How to fish a Parachute Adams (and why it still works)

If you could carry only one dry fly, a lot of anglers would pick the Parachute Adams. It doesn't copy any single insect. It looks enough like many of them that trout eat it on almost any river with mayflies.

What the Parachute Adams is

The original Adams was first tied in Michigan in 1922 and named for the angler who first fished it. The parachute version came later. It winds the hackle flat around an upright post instead of around the hook shank.

Its gray body and brown-and-grizzly hackle pass for a Blue Winged Olive, a Callibaetis, a March Brown or a dark caddis. That's why it still catches fish a hundred years later.

Choosing the right size

Size matters more than color. If fish rise all around your fly and ignore it, the fly is usually too big or too small. Catch a natural off the water or check a spider web on the bank, and match its length.

A size #14 is the all-round choice for most summer mayflies and searching riffles, and it's the size in our boxes.

How to rig it

On its own: tie it on a 9-foot leader tapering to 5X or 6X tippet.

As a dry-dropper: tie 18 to 24 inches of tippet to the bend of the Adams' hook and add a small bead-head nymph. The Adams becomes your strike indicator.

How to fish it

The goal is a drag-free drift: the fly should float at exactly the speed of the current, as if it weren't attached to anything.