Fly Fishing Life

Lydia Wickizer ties under the name Flannels & Flies from Colorado Springs, Colorado, where she's become a self-described "unofficial hype woman for all women in angling." A member of Colorado Women Flyfishers and a Solarez and Ahrex Pro Team member, she teaches and ties at fly fishing shows across the country in support of a more inclusive fly fishing community. Summer brings plenty of reasons to celebrate: graduations, weddings, long, relaxed barbecues. On June 27, there's one more worth marking: National Women's Fly Fishing Day, a day dedicated to recognizing and supporting women in this remarkable sport. The observance has deeper roots than a single date. In 2020, Fly Fishers International's Women Connect program established June as Women's Fly Fishing Month, a month long celebration honoring female anglers worldwide. What began as a single day, June 27th, has grown over the years into this full month of recognition, with clubs and councils across the country hosting clinics, casting days, and tying nights in support of women in the sport. It's the perfect excuse to invite a woman in your life to experience fly fishing for the first time. If the weather doesn't cooperate, take the day indoors and teach her to tie a fly or work on casting technique. Better yet, learn together by exploring the many fly patterns women in this community have developed and shared over the years. Whether you're on the water or at the tying bench, the day is about more than technique. It's a chance to share stories, build connection, and celebrate the rich, evolving history of women in fly fishing together. READ MORE ABOUT WOMEN'S FLY FISHING MONTH How Fly Tying Changed the Way I See the Water Read more Fly Tying Tips for Beginners: How to Build a Routine That Actually Sticks Read more

New Jersey fly tyer and angler Kayla Gordon brings a practical, local-water perspective shaped by trout streams, hatches, and the satisfaction of catching fish on flies she tied herself. A Team Norvise and Renomed Pro Member who ties for South Branch Outfitters, she writes from the sweet spot where the bench meets the river. These are her words: Most people get into fly tying because they want to save money or catch more fish. For me, it became much more than that. Tying flies completely changed the way I look at rivers, fish, and even the smallest details on the water. When I first started fly fishing, I was only focused on catching fish. I cared more about where the fish were holding or what fly someone told me to use. I never stopped to ask, Why am I using this fly? or What is this actually imitating? Learning to Ask Why Once I started tying my own flies, though, I started paying attention to the why behind everything. Fly tying forced me to slow down and take a step away from just trying to catch fish. I began noticing bug activity, paying attention to what insects were present, how they behaved in the current, and what stage of life they were in. I found myself looking closer at things that I used to completely overlook. I found joy in flipping over rocks, watching the current, and trying to understand what the fish were feeding on instead of just guessing. Slowing Down on the Water Fly tying taught me to slow down and to pay attention. Suddenly, I was paying more attention to the size of the bug, the color, and what they look like as they flow through the current. Instead of just cycling through random flies hoping something works, I began to make more intentional decisions based on what I was seeing on the river. Confidence Over Perfection Tying my own flies also gave me a completely different level of confidence while fishing. There's honestly nothing better than catching a fish on a fly you tied yourself. It's one of those feelings that never really gets old. And the funny part is, the fish don't care if your fly is perfect. Some of my ugliest flies have caught some of my best fish. I think that's one of the biggest lessons fly tying teaches you early on: presentation and confidence matter so much more than perfection. Where Creativity Comes In I also think tying makes you much more creative as an angler. Once you understand the basics of certain patterns, you naturally start experimenting. Sometimes it's as simple as changing a dubbing color, adding a little bit of flash, trimming a fly differently, or mixing materials from a few different patterns together. One of my favorite things to do is mix different types and colors of dubbing in a coffee grinder to make my own unique dubbing. Some ideas end up being complete failures, but others turn into confidence flies I never leave home without despite how ridiculous they look. It's Okay to Tie Ugly Flies For beginners, fly tying can feel extremely intimidating at first. Social media makes it seem like every fly must look flawless to catch fish. In reality, everyone starts somewhere. My first flies were messy, overdressed, and crowded at the hook eye, but every bad fly taught me something new about tying. That learning process is honestly part of what makes tying so enjoyable to me. Beginner Fly Tying: Matching Fly Hook and Bead Size Read more Essential Guide to Simple Fly Tying Patterns for Beginners Read more The Night Before the River One of the things I appreciate most about fly tying is how much more connected it makes me feel to the entire experience. Fishing doesn't just start when I step into the river anymore. It starts the night before at my vise. I think about what the river conditions are, what bugs are currently hatching, and tying patterns that I genuinely believe in. That preparation builds excitement and makes every fish feel so much more rewarding. At the end of the day, fly tying isn't just about making flies. It changes the way you see the water, understand insects, approach fish, and appreciate the process behind every catch. Once you start tying your own flies, you stop simply fishing the river and begin understanding it. For me, that's what makes fly tying so rewarding, it turns every trip to the river into an opportunity to learn something new and to teach others.

