The Olive Damsel Marabou

Thumbing through my season of Rainbows journal from 2001 and 2002, I noticed that I used the olive damsel marabou a lot that trout season and with fairly good success. Why I strayed away from the pattern over the years, I simply don't know. It could very well have been that other patterns such as standards like the pheasant tail or hare's ear were working so good, I simply didn't need to fish the damsel marabou. But, I do remember the pattern brought me a lot of enjoyment... so I started tying some more for this coming season.



The damsel marabou can be tied a variety of ways using a variety of hooks. Probably the most popular hook is a standard streamer hook but for the pattern above I used a 3XL Curved Shank hook. The damsel marabou can be tied with beadchain eyes, mono eyes, or black beadhead. Pheasant tail can be used as a wing case or not and legs can be added or not.

I tied up six of the olive damsels and realized it had been some time since I have been fishing. In a recent conversation with Charlie, I told him I believed the damsel would work on the Rock Creek carp so today would be the testing ground for my theory.

Now, the heat index today was 113, so I waited until late to get on the water, and even at that... I didn't stay long.

The olive damsel would hook-up with three carp but all three were lost. Two were lost to break-offs, and the other to a bad tie I made. Anyhow... I guess the carp like the damsel. What give me the idea of using this pattern on carp is my water garden. It's absolutely loaded with damsel's and they are really odd looking creatures. I netted a number of them so I could get a closer look and make notes of some details.

Figure Scotty could use some of these patterns at the One Stop so it's back to the vise for now.

Fly Of The Week

Olive Damsel Marabou




Back around 1999 and 2000, I fished this fly a lot on Blue River and always had good results. Why I've strayed away from this pattern is a mystery to me.

This pattern found itself in the vise quite regularly back then and yes...there were some alterations. When fished, it was always fished with action and motion.

The movement of this fly seems to trigger the reaction of the fish and the fly has to have a good deal of fluidity to it. In other words the fibers need to pulsate.

For a tail, olive mottled turkey marabou was used if available but dyed marabou will also work. The eyes are glass beads that are threaded together with tying thread or monofilament - and mono holds up much better.

For sure it is a more time consuming tie, but once you're finished... there seems to come a special sense of satisfaction with the end result.

Materials needed in tying this pattern include:

Olive mottled turkey marabou
Size 10 -13 long shank streamer hook
Fine gold wire for ribbing
Olive mottled marabou for body dubbing or palmering
Olive mottled marabou fibers for legs and wings
Glass beads for eyes, emerald best color, red and black also work
Olive yarn for thorax
Olive thread