Troutnut Forum > Fly Hatch Talk > getting midges down
This topic is about the True Fly Family Chironomidae
Midges are the most important aquatic insects in some places, especially fertile spring creeks where they are extremely abundant and the current is so slow that it's efficient for trout to surface feed on very tiny insects.
Some midges are large, up to hook size 14, but the majority are size 22 or smaller. The number of genera and species is hopelessly huge for angler entomologists to ever learn, and the identifing characteristics often require slide-mounting tiny parts under high-powered microscopes. Even the most Latin-minded fisherman must slip back to the basics--size and color--to describe his local midge hatches. Read more...
There are 13 more specimens...
The Discussion
| CaseyP | December 8th, 2007, 9:44 pm | |
| Arlington, VA/ Mercersburg, PA Posts: 252 | says here midge pupae rise in the water and struggle in the film to become adults. my imitations are so small that they don't seem to go down very far in order to rise--ike a wet fly might at the end of the swing. any ideas? or am i fishing them wrong? | |
| "You can observe a lot by watching." Yogi Berra | ||
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| LittleJ | December 8th, 2007, 11:02 pm | |
| Hollidaysburg Pa Posts: 128 | I usually fish midges like I would any nymph with weight and an indicator. A little off topic, but I fish midges on the surface with an indicator as well usually trailing a wulff or something i don't need a 10x spotting scope to see. Jeff | |
| SlateDrake9 | December 10th, 2007, 7:49 pm | |
| Potter County, PA Posts: 47 | Beads. Tungstun beads. | |
| Fishing with bait is like swearing in church. -- Slate Drake | ||
| CaseyP | December 10th, 2007, 9:24 pm | |
| Arlington, VA/ Mercersburg, PA Posts: 252 | oh, of course! instead of the glass beads. or maybe both...the glass kind looks rather like eyes, or something living anyway. thanks for the help, guys! | |
| "You can observe a lot by watching." Yogi Berra | ||
| Jmd123 | December 13th, 2007, 3:45 pm | |
| Posts: 148 | I can confirm the difficult taxonomy of midges (Chironomidae). I almost got a PhD in aquatic enotmology - I was enrolled at U of Missouri in the late 90's. I didn't finish the degree - otherwise I could be known as Dr. DeNike - but I did a lot of midge taxonomy, somewhere in the order of 700-800 specimens. The taxonomy is based upon the structures of the head, particularily antennae and mouthparts. This required mounting on microscope slides and smashing the head just enough to spread out the mouthparts for easy visibility. If you didn't smash hard enough you couldn't see anything as the head is rather opaque, and if you smashed too hard the whole thing would explode and you would have to go searching around the slide for the parts you need to see. This was just to take them to genus! I ended up doing about 250 more in my first consulting job too... My best FISHING experiences with Chironomidae were in the pond I lived on while in that PhD program. Big (size 14-16), plume-antennaed males of perhaps a Chironomus species (plumosus?) would skim the water's surface about dusk and get snapped up by big (6-10") bluegills (and one 12 1/2" black crappie one night, much to my surprise). An Adams or Mosquito in the appropriate sizes were the ticket there. Jonathon | |
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