Some fly tyers come to the vise through curiosity. Others come to it through necessity, and the craft becomes something closer to a lifeline than a hobby. Jeff Deshefy’s path runs through the second door, and it shapes everything about how he ties: purpose-driven, durable, built for water that doesn’t forgive a fly that can’t hold up to it. This month’s featured pattern, the Jumbo John, sits squarely at that intersection. It’s a fly built for heavy, demanding conditions, adapted by a tyer who understands what it means to rebuild something from the ground up. A Foundation Built Early, Rebuilt Later Jeff has been fly fishing since his early teens, introduced to the sport by his grandfather — a relationship that instilled in him a deep respect for fly fishing etiquette, conservation, and stewardship on and off the water. For years, he fished exclusively with commercially tied flies, never imagining tying would become the central part of his fishing life that it is today. That changed following a life-changing injury. Fly tying became a form of rehabilitation during his recovery — a way to rebuild both physically and mentally during a period when the usual outlets weren’t available. What started as therapy evolved into a serious pursuit, and over the following years, tying grew into a daily practice: planning new patterns, commercial tying, guiding, and exploring technical design concepts at the vise. Today, Jeff’s work reflects a balance between traditional influence and modern innovation, with a particular focus on durable, purpose-driven flies designed for the demanding conditions of Northeast steelhead and trout water. That focus is exactly what makes the Jumbo John worth featuring. From Copper John to Jumbo John The Jumbo John was originally developed by renowned Colorado fly tyer John Barr, and represents a natural evolution of one of the most influential modern nymphing patterns ever created — the Copper John. Barr’s designs, which came to define weighted nymph construction during the late 20th century, focused on hydrodynamic efficiency, rapid sink rates, and durability under demanding river conditions. Where the Copper John became widely recognized for its slim wire body and mayfly profile, the Jumbo John expanded on those same principles by scaling up size, bulk, and visual presence. Designed more as a generalized stonefly or attractor-style nymph, the pattern excels in heavy water, where depth, flash, and profile matter as much as precise imitation. The tightly wrapped wire abdomen, flashback wingcase, and weighted beadhead get the fly to the strike zone quickly — a signature of Barr’s broader design philosophy, and exactly the kind of construction that holds up to the punishment of big, aggressive fish in fast water. In the years since, anglers have continued adapting the Jumbo John through color variations and material substitutions, turning it into a versatile searching pattern capable of taking both resident trout and migratory fish. An East Coast Adaptation: Steelhead on the Salmon River Jeff’s introduction to Barr’s heavy wire nymphing concepts began after watching a documentary centered on British Columbia steelhead anglers fishing Copper Johns through powerful current seams. That exposure pushed him to experiment with the pattern during the early Lake Ontario steelhead runs in October and November, where aggressive fish responded well to bold attractor nymphs drifted deep through fast holding water. Further research led him to the Jumbo John itself — a larger, more robust interpretation that turned out to be perfectly suited to the conditions found on New York’s Salmon River. Through time on the water, Jeff began modifying color combinations to better match the tones and triggers that consistently produce strikes on this species. In colder flows and higher water, the added mass and visual presence of the Jumbo John let it function as both a searching nymph and a suggestive stonefly imitation — particularly effective during the early-season push of fresh steelhead entering from Lake Ontario, but productive throughout the winter as well. Rather than matching a specific hatch, the pattern thrives on suggestion — combining flash, weight, and silhouette to provoke reaction strikes from fish holding tight to structure in cold, heavy water. Tie It Yourself The full recipe for Jeff’s steelhead-adapted Jumbo John (hook, wire, bead, and wingcase specifications, along with his color combinations for Salmon River and Lake Ontario tributary conditions) is available in our Flybrary, here. Tie The Jumbo John

