My favorite sea trout pattern

Since the first fishing I’ll be doing personally in the new year when the new season starts will be sea trout fishing I might as well start by telling you about my favorite sea trout pattern.

My favorite sea trout fly - The Dyrbitur

This story begins three years ago in the autumn of 2008. A new fly tying book about streamers was being published here in Iceland and I was asked to proof read the book before it was printed. At that time I was studying tourism in Holar University College and felt nothing but honored to help my friend the publisher out. One of the patterns in the book is the creation of the author himself and I’d seen and heard about it many times before. I even had some in my fly box but never used it all that much.

The cover of that book I proof read

When proof reading the book I read the story behind the name of the pattern and that intrigued me. The name of the fly is Dyrbitur wich in Icelandic is a term used for foxes and stray dogs that attack livestock, mainly lambs and occasionally, even full grown sheep. Story has it that the creator of the fly was approached by a group of guys going to fish the Litla River, a river the creator knows quite well, and they needed a secret weapon to bring with them. The creator gave them this fly and told them that they were in for a treat as a “dyrbitur” had been spotted in the river a few days before (in this case the term is used for such a big fish that it would be big enough to attack livestock).

A few days later the creator of the fly – Sigurdur Palsson got a phone call. The excited voice on the other line did not even say hello – the greeting was “we got it!”. Sigurdur’s reply was “got what?”. That panting voice on the other line replied “The Dyrbitur… on the fly you gave me. Whats that fly called?” And the rest is history as naturally the fly would be called Dyrbitur.

Here is a video taken when these anglers caught that “dyrbitur” on the Litla River. I don’t want to take anything away from these guys but I want to state for the record that I am against the fact that they killed this magnificent beast and that since then all killing has been banned on the river and today it is a full catch and release river as it should be. Enjoy.

 

Anyway…. I then tyed up a few of those flies and had them in my box. Did not use them all that much but they were always there. Then in 2010 a group of Scottish anglers came over for a combination trip for salmon, trout, char and sea trout. We started in the Litla River for 3 days where they caught 80 something fish, among those a 10 pound brown trout. We then moved to the Huseyjarkvisl River for some salmon and sea trout. On the final day one of the guys showed me a fly he had in his box – a Scottish pattern called Humungus. I liked it and on the last morning two fresh and bright silver sea trout nailed it.

One of the two fish that nailed the Humungus that morning

My client gave me a copy of this fly for me to imitate since I was booked to go fishing the Huseyjarkvisl River with my father a few days later. So when I got back home I sat down to tye some up but being so busy at the time I only had time to tye two copies. So I then had three copies of the fly in my box.

When we arrived to the river we started fishing the salmon beats but I used the Humungus as I was searching for sea trout rather than salmon. You might wonder why – but let me finish and I’ll explain. Anyway…. soon after I started fishing I hooked a nice brown trout on the Humungus but shortly after that I snagged it on a rock and broke off. One copy down, two to go.

As dusk set in my father came and joined me by the pool Rettarhylur – a slow and deep pool known to hold both salmon and sea trout all season long. So I fished it through with 1-2 salmon patterns and then changed tactics and fished the Humungus upstream but stripped very fast downstream to imitate an injured stickleback. Literally on the first cast a brown trout hammered it, gave me a good fight before I let him go. Second cast something bigger came almost to the surface to strike the Humungus fished in this way.

That fish turned out to be a salmon and the fly was stuck way down in it’s throat so I had to snip the leader and leave the fly or else risk cutting the gills. So two down and only one to go. Only the original was now in my box.

The next morning we moved to the trout beats and got to experience the kind of sea trout bonanza the Huseyjarkvisl is so famous for. When the original copy of the Humungus was smashed to pieces by countless sea trout I switched to the Dyrbitur as it is quite similar. The fantastic fishing kept going strong and since then I’ve tyed up loads of Dyrbitur patterns as well as recommended it to my sea trout fishing clients. It is super simple and easy to tye so it’s perfect for those of you that have little time to tye flies. For the Huseyjarkvisl I like it with a tungsten bead as well as flat lead in the body for that extra weight because there you want the fly to go deep as fast as possible.

The last fish I caught on that fishing trip September 22. - 25. 2010. Nailed the Dyrbitur

Now I promised to tell you why I was chasing sea trout rather than salmon at that time. The answer is simple. The sea trout get just as big as the salmon there and at that time the sea trout were running but the salmon were already in the system and had been for a while. I always prefer a fresh run fish, a bar of silver.

Here is the recipe for this pattern:

Dyrbitur

Creator: Sigurdur Palsson

Hook: size 2-6 streamer hook

Bead: silver

Thread: black

Tail: black marabou with few strands of krystal hair on both sides

Body: half silver chenille, half black chenille

Hackle: black hen hackle

 

Here is a video from the Huseyjarkvisl River – Spring sea trout fishing:

 

We have some dates on the Huseyjarkvisl in September for a combination of salmon and sea trout. Fantastic dates for some fantastic fishing. Drop me a line at info@icelandangling.com for further information. Info on the river can be found here:

http://icelandangling.com/huseyjarkvisl-river-salmon-beat.html

and here:

http://icelandangling.com/huseyjarkvisl-river-trout-beat.html

Tight lines,

Stjani Ben

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