Use this material of 2x2mm synthetic eggs to tie the latest OS-3 pattern from Walt "The Otter" Mueller.
Double wide string approx 3" or 31 eggs long.
Notes from Walt Mueller, Jr. “The Otter” Blue River Designs, LLC
This pattern represents very small eggs that are prevalent in most streams during all 12 months of the year from different species of sucker’s spawn along with other non-game species such as white fish. The eggs of these fish are very small, in the 1 to 2 mm size range. Charlie Meyers, of the Denver Post, covered some of these facts recently in his article. All these fish have very small eggs, similar in size to these patterns, which are made with a double row of 2 mm egg sizes in numerous and contrasting colors. These many different and varied fish species spawn at different times of the year than when most rainbow, cutthroat, brook and brown trout spawn (spring and fall months, usually). Even these four types of trout can spawn at varied times, other their normal spring and fall months. Quite often, you can find trout spawning late into the early summer, well into June and July. After that, the other trout species often start as early as September for the fall spawn, continuing well into January and February of the next year. When you add the variations of the timetables for all these fish to spawn, you have virtually every month of the year with available eggs in the water for trout to feed upon. And feed upon them they do, as fish eggs represent one of the highest protein values, by weight, compared to any other natural foods available to all these species of trout. Both female and male trout will eat their own loose eggs from their own redd during the spawning cycle.
In summary, egg patterns are available all year long, and fishing with an artificial egg pattern as one of your favorite flies is an excellent choice. This new “OS-3” pattern can be used for steelhead and all trout species, with emphasis on all the Great Lakes tributaries for spring and fall run steelhead. In late spring into early summer, the suckers spawn on these tributaries, and this makes for a very productive fly pattern for steelhead.=Use on rivers and streams in all the western and eastern tail waters is especially productive, due to the small egg size of the pattern used on fish that have been hooked numerous times in catch and release areas. This pattern can be tied as a single egg on a #18 or # 20 hook, double and triple eggs on a #16 hook, a quad of four on a # 14 hook, 6 eggs on a # 12 hook, or finally 8 eggs on a # 8 or #10 hook. The pattern also Otter’s Milking Veil material to give the pattern a “milking egg” look, as with other Otter’s “Soft Milking Egg” patterns.
This finished fly should take numerous fish so long as you carefully unhook all fish with your forceps on the bend of the hook and not on the egg material. As with our other “Soft Milking Egg” patterns, this pattern is very soft and translucent which closely and accurately mimics numerous sucker species and whitefish spawn. Since the egg material is soft it allows more hookups as a fish is not as apt to spit it out so quickly. It’s the real deal! Good luck, and let us know how you are doing with this new and exciting pattern!
