Umpqua Bionic Ant

"I believe I know you're thinking "this is just a sailor ant". Please know that I realize I'm not the originator of the Sailor Ant. One of the definitions of "bionic" is: Having extraordinary strength, powers, or capabilities; superhuman. The Bionic Ant is a sailor ant with extraordinary Trout attracting powers! While I'm not the inventor of the sailor ant I am the first (that I know of) to add tiny spanflex legs, a watershed treated poly wing and utilize the superchicken capabilities of coachman brown hackle to enhance the pants off of a sailor ant.

The Bionic Ant was created to fill the void between the commonly available huge ant patterns (Chernobyl ants etc…) and tiny ant patterns (fur ant, para–ant etc…). The Bionic Ant is large enough to get noticed and small enough to get devoured. It is very buoyant and visible making it ideal for dry/dropper fishing yet unintimidating to even a super selective Silver Creek Brown.

I've been fishing the Bionic Ant for nearly a decade and it has produced everywhere Trout reside. It even fools the occasional Sunfish or small Bass. Originally it was tied without the watershed treated wing (its latest addition). The wing adds floatability and visibility while giving the fish one more reason to sample this tree tossed terrestrial.

The Bionic Ant aided me (along with the Frenchie fly pattern) in my first World Fly Fishing Championship. While in Portugal in 2006 I collected my first World Championship "session win" (most total cm of fish in 3 hours) on the Alva River. Using the Bionic Ant with a Frenchie suspended below it I took 7 fish on a venue that was blanking most competitors. Those are the kind of things I don't forget!" – Lance Egan