Scott Howell's Prom Dress Fly

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Blue Copper Fuchsia Purple
The Prom Dress Fly
By: Scott Howell
One look at my newest go-to fly, and you’ll see why it is called the Prom Dress.  I simply called it my “secret weapon” until a lady client of mine aptly named it!  The name captured the fly perfectly - it’s big, pouffy, shiny, and the envy of all the flies in my box.  It’s been so effective for me that I’ve kept it under cuff - until now.
You can blame the Prom Dress on the fact that I am an (admitted) recovering gear addict.  Although I grew up in a fly fishing family, I went astray for a period of a my life and was a full-on spin weeny for a number of years.  As a matter a fact, at the age of 16 it got so bad that I thought I actually wanted to join the Bass Tournament Circuit!
Whether I like to admit it or not, I learned a ton about fish as a gear head, and it has helped shape who I am as a fly angler today.  Many of the
techniques and tackle I once used when spinning for steelhead now ties directly into how I currently chase them with the fly. 
 To this very day, when winter rolls around, I feel an urge to pick up a plug rod.  The feel of a big steelhead hammering a plug is addictive.  The only way I  calm the twitching in my right hand is to tie on a large plug-like fly.  For the last couple years, more times than not, that fly is a Prom Dress.

As a recovered gear angler, I now find it interesting that we used to fish subdued-toned plugs for summer steelhead, but as the water cooled and our fresh winter steelhead arrived, we would break out the flash.  Our most productive winter plugs were always metallic in color.  Understandably, many of the proven winter fly patterns are brighter in color and often incorporate flash into their dress but, virtually none fit the description of metallic.  Now looking back on it , it is hard for me to understand why it took me as long as it did to make this connection.  It was finally making that connection that spawned the Prom Dress (PD).

The Prom Dress’s success is due to the fact that it exhibits all the qualities that have proven to entice steelhead on both fly and gear tackle.  The PD is a large life-like silhouette that can be tied in nearly any color to suit all water conditions and fish preferences.  It is finished off with lead eyes to sink the fly deep.  And, most importantly it has lots of movement and FLASH!

Even though most fly anglers have little or no experience fishing terminal tackle for steelhead, there are few who are not aware of how productive gear fishing can be.  Spoon tossers and plug pullers snatch steelhead out of runs behind (or in front) of fly anglers all the time.   After witnessing such accounts, it is very easy to understand why a flashy fly like the PD is so successful.  It doesn’t take much imagination to see the correlation between the shiny action of a spoon and the flashy swimming movement of my go-to fly.

Admittedly, the PD stretches the boundaries of what actually constitutes a “fly”.  I continue to be amused by a story that worked its way through the grapevine back to me.   Unfortunately, some friends of a friend found one of my lost Prom Dresses somewhere on the river.    They were immediately turned off by how obnoxious the fly was.  How I heard the story - one of them said after finding it, “let’s burn it and never speak of it again!”   The fly has been so successful for me, I hope they did just that!

The only true “purest” I know is Lee Spencer.  He has dedicated his life to protecting the steelhead of Steamboat Creek.  Considering the fact Lee fishes strictly dry flies with no point on his hook, we should all accept that we each find our own comfort level within the sport.  I myself have rationalized that my concoction of tinsel, spun goat, and flashabou is as much of a fly as a strip of rabbit fur.   At the same time, I have to admit, one is able to rationalize all sorts of things if it serves them well and is in their best interest.  That is exactly the case with the Prom Dress.  The  PD has done more for my winter steelheading success than anything since I first picked up a two-handed rod.

Over the years, the PD has proven its worth well beyond the realm of just the winter steelhead game.  Some of the anglers that are most displeased that I am now revealing the PD’s secret cover are clients of mine that have taken the fly to the Columbia Basin streams.  Just this fall I had a friend return from his yearly sabbatical on the Salmon River in Idaho.  I will let his words from an e-mail to me do the talking, “The prom dress was the ticket!  Our group caught nearly all of their fish on the PD.  We did well on the copper but the blue crushed them.  Ya heard me right - BLUE!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Stories like this from clients of mine taking this fly outside of my home waters have become the norm.  After hearing so many success stories,  I had to send some to my friends in BC who call the Skeena Valley home.  The PD has since become the staple of their fly arsenal very much the same way it has for me here in Oregon.  It is often the fuchsia color that gets the rave reviews from the mighty rivers to our north.  But, after spending a dozen seasons living on and fishing the Skeena drainage myself, I can testify that the blue and copper can prove equally as deadly.  I had a client report back to me about landing back-to-back 20 pounders on the Babine fishing behind a fellow angler fishing a purple articulated leech.  There’s just something magical about all that flash!

However, it is the stories that make their way back to me from outside the realm of steelheading that proves the PD’s versatility.  It had become a part of my Holiday off-season to tie Prom Dresses for a group of my clients who would chase sea run browns in  Tierra del Fuego each February.  They have gotten to the point that they are just not nearly as confident fishing anything else.  They just had to have them!  Now that Solitude has taken on this pattern, I will not be tying their flies this winter - thank goodness!

But maybe one of the most rewarding stories came from fellow guide, Frans Jansen who I have come to respect as one of this industries true innovators.  Admittedly, he was the mind behind the foam popping bill on my Ska-opper pattern.  Last year, when Frans headed to Canada for his annual Atlantic Salmon trip, he arrived to find the rivers very low and fishing poorly.  The salmon had all gone stale in the pools and were off the bite.  That was at least until they were shown a Prom Dress.  Frans had a single copper PD that I had given him earlier that year. It was while he was out here in Oregon promoting his lodges in South America.  He said the only fly he could get a fish to eat was the fly I gave him.  He returned home a true believer and was already visualizing places in Patagonia where the PD was going to prove useful for him.
Who knows where the Prom Dress will head next.  The potential for this pattern in Alaska is endless.  It has already earned its keep as a killer king salmon pattern but its versatility does not stop there.  Silvers, chums, rainbows, char, steelhead - you name it!  Now that I have settled with my business and family here in Oregon, my traveling days are limited. I will have to wait for others to report back to me with stories from their next adventure with the PD.
Prom Dress, Blue
As a sport, fly fishing is the scientific  exploration of the aquatic world with tools, which deliver information about game fish that no other equipment can render. Often this information is collected and the fish is released with a minimum amount of wear & tear. It survives to possibly be re-examined by someone else.  Even the most experienced anglers are often reluctant to try to explain why anadromous salmonids will strike any fly while in fresh water. Nothing bright blue lives in the water with these fish. Maybe that' the Que. 

Item Description Size Price To Top
PD-BLUE  Prom Dress Fly, Blue 2  3 for $10.50 
 Prom Dress, Copper
It's pretty safe to say that nothing in a bright metallic copper color lives in the rivers with your intended quarry either. Yet, copper colored wobblers are known to be deadly at times, especially in tannin colored water.

Item Description Size Price To Top
PD-COPPER  Prom Dress Fly, Copper   2  3 for $10.50
Prom Dress, Fuchsia
What do they take this thing for, a cloud of blood, a pulsing squid, of some thing in their territory that makes them very angry?  Fact is we have been told by a couple of fly fishers that are in the know, that this is the sleeper color.

Item Description Size Price To Top
PD-FUSCHIA  Prom Dress Fly, Fuchsia   2   3 for $10.50  
Prom Dress, Purple 
When the light levels go dim, there are a great many things under water that turn purple Maybe that is why purple is a such a successful theme in flies, because the color is so familiar.

Item/FONT> Description Size Price TTo Top
PD_PURPLE  Prom Dress Fly, Purple  2  3 for $10.50 

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