Shopping for a fly tyer can feel like buying a paintbrush for an artist — he probably has opinions, and he probably already owns more thread than any one person needs. But that’s exactly why a good gift lands so well: the right tool, the right material, or just a thoughtful little extra says I see what you love better than almost anything else. We’ve pulled together a range of gifts for Father’s Day (Sunday, June 21), sorted not by category but by the kind of tyer your dad is — whether he’s just getting started, fishes more than he ties, or has a fully stocked bench and swears he doesn’t need a thing. A few of these are on sale right now, too, so there’s room to be generous without overspending. The little extras (tuck one in a card) Sometimes the best gift is the small thing he keeps meaning to grab and never does. Wapsi Ultra Thread — $2.24 (15% off) The site’s top-selling thread for good reason: strong, smooth, and available in 70, 140, and 210 denier across dozens of colors. Pick up two or three shades he’s been low on. It’s the kind of refill that always gets used. Tiemco TMC 100 Dry Fly Hook — $6.26 per pack of 25 (30% off) Tiemco’s most-trusted dry fly hook, in sizes 10 through 26. At 30% off, even a dad with a drawer full of TMC 100s will happily stock up — and a few packs paired with the Ultra Thread above makes a tidy little bundle that feels like more than the sum of its parts. For the dad who fishes more than he ties Not every tying dad spends most of his time at the bench. For the one who’d rather be on the water, these earn their place in the vest. Loon Outdoors Aquel Gel Floatant — $5.94 (15% off) Loon’s best-selling silicone gel floatant won’t melt in summer heat or stiffen up when it’s cold. It’s a streamside essential small enough to slip inside a Father’s Day card as a surprise. J. Stockard Double-Sided FliCon Silicone Fly Box — $13.45 A slim, clear-lidded box with self-healing silicone foam on both sides, so hooks hold firm without crushing delicate hackle. Better organization for the streamside dad, in Large, Midge, and X-Large to match how he fishes. Bench upgrades he’ll feel every session These are the small-to-mid upgrades a working tyer notices immediately — the difference between making do and tying comfortably. Umpqua Dreamstream+ Bobbin — $17.56 (20% off) A workhorse bobbin with adjustable tension arms, a smooth steel tube, and ball-weighted arms for steady thread control. If he’s been fighting tension or snapping thread, this fixes it — and it’s a meaningful step up at 20% off. Dr. Slick All-Purpose Scissors, 4″ — $19.95 Gold loop handles, serrated blades, and a choice of straight or curved. These are the scissors tyers actually reach for on every fly. A genuine under-$20 upgrade for anyone still borrowing from the kitchen drawer, and a smart backup pair for a seasoned bench. Whiting 100-Pack Saddle Hackle — $25.45 Pre-sized Whiting hackle in a pack measured for exactly 100 dry flies — no sorting, no waste. For the dad who already has a full cape but would love a ready-to-tie pack for an evening of Sulphurs or Adams. For the dad who already has everything The trick with this one is finding the thing he’d love but won’t buy for himself. Stonfo Elite Disc Drag Bobbin — $29.75 Precision Italian engineering with a quick-adjust disc-drag tension system and a weighted stainless body. It comes in Original, Saltwater/Streamer, and Compact versions — the kind of refined upgrade a longtime tyer notices every single session. See Product See Product Getting him started — or doing it right For the dad who’s curious about tying, or the one ready to graduate from his first kit. J. Stockard Economy Vise & Tool Kit — $34.95 Everything a new tyer needs in one box: vise, scissors, bobbin, bodkin, hackle pliers, and more, with or without a carrying case. This is the “here’s how you get into it, Dad” gift that removes every excuse not to start. Dr. Slick Fly Tying Tool Gift Set — $119.95 A full bench of professional-grade tools — all-purpose scissors, ceramic bobbin, threader, bodkin, hair stacker, whip finisher, and hackle pliers — in a hard-shell display case that doubles as a fly box. Rated 4.91 out of 5, with buyers reporting their tools are still going strong years later. It’s the rare tying gift that already feels gift-wrapped, perfect for the tyer ready to move up from an entry kit to tools he’ll keep for good. The splurge When you want the gift to be the gift. PEAK Rotary Vise — $239.95 PEAK’s flagship rotary vise: a heavy pedestal base, precision cam-operated jaws, and true 360° rotation, rated 4.86 out of 5 across 49 reviews. For the serious tyer who’s been limping along on an entry-level vise, this is a bench centerpiece he’ll be using decades from now. A Guide to Introducing Children to Fishing Read more Basic Fly Tying Tools To Elevate Every Tyer’s Bench Read more When in doubt J. Stockard eGift Card — $10 to $500 If your dad has firm opinions about exactly which hackle color or hook size he needs next, let him choose. The eGift card is delivered by email — there’s a “Send as a gift?” option at checkout — so there’s nothing to wrap and nothing to ship. Available in $10, $25, $50, $100, $250, and $500. Order in time for Father’s Day Father’s Day falls on Sunday, June 21 this year, so there’s still comfortable room to shop. A few notes to make sure it arrives: Standard USPS free on orders of $100 or more — so a gift set, a vise, or a card stacked with a few extras can ship at no extra cost.  To be safe with standard shipping, order by the end of this week.  Whatever he ties, there’s something here to make this Father’s Day feel like you were paying attention all along.

