When Fish and Game’s executive director and chief law enforcement officer were in North Country Angler, a discussion broke out about the warden’s Worry and the Supervisor flies. To be honest, it had been quite sometime since I had even thought about those two highly effective patterns for trout and salmon.
I decided to go to the bookshelf and reacquaint myself with those patterns. The Warden’s Worry was one of my earliest bucktail streamers that I fished and I tied. Dick Surette had introduced that fly to me.
“Use a sinking line and drag the fly across the bottom of Ledge Pond,” he said. “You will do well there.”
Looking back in Surette’s book, “Trout and Salmon Fly Index,” The Warden’s Worry was developed by Warden Supervisor Joseph Stickney in 1930. Stickney came up with the color combination to imitate large nymphs that crawl along the bottom of north country ponds. It was a favorite of Surette when fishing for trout and salmon once the waters warmed and fish moved into the shallower waters.
The book does not have a mention of the fly the Supervisor.
Back to the bookshelf to the bible of streamer flies. “Streamer Fly Tying & Fishing” by Col. Joe Bates is the undisputed source for all things old school streamers. Col. Bates actually fished with many of the creators of the flies in his book. Joe Stickney was one of those anglers.
The Supervisor was the first streamer fly created by Stickney. He was trying to imitate the smelt, a favorite forage fish for brook trout. The warden did not tie his own flies. Living in Saco, Maine, he would drive up to Portland, Maine, and sit with one of the fly tyers at Percy’s Flies. There he would create and make changes. In 1924, the Supervisor was born.
The original Supervisor did not have a topping of peacock herl. Stickney added this later and the effectiveness of the fly increased exponentially. He liked to dress the fly thinly to give the fly a tight silhouette but was a stickler for having “shoulders” that would move water.
The Supervisor remains a go to fly for all anglers who troll our larger lakes during “ice out.”
Stickney developed a third fly that seems to have disappeared from angler’s consciousness. The Lady Doctor Bucktail was a fly that Stickney created in honor of his wife. She was a doctor in the town of Saco.
This had to be what led to a complicated and beautiful fly. The Lady Doctor Bucktail, surprisingly had no bucktail. The wing was white polar bear hair over which was black bear hair. Excellent choices as these hairs have translucence and are very swimmy in moving water.
The tail is two yellow hackle tips. The tag is gold tinsel. The butt red floss. The body exudes elegance. Yellow floss ribbed with oval gold tinsel and the tinsel in then ribbed with a yellow hackle. Once to the head of the fly, the remainder of the hackle is wound and then tied down as a throat.
Once the bear hair is tied in, the wing is topped with two jungle cock feathers tied side by side half as long as the wing. A shoulder of red breast feather, I use golden pheasant, is the final step. The fly is beautiful as I am sure Doctor Stickney was.
Tie a few of these forgotten flies. They are fun to tie and sure to bring a smile to your face when you hook a trout on this beauty in the spring.
Polar bear hair is no longer available to fly tyers. We use Ice Fur from Hareline as an acceptable substitute.
Steve Angers, a native to the Conway area, is the author of the book “Fly Fishing New Hampshire’s Secret Waters” and operates the North Country Angler.
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