Vaal Hoppers...

**dleroux** · 12-06-09

Hi guys,

Iâ€™m going to fish the Vaal tomorrow, I will mainly focus on targeting SM on a dry and dropper approach but will also have my LM arsenal ready. I tied a few Hoppers in cream, yellow and black colours and never tried them before on the Vaalâ€¦ I would like to know from the Hopper experts how do you fish this pattern effectively in winter?

Cheers

Dirk

**C J** · 12-06-09

Originally Posted by dleroux

Hi guys,

Iâ€™m going to fish the Vaal tomorrow, I will mainly focus on targeting SM on a dry and dropper approach but will also have my LM arsenal ready. I tied a few Hoppers in cream, yellow and black colours and never tried them before on the Vaalâ€¦ I would like to know from the Hopper experts how do you fish this pattern effectively in winter?

Cheers

Dirk

First of all......I'm not an expert!

..........but you can fish them like any dry to sighted fish. Dead drift works the best for me. I tried a hopper last weekend, small light brown Webs hopper, the fish do go up to it and bump it with the nose, but thats it. I think you better off throwing small May imitations.

**troutmaster** · 12-06-09

Wouldn't!

Might get a reaction strike if you cast to sighted fish; but I would cast klinkies.

Good luck.

**Yellowfever** · 12-06-09

Winter is not big season for Hoppers. It's cold and they are sluggish, you won't see a lot jumping around. I would go for something else.

I find the fish refuse the Vaal caddis in winter.

**Scythe** · 12-06-09

The problem with hoppers and SM is that people build them to be too buoyant, your hopper should basically ride about 80% submerged with only the top foam wing which is folded over the DH wing (or whatever wing you're using) If you see them bumping your fly or missing it, they're sucking it down but not hard enough to make your fly dunk. They're used to sucking down MF, which don't take a lot of sucking to get into their mouth. (I told you this much a long time ago CJ, when you posted your hopper)

Also keep them small, no bigger than #10 or #12 for the Vaal, preferably #12 or #14 and use a heavy gauge wire, it helps to make the fly sink an use one of the mtallic dubs on the thorax and body, once waterlogged, it adds to the weight and keeps the fly dunked.

Approach wise, there are better way of catching SM on a 'dry' fly than using a hopper, especially when a hatch is moving and you can accurately identify what size & colour is working as well as what stage of the invertibrate the fish are feeding on (90% of the time on the emerger)

However when finding the cruising pods of three or four fish in a big pool when they aren't actively feeding, splat the hopper (with a big noisy splat, using a tuck cast to get hopper onto water without too much line splash) about a meter or a meter an a half in front of it's nose, direcly in the feeding path, you're bound to get a hit.

Also don't be scared if you see the fish spooking by your presentation, leave the hopper stationery and wait, 5 times out of 10 is the fish has been spooked, they simply dive, then turn and come back, if nothing after 3 seconds, twitch, second, twitch another second, then lift off and present to your next pod.

My ZAR 0.02, YMMV.

**C J** · 15-06-09

Noted, and I did play around with the DH head idea. What I like about hoppers is that you can cast them at any time. I remember one afternoon at Silver......Redhumpy was with me. I was not far upsteam from the Silver border fence. I found a some fish in a shallow rappid busy kicking over some rocks. I chucked a foam head hopper about 2m in front of them and left it to drift right over them. First cast got smacked......and so it went. If I remeber correctly, I caught 7 fish in that one rappid - did'nt move once. The thing was.......it was about 6 in the evening, and what's the chances of seven hoppers falling in the same place........fish still wacked it! More proof that yellow's are oppertunistic hunters.

**Byron** · 15-06-09

Originally Posted by C J

Noted, and I did play around with the DH head idea. What I like about hoppers is that you can cast them at any time. I remember one afternoon at Silver......Redhumpy was with me. I was not far upsteam from the Silver border fence. I found a some fish in a shallow rappid busy kicking over some rocks. I chucked a foam head hopper about 2m in front of them and left it to drift right over them. First cast got smacked......and so it went. If I remeber correctly, I caught 7 fish in that one rappid - did'nt move once. The thing was.......it was about 6 in the evening, and what's the chances of seven hoppers falling in the same place........fish still wacked it! More proof that yellow's are oppertunistic hunters.

One might call them HOPPERtunistic feeders... (how lame was that?)

No seriously they like them but yellows can be like crows at the best of times

** runs, hides waits for it **