Women's Fly Tying Month. Jillian Beattie traces her path from a childhood to tying her own musky flies and the tribe of women anglers she found along the way.

"No one ever tried to get me interested in fishing," writes Guest Blogger Mary S. Kuss. Mary is a life-long avid angler, a retired licensed PA fishing guide, and founder of the Delaware Valley Women's Fly FishingAssociation. She started fishing at 6 years old, read on as she reflects on her life in fly fishing and the current rise of women in the sport.  I was six years old when I first took notice of people doing it, and I desperately wanted to do it myself. I pestered an uncle by marriage to help me get started as soon as I found out that he was a fisherman. He set me up with a rather primitive pole and line, and although I failed to hook up on the first bite I had from a Pumpkinseed sunfish on its nest I was firmly hooked on fishing.  I voraciously consumed all the information I could lay my hands on. I’d beg my Mother to buy me a copy of Outdoor Life, Field & Stream, or Sports Afield at the supermarket, and would read it from cover to cover. And I loved watching my favorite weekly TV show, Gaddabout Gaddis, the Flying Fisherman. All of these things fueled my passion. Growing up in Point Pleasant, New Jersey in the nineteen-fifties and sixties provided me with ample opportunities to engage with the natural world in general and fishing in particular. When fly fishing came on my radar during my teenage years, serendipity provided me with three mentors. I got to fish the some of the Holy Waters of the Catskills, the Beaverkill and the Willowemoc, and to make the acquaintance of Harry and Elsie Darbee. In 1978 I married a man who was not an angler. What can I say, I was in love. He fly fished with me before we wed, and did well at it, but stopped immediately after. When I finally asked him why, he replied, “Why should I go fishing, I caught the fish I was after.” I forgave him this little deceit, mostly because he was always tolerant and even supportive of my fly fishing habit. Our marriage has lasted for 48 years now, which says a lot. In the early years of my fly fishing experience I was often the only woman present. This caused some humorous incidents. Once while fishing the Beaverkill along Old Route 17 I heard a car screech to a halt on the roadside pull-out above me. A guy jumped out and ran to the guardrail to take a look. As he returned to his vehicle I heard him exclaim to his companion, “Crisis Pete, it’s a woman fly fishing!” By the 1980’s I’d put in a stint as a water pollution investigator for the NJ State Bureau of Fisheries, and been very active in three different Trout Unlimited chapters. I also started working as a fly fishing instructor and guide at The Sporting Gentleman, an Orvis dealership in Media, PA. In 1992 A River Runs Through It hit movie theaters. Those in the fly fishing community referred to it simply as The Movie. It spurred a tremendous boom in all things fly fishing. When the inevitable crash came the industry was desperate to stem the bleeding. At long last attention turned to women, until that time a largely untapped pool of potential customers. The involvement of women in the sport has grown steadily ever since.  In 1996 I recruited nine other women anglers to launch the Delaware Valley Women’s Fly Fishing Association. The club is still going strong under its third generation of leadership. The future of women in fly fishing looks very bright, and I’m very proud of myself and my sister anglers for it.    Breaking The Rules Read more From Lake Erie to the Gallatin: A Conversation with Jessica Suvak Read more

By now most tyers have felt the tungsten price shock at the bench. What was a manageable material cost has become a genuine line item in a season’s tying budget. The short version: tungsten probably won't be getting any cheaper. The forces driving prices are structural — China controls roughly 80% of global production, export volumes dropped sharply in 2025, and the competing demand from defence and semiconductor industries is prioritised over fly tying beads every time.  Is there some way to put a positive spin on the situation? We like to think so (at least when it comes to getting your fly down into the strike zone)... Tungsten became the default bead material on a huge percentage of nymph patterns over the past three decades, not because it was always the right choice, but because it was available, affordable, and effective enough that defaulting to it rarely cost fish. Price pressure, applied selectively, tends to produce better decisions. A tyer who is now thinking carefully about when tungsten actually earns its place on the hook (and when brass, lead wire, or a technique adjustment does the same job) is a better tyer for having thought about it.  