Favorite Flies for Maine: 50 Essential Patterns from Local Experts

By Bob Mallard

Maine offers some of the most diverse angling opportunities in the nation. Depending on the season, or your fishing preference, you can canoe a remote pond in search of native brook trout, cast dries in solitude for rising trout on a large freestone river, troll in a lake for salmon, or search for stripers along some of the most beautiful and rugged coastline in America. Because of this diverse fishing, it is no surprise that Maine also has a rich fly tying tradition. In this book, Maine guide, fly designer, and former fly shop owner Bob Mallard shares with readers 50 essential flies from guides and other experts around the region. Detailed recipes and photos are included for each fly as well as fishing tips and other information, making this book an invaluable resource for anyone planning to visit this state as well as residents that want to learn how to catch more fish in their local waters.

• Language: English
• Publisher: RowmanLittlefield
• Release date: Jan 14, 2022
• ISBN: 9780811770057

Book preview

MAINE

Maine has the unique distinction of being the only state in the contiguous United States bordered by only one state, the equally rural New Hampshire. The other borders are Canada and the Atlantic Ocean, resulting in a level of geographic isolation not found anywhere else on the East Coast.

Maine is by far the largest state in New England, and three times the size of Massachusetts. It has the third-smallest population in New England, however, behind Vermont and Rhode Island. Maine has the lowest population density in New England at just over 60 percent of Vermont’s, roughly one-third of New Hampshire’s, and a mere fraction of the population density of Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island. At less than forty-five people per square mile, it is the twelfth least densely populated state in the nation.

At 5,270 feet above sea level, Mount Katahdin in Baxter State Park is the highest point in Maine. It is also the terminus of the fabled Appalachian Trail. Maine’s mean elevation is just 600 feet, and its lowest point is sea level.

There is one national park in Maine: Acadia. The recently established Katahdin Woods and Waters is Maine’s only national monument. Roughly 40,000 acres of White Mountain National Forest lies within Maine. Allagash Wilderness Waterway is the East’s premier wilderness canoe area, and one of the most remote in the country.

Baxter State Park is the centerpiece of Maine’s state-owned lands, along with Deboullie and Nahmakanta Public Reserved Lands, Debsconeag Lakes Wilderness Area, the recently acquired Cold Stream Forest (where my home waters are located), Seboomook Lake, Bigelow Preserve, and numerous smaller parcels.

Maine’s official state animal is the moose. The state bird is the chickadee. The eastern white pine is the state tree. Maine’s state fish is the landlocked salmon, Salmo solar sebago, named after Sebago Lake in the southern part of the state.

Percival Baxter is Maine’s favorite son. The former governor gave the state its greatest gift, Baxter State Park. The son of a six-term mayor of Portland, he used his influence and money to protect Maine’s signature landmark, Mount Katahdin, in perpetuity. Few private-citizen land donations rival what Mr. Baxter did for Maine.

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Landlocked salmon, S. solar sebago, Maine’s state fish. Karen Talbot art

Roxanne Quimby, the founder of Burt’s Bees, donated the land used to create the new Katahdin Woods and Water National Monument and funds to help run it. She also donated 100 acres of land to Acadia National Park. Ms. Quimby is a philanthropist of nearly unmatched generosity. With the help of her son Lucas St. Clair, she left a legacy that is not yet completely understood or appreciated.

Many early fly fishing and outdoor product manufacturers were founded in Maine, including outdoor giant L.L.Bean. The anchor business of Freeport, one of Maine’s busiest communities and most popular tourist destinations, and one of Maine’s best corporate citizens, it would be tough to imagine Maine without L.L.Bean.

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Baxter State Park, crown jewel of Maine’s public lands.

Canoe manufacturer Old Town was a longtime fixture in Maine. Myriad sporting media featured pictures of green or red Old Town canoes, many of which held wool-clad sportsmen, paddling across a lake or down a stream, poling up a river, or beached at a remote campsite. Few things are as uniquely Maine as an Old Town canoe.

Legendary bamboo rod companies H.L. Leonard Rod Co. and Thomas Rod Company were located in Maine. Their rods were some of the most sought after in their day and are highly collectible today.

Maine was the birthplace of two historic fishing boats: the Rangeley Boat and the Grand Laker. Named after their respective regions, they were designed for use on lakes. The former is rowed and the latter motored. These classic wooden boats are highly collectible.

