More Saturday-fly-tying and a little more time repopulating one of my favourite trout patterns in preparation for the up and coming trout season; ladies and gentlemen, I give you a truly undisputed heavy-weight fast water pattern, the CDC & Elk.

Next to the Klinkhamer, this pattern seems to be unsinkable on the streams, even in their faster waters, and because of which, this pattern remains one of my firm favourites. So easy to tie, and only consisting of two ingredients, my fly box is stuffed full of them.

CDC & Elks, oh I love them so!

As I’ve mentioned, it’s two ingredients of CDC and Elk (although every fly tier I’ve ever discussed this pattern with (including myself) use deer hair as an alternative to it’s coarser cousin, the elk) present this fly with an almost unsinkable dexterity, a capability required for fishing the small freestone, and tumbling streams I call home. Because of these faster waters, buoyancy is paramount, and the CDC & Elk does this effortlessly straight from the box, and without any addition of floatant. I once heard this pattern described as ‘A lazy man’s dry fly’, and I’d agree slightly.

Eventually, this pattern will become water logged, but I find this tends to be the case due to the fact that it tends to attract so many fish! A quick pinch between amadou, or a dusting of a product such as Frog’s Fanny, and the fly is back in action (although, with that said, the CDC & Elk still manages to pull fish up even when waterlogged and fished in the surface-film or just below it).

As you can see from the below image, the light, extremely floatable body is crammed full of highly mobile CDC fibres and, paired with a pronounced head and deer hair wing, makes for an almost unsinkable, and extremely detailed copy of an adult caddis; a meal which any trout would find hard to ignore…or at least any trout I know.

CDC & Elk

The results…

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