Dry or Wet. That is the question?

[WRector]

After having trading PMs with someone I will leave anonymous for purposes of the poll, he brought up the fact that most of the time he preferred nymphing/wetfly over any other type of fly fishing.  I on the other hand prefer dry, but given the opportunity to catch fish will switch back and forth in order to adapt to the fish's preferences throughout the day.  Was wondering what others thought about the subject?

[flatlander]

Dry flies...upstream presentations only...in my my tweed coat and tie. 

[Z-Man]

Dry, upstream, to rising trout only, with Tweed coat, tie, and mirschaum pipe.

[benflyfishn]

Mostly down and dirty with a stick of dynamite. 0--0  I like catching fish I can't see, and I seem to catch more fish nymphing. And no I do not use an egg pattern.
But will go to the top when they are sipping, and depending on conditions and river I fish too.

[tbird4]

Whatever it takes I catch more when I can't see them, just trying to drift the seams, it is fun to watch them rise to your fly though.

[WRector]

...in my my tweed coat and tie. 

Haha!  Now that would be a sight.... 

But reminds me of the story Paul tells at the dinner table in a River Runs Through It "I met the president...  Yes the president...  He was in Dakota, fly-fishing... Fly-fishing in a suit and tie, white gloves and patent-leather shoes.  l asked him. l went right up to him. I said, "Excuse me, sir.  Can you tell me what they're biting on?"  He says, "The end of my line."  Then some of the locals came over, tied on a fly the size of a chicken.  Ol' Cal, he heaves it out there.  Figured if he can't catch a trout,  he'll scare one to death."  Got to be one of the greatest movies ever made, for the fly fisher anyways.   

Back to the poll.  There is nothing better than seeing a trout slowly cruise up from the depths of a deep pool trying to decide as he rises whether or not he is going to sip the fly.  I would say it is a poetic act, but one that I will most likely not ever be able to describe.  Of course, you also get those days when you have 3 or 4 jump out of the water competing for the fly that you just ever so gently set right on top of there heads.  Those days are just fun  ;hb

[jkilday4]

All good to me.

Dries: Hard to beat the keyed-up, focused aspect of sight-fishing to trout taking on the surface.  Figuring out the fly to offer, calmly delivering the required presentation skill, & having to count 'one-mississippi' pre-hookset (not 'God save the queen' round here please) ... very rewarding.

Wet: I love feeding slack through top part of a seam & then giving a soft hackle a good strip/thump when it gets lower & starts to swing.  I like the normally aggressive takes.  And there's a likening to dry-fly fishing when you see lots of head-tail rises to something just below the slack surface and you swing a small flymph in the zone for the take.  Nymphs are always good to go to when I'm struggling to get on the board, hungover, lazy, it's a slow day or when I want to try to go for a bigger fish that may be laying low.

Streamers of course on high/muddy water or at night..love also seeing a fish chase a streamer in the bottom of a deep slow-moving run.

Wait a minute...why was 'live minnow' not on the poll list??

[flytire]

with approximately 90% of the food is underwater (so it has been said, not my claim) i'd say the nymphs, streamers etc have a good chance of hooking trout. but i do like dry fly fishing!

[teachrtec]

I would have to save the most of my fish are on nymphs in a years time. There are windows in the year that a hatch just gotta be fished dry. Hard to nymph thru a mayfly hatch or a dark caddis blizzard.

[Red-Ass]

The hell with all the fancy flies, I prefer just to use some old fashioned CORN! ;hb

[ohiooutdoorsman]

I would say a soft hackle. Almost always have one on my line, whether it be greased line swing, below a dry as a dropper, as the trailer on my nymphing rig, or searching new water.

Fish are almost never NOT biting on soft hackles, even if they are keying in on something else, at least on the smaller freestoners I fish.

[glassfisher]

Dry flies...upstream presentations only...in my my tweed coat and tie. 

You can keep all that fancy crap, I'd rather throw on the rubba hippers, an ol nascar t-shirt, squeeze in a big fat dip of cope and tie on my fay-ver-ite ra-pala! 

Git er dun! 

Is that better Al?   

[troutphisher]

What are dry fly's?

[5xTippett]

I would rather catch one a foam beetle I tied myself.  However, I have to confess that River Man has corrupted me and this time of the year I am throwing one of his his secret weapons that he taught me to tie.  It is a nymph that I use as a dropper behind a dry fly so I can at least pretend that I am fishing like a gentleman.  Half the time you can find me on the bank trying to untangle the dropper.

[Woolly Bugger]

Half the time you can find me on the bank trying to untangle the dropper.

I spend a lot of time doing that too -- split shot -- nymph -- dropper rig