The blog over at Last Cast Life makes this argument compellingly, including a reminder that the bead head nymph only became standard practice in the early 1990s. Serious tyers were getting their flies into the strike zone for decades before tungsten beads arrived, and the methods they used are worth revisiting. So, what are the alternatives, and when do they actually work? Brass beads Brass is not a compromise. It is the correct material for a meaningful range of fly types and water conditions, and the current pricing environment is a reasonable moment to remember that. Brass beads provide moderate weight and are lighter than tungsten or lead, which gives you more control of the depth while fly fishing in slower-moving water. In slower currents, shallow tailouts, spring creek presentations, and any situation where a tungsten bead would drive the fly too deep or too fast, brass is the functionally correct choice — not a substitute for tungsten but the right material for the job. Our brass vs tungsten beads breakdown covers exactly when each material earns its keep, but the practical headline is this: if the water is slower, shallower, or the fish are higher in the water column, brass is fishing the right zone. The Hareline Brass Beads range covers the full size spectrum from midge to streamer, in all the standard finishes. For tyers who have been defaulting to tungsten across the whole bench, there are almost certainly patterns in the box where brass is the better choice — and currently the more economical one by a significant margin. Lead and lead-free wire Lead wire wrapped on the hook shank distributes weight along the body rather than concentrating it at the head, which changes how the fly sinks, how it moves in current, and how it looks to the fish. A wire-weighted nymph without a bead often has a more natural tumbling action through pockets and runs than the same pattern with a heavy bead pulling the head down. Lead-free heavy-weight wire from Semperfli is the best option for adding significant weight to nymphs and streamers. This environmentally safe option provides excellent sink rates without the toxicity concerns of lead wire. The technique matters as much as the material:  graduated weighting produces better results than random wrapping: placing 60% of the wire weight in the forward third of the hook shank for nymphs gets the fly down efficiently while maintaining action in the body. Semperfli Lead-Free Weighted Wire, Wapsi Lead Wire, and Ultra Wire across sizes from small to large cover the full range — from adding subtle weight to a Hare’s Ear on a size 16 hook through loading a large stonefly nymph to anchor a euro rig. Wire in multiple diameters is worth having on the bench regardless of bead pricing, because it solves weighting problems that beads don’t address and adds body detail that dubbing alone can’t produce. Bead chain and brass dumbbell eyes For any tyer who uses tungsten dumbbell eyes on Clousers, egg-sucking leeches, or saltwater patterns, the current pricing environment is a direct prompt to reassess whether the jigging action and depth those patterns require genuinely needs tungsten or whether brass gets the fly fishing correctly. Hareline Brass Dumbbell Eyes in sizes from extra-small through large cover the streamer and saltwater range. Brass barbell eyes add weight and action to any pattern and allow the fly to sink more quickly in the water column while maintaining the level of depth control that slower-moving water requires. For most Clouser applications where the retrieve speed keeps the fly in the mid-column, brass provides the jigging action the pattern requires without the sink rate of tungsten that would put the fly on the bottom on every pause. Bead chain eyes remain the correct choice for shallow water presentations — bonefish flats, spring creek streamers, shallow bass water — where a heavy dumbbell eye would put the fly past the fish’s feeding level on the first strip.  