The Top 5 All-Time Best Fly Pattern Names

Okay, so the Woolly Bugger didn\’t make the cut, but it really is one of the better fly names!

When it comes to fly tying, I think some guys have more fun naming their creations than actually catching fish on them. Flip through a book of fly patterns and you’ll see what I mean.

Inspiration for fly names comes from many places. Some patterns seem to be a bit autobiographical (Mormon Girl, Purple Joe, The Professor) others may pay homage to a particular body of water (Skykomish Sunrise, Madison Madman)or even various physiological features of the fairer sex (Cleavage, Buns of Steel). Some names are violent (Kilchis Killer, Siuslaw Slayer, Hatchet) and on it goes.

While there are hundreds of worthy entries out there, here’s our Top 5 List of the Greatest Fly Names Ever…

#1 Winter’s Hope

The chips are down, you’ve been standing in cold drizzle all day without so much as a sniff from the fish…you’re about to pack it in and then you remember one last pattern in your box. They could have named this one “Light at the end of the Tunnel…”

Take a look at the Winter’s Hope

#2 Pie-Eyed Perch

A fancily-tied streamer pattern, this one’s name inspires lots of confidence in the caster — As in, the perch’s eyes just got big because it sees that giant pike that’s about to engulf it.

Take a Look

#3 White Jungle Cock

I kid you not…have a look for yourself HERE (No, this isn’t a porn link!)

#4 Purple Herinator

This guy’s a nice, sparsely dressed steelie pattern that seems to suggest that the bites it solicits are so violent and the fish so big that you may be getting a mesh panel installed in your abdomen after a day of fishing it. Come to think of it, couldn’t we have left the “purple” outta the name? May be a tad too descriptive!

#5 Fat Bastard

I donno why I like this one so much. Maybe it’s the whole white trash meets fly fishing thing. I mean, imagine being on a stream and talking to some super yuppified cat in his $3,000 waders. He asks: “Did you get that fish skating Elk Hair Caddis?”

“Shit no,” you reply, “Caught this dumbass on Fat Bastard…with a couple big split shot and half a nightcrawler. Wanna swig of my PBR and a handful of Flaming Hot Cheetos?”

Here he is Fat Bastard himself!