Fishing with the Corixa Bug

The Corixa fly or bug which ever you prefer to call it is also known as the Water Boatman, it is an aquatic bug that paddles along the water surface with oar-like hind legs. This bug lives in fresh water and there is over 500 species known World wide. The water boatmen have a grayish, elongated, oval body, 3 to 12 mm long and  have a conical beak and a broad head with large eyes. The adults have short, flattened front legs; long, slender middle legs; and oar-like hind legs fringed with fine hairs that help them in swimming.

Like all aquatic bugs, water boatmen lack gills; they breathe air when at the surface of the water. They frequently carry an air bubble on their body surface or under their wings, and draw oxygen from this bubble while they are underwater.Water boatmen live most commonly in ponds and along the edges of lakes and eat algae and minute aquatic organisms. 

They can be sometimes confused with back swimmers, which are generally larger bugs that swim upside down.
The Scientific classification of the Water boatmen make up the true bug family Corixidae, suborder Heteroptera, order Hemiptera. During the summer I decided to take a break from my river fishing and headed to a local small lake that holds a nice stock of brown trout, the day was lovely and sunny and I had planned to do some buzzer and dry fly fishing from the bank. Arriving at the venue I took a stroll down the right hand shore and observed several good trout breaking the surface, excited at the thoughts of hooking into one of those beautiful fish I covered them with several different dries but to no avail. The light breeze dispersed and the lake was flat clam it was only then that I say what the trout were feeding on, it was the Water Boatman bug. The fishing was exciting using the limited patterns I had in my box to match the hatch but and i managed to fool a few fish that day. I returned the next day with some more variations of the Corixa that I tied the evening before and had a cracking second day on them taking fish after fish, one being the beautiful hen fish in the picture above. 

I was fishing the two files below on a floating line and retrieving very slow almost fishing the bugs stagnant the bottom bug has a little bit of weight it to drag it through the water. I used the two different weights in the flies to find out at what stage the trout were feeding on the water boatman as it made its way to the surface for oxygen by letting them down on different counts and using different retrieves to present the bug exactly the way the fish wanted it. 
Here are the two bugs that I fished and had great results on them:

Hook: Hends BL200 size 14

Thread: White Grail thread 

Rib: Green Mono

Under body: White foam

Body: White CDC dubbed on

Back:White foam colored in with permanent markers.

Legs: Brown Goose Biots.

Hook: Hends BL200 size 14

Thread: White Grail thread 

Rib: Brown Floss

Under body: Flat lead

Body: White Antron wool

Back: Pearl Scudback Cinnamon 

Body and back is coated in UV resin

Legs: Rubber centipede legs 

Hackle: Squirrel plucked from skin and dubbed on then brushed out well.

Sitting at the bank of a lake and the sun is beaming down with good quality trout on the move and you have the flies to catch them is pretty close to heaven for me. When the trout hit that fly the give it some thump and when you lift into them its an explosion of adrenaline as the fish plays tug and war with your line and fly. Its days like this that we endure the tough days for and the days we look forward to. 

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