The weight hierarchy (bead chain → brass dumbbell → lead dumbbell → tungsten dumbbell) maps directly to water depth and current speed, and that map still applies regardless of tungsten pricing. See Product See Product Polyleaders and sink tips One of the most efficient solutions to the tungsten question isn’t at the tying bench at all but at the end of your fly line. A polyleader or sink tip converts a floating line into a system that fishes at depth, which means the fly itself can be lighter, sparser, and more naturally mobile than a heavily beaded equivalent doing the same depth work on its own. The logic is straightforward: the line does the sinking, the fly does the swimming. A lightly dressed soft hackle, an unweighted wet fly, or a sparsely tied nymph on a sink tip behaves differently in the water column than a tungsten-beaded version of the same pattern. In fact in some instances it might move more freely, respond to current more naturally, and present a profile that isn’t anchored head-down by the bead’s weight. For many situations, that presentation can be more effective than the beaded alternative, not just a cheaper substitute for it. The Airflo Tactical Polyleader is the most versatile entry point — built on Airflo’s PVC-free polyurethane construction, it tapers like a fly line rather than a level sink tip, turning over large flies and weighted rigs cleanly without the hinge point that undermines stiffer mono sink tips. Loop-on attachment converts a floating line to a sink tip in seconds across multiple sink rates — from slow intermediate for just below the surface through fast sinking for deeper runs. The RIO Sinking Trout VersiLeader provides the same functionality in RIO’s construction — a pre-tapered, loop-on system available in multiple sink rates specifically calibrated for trout water. For anglers who want a more precise density selection, the Scientific Anglers Sonar Leader is available in five densities — float, hover, intermediate, sink 3, and sink 6 — on a 25-lb mono core in 7-foot and 10-foot lengths. The 10-foot Sink 6 in particular gets a lightly weighted fly into deep runs that would otherwise require a heavy tungsten bead to reach. For streamer applications where a full sink tip is the right tool — deep runs, steelhead water, lake fishing for predators — the Scientific Anglers Frequency Sink Tip Type III puts a fast-sinking 10-foot tip on a floating running line, keeping the line controllable and liftable while getting the fly into the two-to-four foot depth range. The RIO Elite Predator takes this further for warmwater and predator applications — a three-density system (floating rear, hover section, intermediate tip) that holds flies in the top two to three feet of the water column without needing the fly itself to carry significant weight. The practical point: before adding weight to a fly to get it deeper, consider whether a polyleader swap achieves the same result with a fly that moves better in the water. In many situations it does — and the presentation improvement is not incidental. The technique adjustments that change the equation entirely The Last Cast Life post makes the point that tungsten became a substitute for casting and line management skill in some corners of the sport — and it’s worth sitting with. A tuck cast, a longer dead drift, better mending upstream to control belly and extend sink time — these are skills that put flies in the strike zone without any change in material. Techniques worth developing alongside the material review: The tuck cast — a deliberately driven stop on the forward cast that drives the fly down into the water rather than laying it on the surface. Creates immediate sink and is particularly effective in pocket water where the drift window is short. Upstream mending — reduces drag, extends drift time, and creates more sink time for lighter flies. A well-mended drift with a brass-beaded fly can often fish the same depth as a poorly managed drift with tungsten. Spare patterns without beads — an unweighted soft hackle, a sparse emerger, or a simple wet fly worked on a downstream swing covers water that a heavily beaded nymph fishes past. Trout feeding in the upper water column or just below the film are not caught on tungsten-heavy patterns regardless of how well the cast is made. Brass vs tungsten beads: sink rate, depth, and when to use each Read more In Praise of Sink-Tip Fly Lines Read more Where tungsten earns its place (and price) None of this is an argument for removing tungsten from the bench. It is an argument for using it where it genuinely outperforms the alternatives: fast, deep water where the trout are holding at the bottom and the fly needs to arrive quickly and stay there through a short drift window. That’s a real and common fishing situation and tungsten is the correct answer to it. The practical habit worth building: before reaching for a tungsten bead, ask whether the water and the presentation actually require it.  Our brass vs tungsten beads guide maps the water type and pattern type decisions in detail. The full beads, eyes, and weighting range at J. Stockard covers everything from glass beads for surface work through lead wire and dumbbell eyes for deep, fast water.

