Blue Dawn Intruder - Jay Nicholas
Author, angler, and fly tying legend Jay Nicholas is well known for his intruder designs. In Flies For Atlantic Salmon & Steelhead, Jay wrote a chapter on intruder fly design that included the history of this pattern category with over 20 images of various intruder patterns.
By large measure, intruders are a radical departure in length and silhouette. The intruder featured in this blog post, a Blue Dawn, is an exquisite original intruder that Jay tied for a deluxe edition of Flies For Atlantic Salmon & Steelhead that included a framed set of 12 flies, each tied by the fields best known fly dressers. Desktop only: Right-click the fly image to open it in a new tab to view the high-resolution version. This feature is not available on mobile.
Jay originally developed the Blue Dawn as a light, lively tube intruder for fishing at modest depths of 1 to 4 feet with floating, intermediate, or Sink-3 tips. It can attract both summer and winter steelhead. He has varied the pattern over the years, and the version shown here is his current favorite. The Blue Dawn is now also included in our ever-expanding Fly Pattern Dictionary.
At just 2.5 inches long, this is a small fly by intruder standards. He considers its sparse dressing especially suited to clear, low water in any season.
For dirty or cold water, he would increase the fly’s overall length to about 3.5 inches by making both the rear and front stages longer and fuller. At the rear, he would add two turns of wide, webby blue-grizzly saddle as the first collar ahead of the dubbing loop. At the front, he would add two turns of black marabou after the schlappen and before the blue hen collar.
He would also extend the wings to 5 cm beyond the back of the tube, using longer, more plentiful ostrich herl and four saddle feathers instead of two. In his view, flies ranging from 2.5 to 3.5 inches cover most steelhead preferences.
Although he prefers the Blue Dawn on a tube for shallow fishing, where it remains light and lively, the pattern can also be tied on a shank. He would choose a shank for deeper or considerably faster runs.
Jay also provided some additional dressing notes.
The Basics
Hook: This fly is fished with size 2, light wire hooks (ring-eye or up-eyed
Thread 8/0 or 6/0 Fl. Pink or Fl. Blue
Tube Pro Sportfisher Classic Fl. Pink or Fl. Blue, Large (3.2 mm)
Disc Ultrasonic Metallic Blue, Medium 9 mm
Body Lagartun Fl. Blue Flat Braid
Dubbing Senyo’s Fusion & Laser Dub
Rear Stage
Leave 5 mm of tube bare
Dubbing Senyo’s Fusion and Laser Dub (Eat A Peach and Fl. Fuchsia)
Kingfisher Blue Hackle (hen or saddle, webby)
Lady Amherst Pheasant Tail Hackle Barbules (Shrimp Pink)
Body/Waist
Lagartun Fl. Blue Flat Braid (preferably a double layer, but doing so will increase the cost to several hundred dollars per fly.
Front Stage
Dubbing Bump—Similar to the bump used in rear stage)
First Collar—Black Schlappen (wide, to middle of body)
Collar Highlights—Fibers from Amherst Pheasant tail, extend to rear end of tube
1st Wing—Black Ostrich Herl (12 fibers extending 20 mm past back of tube)
2nd wing–grizzly saddle feathers, kingfisher blue (20 mm longer than tube)
Shoulder—Jungle Cock Nail Feather (to full first wrap of body (waist)
Front Collar—Black Schlappen (a second feather, forming a collar on the fly)
Flash—Optional (I consider flash as important to anglers, not to steelhead)
Bare tube (after front collar)—This 5 mm of unsupported tube allows me to hold the fly while sliding-on the disc and melting the tube-end to secure it
Disc —Metallic Blue Ultra Sonic Disc
Jay at this vise. He is the author of the books Intruder Essentials (2015) and Advanced Intruder Strategies (2016).