.

Simple Dry Sedge

This simple sedge pattern caught me a few beauties up at Farmoor recently.

Hook – size 14 dry fly hook
Body – dubbed with rusty brown and wrapped with silver wire.
Wing – CDC tied backwards (brown would be best but I only had olive. Trout didn’t seem to care!)
Hackle – fiery brown cock hackle.
Antennae – two pheasant tail fibres.
Tying notes – I pick out the dubbing at the end to make it fluffy and trim the hackle at the bottom (like a bob’s bits) so it sits lower in the water.
Fishing notes – I have found most takes come as soon as the fly hits the water, so cast short distances and regularly. Can be useful to give the line a sharp tug to drag the fly and create a little disturbance (the real sedges ‘dapple’ the top of the water).

Sedge Nymph

Hook – size 12 buzzer hook
Body – Lime green glowbrite thread, 4 pheasant tail strands
Thorax – rusty brown dubbing
Tying notes – Tie the pheasant tail fibres in at the tail then alternately wrap them over and under the thread to create the ‘weave’ effect. After adding the dubbing, hold the pheasant tail over the thorax, tie in at the head and then bend back for the legs, before whip finish.