There are fly anglers who find the sport and quietly make it their own. And then there are people like Jessica Suvak — who find the sport and immediately start building something with it. Born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio, Jess came up as a college athlete competing in volleyball and track before pivoting to ultra running post-graduation. She logged countless miles in the Rocky River Metroparks, where her house sat a quarter mile from the trailhead and — as fate would have it — a stone's throw from her first lake-run rainbow trout run. In her younger years she ran across the Salar de Uyuni salt flats in Bolivia and climbed to altitude in the Andes Mountains. These days, she jokes that she traded ultramarathons for fishing and good drinks. Her fly fishing journey began at Orvis Westlake, where instructors Steve Brugger and Jimmy Mucci lit what quickly became a lifelong obsession. From there, Jess didn't just get into the sport — she built the scaffolding around it. She founded Green Girl, an Ohio-based outdoor group dedicated to getting more women outside. She co-founded Ohio Women on the Fly alongside Katie Johnstone, growing it from a small Facebook page into a full 501(c)(3) nonprofit running clinics, entomology courses, tying nights, and trips spanning Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Virginia, Michigan, Cuba, and beyond. She was instrumental in the first Women's Musky Trip with Virginia Trophy Guides. She's worked with brands including Scientific Anglers, Fulling Mill, Orvis, NRS, and Benchmade. She helped build educational programs with the Cleveland Museum of Natural History Trout Club under the mentorship of the legendary Jerry Darkes, and did community work with Ohio Backcountry Hunters and Anglers. In 2024, Jess packed up and moved to Bozeman, Montana with her fiancé Drew. Missing the community she'd built back home, she started Girl Talk Live — a twice-monthly Instagram Live show that pairs real-time fly tying with honest conversation, spotlighting women in the sport who don't always get a seat at the table. The show took off quickly, earning her a feature in Flylords Mag's Women on the Water series and a growing audience that keeps tuning in for the community as much as the tying. We sat down with Jess to talk fly tying philosophy, the move from warm-water predators to Montana trout, what it actually takes to build community in this sport — and the accidental fly that became a personal legend. You can also check out her version of Brendan Ruch's Nut Job pattern here — a great pre-spawn tie for smallmouth and pike that's worth having in your box this time of year. You came to fly fishing from ultra running and climbing. What actually hooked you?I was already deep into the outdoors when I spotted some guys fly fishing while I was out on a training run. I was starting to burn out on running, and it just looked like another incredible way to be outside. I took my first course at Orvis Westlake with Steve Brugger and Jimmy Mucci, and that was it. I was gone. Not long after, I met Katie Johnstone and we realized we were basically the only two women in our area trying to figure this thing out. So we decided to build something around it, and Ohio Women on the Fly was born.You cut your teeth on lake-run fish and toothy critters — how's the transition to trout fishing in Montana been?Smallmouth, pike, and musky are my absolute favorites, so coming out West, I actually had a tough time catching trout. I'm like, I'm confident that there's fish there — but if they don't want the streamer, I'll find new fish. Back home I was a diehard streamer angler. Out here, I'm getting softer with my age. It's hard to deny that these fish want to eat little bugs. They don't always want to work super hard for it.I've been nymphing more just to get used to where the fish are sitting. But now that I've been at it a bit longer and I know the water better, I'm getting back to streamer mode. And I'll say this — there's a big hungry brown out there somewhere that's just waiting for my fly to come past its face. I know it.You're also starting to explore dry fly fishing more. How's that going for someone who loves throwing big meat?I always joke that's why I'm probably not a great dry fly angler yet — I'm just not a delicate human. I wanna slap a huge fly down on the water. But the art of those tiny patterns is genuinely beautiful, and I'm getting more into it. My partner grew up doing a lot of dry fly fishing in New York and Vermont, so we'll be out on the boat together and it becomes this whole fun back-and-forth. It's a new experience for me that I'm really starting to appreciate. It's just as challenging in its own way. One of the gals I fish with out here said she basically just ties dubbing and CDC for her dry flies and she catches more fish on those than anything intricate she spends an hour on. And I'm like — if it works, go for it. That's the whole philosophy, right? Let's talk fly tying. What's your philosophy on it, and why do you do it?At its core, I think fly tying just makes you a better angler. You pay more attention to what the fish are eating — you're flipping rocks, you're looking at everything, you're observing how things swim and what colors are actually in the water. Then you go home and try to mimic it. It's one more step into the sickness of fly fishing. How far down the rabbit hole can you go? Beyond that, it's the best decompression at the end of a long day. Some people sit in front of the TV. I put a record on, sit down at the bench, and tie. It's meditative. And now we have three dogs, so sometimes I just lock myself upstairs and it's like — no sound, nobody bothering me. It's perfect. In Conversation With Tim Flagler Read more Why Your Size 16 Isn't Really a Size 16 Read more A lot of new tyers hit a frustration wall early on. How was that for you? For sure — even just buying all the materials at the start is overwhelming. But you know, mistakes happen, and that's where some of the best stuff comes from. I always tell people in my tying classes: most innovative things started as a mistake. If your fly looks a little funky, still fish it. You might have just invented something. Or you might learn something. Either way, you're not