The Last Redfish Fly You'll Ever Try

Like many saltwater anglers, my favorite frustration is chasing redfish. Now, I call it a frustration because in many cases it is just that...frustrating. They can be tempermental fish and often times drawing the bite isnt easy, especially in the winter months. Ive spent many of outings being turned down again and agian with no sign of interest in what I am throwing. This got me thinking. I know my presentation is right but for some reason I still have problems. Ive tried all the usual patterns, Shrimps, crabs, baitfish and still...nothing. So I decided to do some research. What were other guys using? What are the reds keying in on? How can I turn that into a pattern of my own? Ive spent the last few outing observing. Walking flats, looking down in the mud and grass, trying to find some evidence of plausible forage. What I found was all but enlightening. I saw tons of shrimp in the grass and plenty of small minnows sunning in the mud, exactly as I expected. So I started asking around. I found one constant in my search, the Clouser minnow. So I tried it. I headed to my favorite flat and found some fish tailing. After careful calculation I began makeing my move. The reds seems to be more interested but I failed to draw the bite. I was closer than I had ever been but was still so far away. Then it hit me. I remeber all the forage that I had seen in prevous outings and I came to the conclusion that I needed to widen my scope. The Clouser is a fantastic baitfish pattern, no one disputes that, but it just wasnt exactly what I was looking for. I needed something similar but different at the same time. I needed a hybrid, something that could be taken as a baitfish OR a shrimp. Thats when I hit the vice running, and thus the Clouser Hybrid was born. Im not nieve enought to think that im the first one to modify the clouser, but i put a twist on it that I have yet to see in tying circles. After tying a few Hybrids up I returned to the flats. Calculated my moves once again and..... BOOM! fish on! For the next serval hours I was getting bit on every presentation, I had unlocked the key to the finicky reds that had caused so many headaches in the past. I was catching fish when everyone else was eye balls deep in their fly boxes. The next sessions yeilded the same result. I was proud, the time, effort and research had paid off. So here I am, writing a blog about this amazing fly, so that you too may have success on your local flat. I have confidence that it will work anywhere and I encourage you to try it out. Check out the FreshSalt YouTube page for the full recipe and tying instructional. Make those redfish pay for their resistance!