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The lineup of fly-tying vises from HMH Precision Fly Tying in Biddeford, Maine. HMH Precision Fly Tying photo

On the fly-tying end of things, HMH, manufacturer of fly-tying vises since 1975, is located in Brunswick, Maine. It was a pioneer in tube fly tying. I floated the Kennebec River with then-owner John Albright a decade or so ago.

FLY FISHING IN MAINE

Approximately 14 percent of Maine is covered in water, which is a good thing if you like to fly fish. The state is home to over 6,000 lakes and ponds. The smallest are less than an acre and often unnamed; the largest, Moosehead Lake, is over 75,000 acres. Twelve hundred lakes are said to hold brook trout, approximately 585 of which are formally designated State Heritage Fish waters.

Maine is also home to countless miles of rivers, streams, brooks, and flowages. While commonly used in other parts of the country, the term creek is rarely used in Maine, and when it is, it usually refers to a coastal stream.

Maine’s coastline is nearly 3,500 miles long, the fourth longest in the country. It runs from rocky shore to sandy beaches, and everything in between. There is open ocean, protected bays, isolated coves, extensive flats, and miles of estuaries. Over 4,600 islands of varying sizes lie off the coast of Maine.

Fly Fishing History

Maine’s fly fishing history dates back to the late 1800s, when the construction of railroads to help move timber to the mills opened the state up to tourists from Boston, New York, and other East Coast cities. The trains brought anglers to fabled sporting towns such as Rangeley, Greenville, Grand Lake Stream, Jackman, Millinocket, and Naples.

Sporting camps, hotels, restaurants, and retail stores were built along the railroad lines to serve the swarms of visitors. A robust fishing guide industry followed suit. Driven by stories of giant trout and salmon, the media jumped on the bandwagon, and things took off from there.

Maine was, and still is, home to several private salmon clubs. Established in 1887, the Penobscot Salmon Club in Brewer is believed to be the oldest fishing club in the country. The Veazie Salmon Club and Eddington Salmon Club are located on the Penobscot as well. The now-defunct Dennys River Sportsman’s Club was located in Downeast Maine.

Veazie Dam on the Penobscot River was the most famous Atlantic salmon pool in the United States. Its removal opened up miles of river to federally endangered salmon

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The Atlantic salmon beat at the fabled Dennys River Sportsman’s Club in Downeast Maine.

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The cabins at historic Upper Dam near Rangeley, Maine, birthplace of the Grey Ghost. Diana Mallard photo

and other anadromous fish. The Penobscot is ground zero for Atlantic salmon conservation and recovery, and if it doesn’t happen here, the species will likely be lost in America.

Starting in 1912, the first Atlantic salmon caught in Maine each season was sent to the president of the United States. The first Presidential Salmon went to William Howard Taft, the last, befittingly, to George H. W. Bush, a part-time resident of Maine and avid Atlantic salmon fisherman, in 1992.

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The now-defunct Lower Dam on the Rapid River, once the most recognizable fly fishing landmark in Maine. Diana Mallard photo

Fly Fishing Landmarks

Upper Dam near Rangeley, Maine, was arguably the nation’s first fly fishing landmark. It separates Mooselookmeguntic Lake and Upper Richardson Lake, and was one of the most famous recreational fisheries in the country at one time. Upper Dam is also the birthplace of the fabled Grey Ghost streamer, Carrie Stevens’s best-known fly pattern.

Lower Dam on the Rapid River was long synonymous with fly fishing in Maine. It donned the pages of magazines, books, catalogs, and calendars for decades. Dismantled under the guise of public safety, all that’s left are some pilings, boards, and a streamside plaque.

Fly Fishing Celebrities

Cornelia Fly Rod Crosby was Maine’s first registered guide. A driving force in the movement to register guides, Ms. Crosby was given the honor of receiving the first Maine guide license. She was also a major promoter of Maine’s fish and hunting.

Leon Leonwood Bean was the founder of retail giant L.L.Bean. Originally known for their Bean Boot, their clothing and products are still worn and used by legions of Mainers from Kittery to Fort Kent. I can’t imagine Maine without L.L.Bean.