losing. Do you have an example of a happy accident at the bench that actually worked? Oh, absolutely. Way back when I was tying a zonker and ran out of materials — no time to get to the shop, so I just threw in whatever I had. We ended up calling it Dreamboat Annie, after the Heart song, because that's what was playing. Just a zonker-style fly with a wild bead head and the most random rabbit strip colors you can imagine. Fished it the next day and it absolutely crushed. My friends and I still tie it. It's nothing special on paper — but it works, and it has a special place in my heart. Speaking of confidence in flies — do you think that actually matters on the water? One hundred percent. If you're confident in a fly, you fish it harder, better, and it stays in the water longer. A fly in the water catches more fish than one that's not — that's just a fact. When I first got into musky fishing, someone told me: if a musky's hungry enough and you put it in front of its face, it'll eat. So make something you're confident enough to throw all day long. A heavy, waterlogged sock of a fly that I can't cast properly? I'm not confident in it. But give me something lightweight that I can throw all day — I'm making my presentations, I'm dialed in, I'm catching more fish. Confidence in your fly directly affects how you fish it. Tell us about Brendan Ruch's Nut Job. What's the story behind it and what does it fish like? [Editor's note: You can find Brendan Ruch's full Nut Job tying recipe and materials list here. It's tied with Fulling Mill hooks and materials that we carry — details below.] It's basically a cheaper, more accessible version of a leggy streamer — legs, two hooks, and a weighted bead. My biggest pike ever came off a fly mimicking this pattern. It's a great pre-spawn tie for smallmouth and pike, but honestly it crosses over into a lot of fisheries. Brendan, the fly's creator, can tell you more about the design decisions, but the short version is: it's simple, it swims great, and fish eat it. You've transitioned from tying big streamer stuff to trout patterns. Does the skillset transfer? Some of it absolutely does — understanding movement, materials, profile, proportion. But sitting down to tie a size 18 nymph after years of five-inch predator flies is genuinely humbling. I remember sitting down one day and thinking, what do trout actually eat? I had to do real research — looking at what local tiers were doing, studying the hatches. The principles carry over, but you scale everything way down and you have to retrain your hands and your patience. I still find myself tying one nymph and immediately wanting to switch to something more interesting. Talk to us about community building — you've dedicated a serious amount of energy to it. My whole life I was in team sports, through college and beyond, and when I graduated I suddenly missed that sense of being part of something. I started a group called Green Girl before fly fishing was even in the picture — just an outdoor recreation group to get more women outside in Ohio. The lifelong friendships that came out of that alone were insane. Women who are now going out solo, planning their own trips, hosting events years later. Then I met Katie Johnstone, we both got into fly fishing at the same time, and we were basically the only two women in our circle trying to figure it out. So we started a Facebook page and organized meetups at Mohican State Park — it's a beautiful spot, stocked river, easy access, safe for everyone. It just grew and grew. Watching people from that community go on to become guides and work at fly shops — that's the whole point, right there. Here's what I always say: people think community building is so much work, and it is, but it's also the minimum amount of work for the return you get. With Girl Talk Live, I'm giving an hour a month to feature a woman who doesn't always get the spotlight in this industry — and it's making a real difference. One hour. That's it. The impact is disproportionate to the effort, and I think that's underestimated by a lot of people. What is Girl Talk Live, and where can people find it? Girl Talk Live is an Instagram Live show I host once or twice a month, typically on Monday evenings around 6pm Mountain Time. Each guest picks a time around her schedule, so it varies a little, but I'm pretty transparent about when things are happening — just follow @girltalk_live and you'll know. The format is simple: I bring on a woman from somewhere in the fly fishing world — a guide, a tier, someone doing interesting things in her fishery — and we tie flies in real time and just talk. The whole session stays up on the page so you can rewatch it. We're also looking at clips and potentially a YouTube channel down the line. I try to spotlight patterns that don't circulate widely online — guests bring flies from their specific home waters that actually work, and we end up having these great conversations about cross-species applications. A carp fly that would make a killer striper fly. That kind of thing. It keeps it fresh and it keeps people learning. I didn't even know this was going to become something. It started as a way to stay connected with my friends through a Montana winter, and it just kept growing. Flylords Mag picked it up in their Women on the Water series, which was a really cool moment. I'm just riding the wave and seeing where it goes. Final word — any advice for someone sitting on the fence about getting into fly fishing or fly tying? Just go. Reach out to every fly shop, every angler. Reach out to me. The worst anyone can say is no, and then you move to the next person. You're going to look like an idiot sometimes — I do all the time. But you make mistakes, you get better, you make a ton of friends along the way. Know that fly shop owners genuinely want you to walk through the door. We're in an age where people want you in there. So just walk in. Follow Jess on Instagram at @jessicasuvak and catch Girl Talk Live at @girltalk_live, typically twice a month on Monday evenings. Full Nut Job tying recipe and materials here. Jess ties the Nut Job Fly

Caleb Snead of Rambler Angler and Blade Co. breaks down fly tying scissor steel, blade geometry, and which KAI scissor belongs at every level of the bench.