Black Nose Dace Streamer Fly

Black Nose Dace is one of the most popular fly patterns that imitate natural minnow.   It was originally tied by an American called Art Flick of Westkill and has been a popular streamer fly pattern since 1950's.   The original imitation was to imitate a minnow called BlackNose Dace and a better picture here.  This is a popilar aquarium fish so if you need a close you you can run to the near aquarium and you can take a close look at it...

This fly has caught most freshwater fish in America and has proven to be successful in Canada and Europe also.  Its good for steelhead late autumn and sometimes the only fly that works late september and october.  Recently this pattern has been tied as salmon pattern with a good success.  It is also known to catch brown trouts, sea trouts and other trouts.

What Time of the day should you fish Black Nose Dace Streamer fly

Like other streamer flies the Black Nose Dace fly pattern can be fished in almost all conditions.  A rule of thumb is that if the trout is not taking dry flies, move to streamer flies and try to imitate to the minnows which are in the river or lake.

Conditions to use Black Nose Dace Fly

Like most streamer flies, Black Nose Dace can be used in almost all conditions.  Since its imitating minnows you should always carry few Black Nose Dace flies in your fly box since this pattern is general and can imitate many different minnows in streams and lakes. 

Black Nose Dace Fly History

This fly was originally tied by Art Flick from New York back in 1940´s and was first published in his book Art Flick´s Streamside Guide.  This pattern should imitate the minnow called Blacknose Dace and was originally tied with polarbear and bucktail hair.  Today this pattern is tied by using bucktail hair since polar bear hair is getting more and more difficult to get the hands on.

Black Nose Dace Fly Pattern Material:

Hook - Standard streamer hook 3x - 4x - sizes 2 - 8
Thread - Black 6/0
Tail - Red wool - measure the hook gap.
Body - Silver tinsel
Rib - Silver ovel insel - medium
Wing - Brown on top of Black on top of white
Head - Black

How to fish the Black Nose Dace Fly

Minnows move quickly and because of that you should always try to move your Black Nose Dace like the minnow it should imitate.  Always retrieve the fly at the same speed, even if you see a trout or salmon chase the fly.  This is because normally a small minnow will not stop when its being follow by a bigger predator.  This is a mistake that we see many people do when they see their fly being chased by a fish.