1. Troutnut Forum
›
2. Fly Fishing
›
3. BWO Color

Hi Jason: Being that the bottom side of a BWO is a medium to light olive in color, why do people tend tie them in dark olive or even gray? The fish only see the bottom. Just wondering.

BWO colors really run the gamut, because they can belong to several dozen different mayfly species. Some are light and some are darker.

Patterns do seem to be a bit on the dark side. This might have something to do with the common name. People think "olive" should be the shade of a green olive, which is too dark for a lot of the species. Then the patterns get even darker when they're wet.

The effect might seem a little worse when you look at the pictures on this site, because I photograph mayflies under really bright light to show the hues and patterns well. Under normal conditions they'll look a bit darker than they appear in my photos.

A guide that I have always respected for his fly fishing knowledge, a Montana Guide who guided on the Missouri River, and a trib, the Smith river, Neal Streaks, wrote that his effective dry for BWO's was a gray bodied Parachute Adams. He didn't feel a need to match the exact body color.

Goose,
In fishing many of the same streams as you I have found that fly rite #10 is a very good color for the early baetids, while something leaning more to the gray end of the spectrum is more suitable for the big summer BWO's (cornutas I believe). Although the ones I examined most recently were almost the same dun color as the wing.
JW