Arthur R. MacDougall Jr. authored the classic Dud Dean, Maine Guide series of articles and books. His writing was featured in Field & Stream magazine in the 1920s and 1930s. In 2001 his son, Walter M. MacDougall, republished some of his stories in a book called Remembering Dud Dean.

Roscoe Vernon Gadabout Gaddis was one of TV’s first fishing celebrities. He filmed his television show, The Flying Fisherman, on the banks of the Kennebec River in Bingham. The show ran from the early 1950s into the 1970s.

Curt Gowdy, famed sports announcer, Red Sox broadcaster, and host of the ground-breaking American Sportsman outdoor television show, fished in Maine. He is said to have enjoyed fly fishing for landlocked salmon in Grand Lake Stream.

Baseball great and renowned fly fisherman Ted Williams was a friend of Bangor outdoor writing legend Bud Leavitt. The first time they fished together in Maine was for smallmouth bass in a small pond in Washington County.

Lefty Kreh loved fishing in Maine. He came to Maine not for its trout or salmon, but for his favorite species—smallmouth bass—in the Androscoggin, Kennebec, and Sebasticook Rivers. He once told me he considered the latter the finest bass fishery in the country.

Presidents Herbert Hoover, Calvin Coolidge, and Dwight D. Eisenhower fished in Maine. A streamside plaque on the Magalloway River commemorates Eisenhower’s visit.

The Bush family maintains a home in Kennebunkport, where former presidents George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush came to fish for stripers. I once test-cast a bamboo fly rod built for George the elder.

Once while fishing the Roach River, I helped an angler out that turned out to be Maine native and NASCAR driver Ricky Craven. The front page of the local paper that day asked Where’s Ricky? The whole state was looking for him, and I found him.

I once took actor and multiple Academy Award nominee Ed Harris—Apollo 13, The Abyss, The Truman Show—and actress Theresa Russell fly fishing on the Kennebec River. They were in town filming a miniseries called Empire Falls. He visited my shop several times to gear up while staying at nearby Wesserunsett Lake. Before heading back to California, he bought a Winston fly rod, Bauer reel, Simms waders and boots, and a logo Kennebec River reel-on rod case from me.

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Academy Award–nominated actor Ed Harris and actress Theresa Russell fishing the Kennebec River in Solon.

MAINE FISH SPECIES

Maine is home to numerous species of fish including nine salmonids, cusk, white and yellow perch, largemouth and small-mouth bass, crappie, redfin and chain pickerel, pike, muskellunge, carp, striped bass, bluefish, tuna, mackerel, shad, alewife, freshwater and saltwater smelt, sturgeon, America eel, and numerous roughfish and baitfish species. This represents a level of aquatic biodiversity found in few, if any, other states.

Six of the eight species of salmonids found in Maine are native to the state: brook trout, lake trout, landlocked salmon, Arctic charr, Atlantic salmon, and lake whitefish. Cusk, perch, pickerel, and smelt are native as well. Brown trout and rainbow trout are not native to Maine. Splake are a hatchery hybrid, a cross between brook trout and lake trout. Bass, crappie, pike, muskie, and carp are also nonnative.

Maine supports the last runs of federally endangered Atlantic salmon in the country, all of which are propped up by stocking. The Penobscot River is the largest run and critical to the survival of the species. Runs are also found in the Kennebec system, as well as the Machias, East Machias, Narraguagus, Pleasant, and Dennys.

Landlocked salmon, Maine’s state fish, are native to only four lakes in the state: Sebago, Sebec, West Grand, and Green. They have been introduced to several hundred other waters, including many large lakes and a few rivers such as the Kennebago, Magalloway, Rapid, Kennebec, Dead, Moose, Roach, and West Branch Penobscot.

Maine is also home to the last Arctic charr in the contiguous United States. Formally known as blueback and Sunapee trout, they are extant in just twelve lakes and ponds in Maine, several of which have been negatively affected by nonnative fish introductions. Once an afterthought and rarely targeted by anglers, Maine’s Arctic charr have recently become a popular bucket list species.

When it comes to fish, however, the species most often associated with Maine is brook trout. In fact, nothing is even close. Per Maine Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, more anglers target brook trout than any other species of fish. From an economic and recreational standpoint, brook trout are as important to the Maine brand as lobsters, moose, and loons.

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A large male rare Arctic charr from Floods Pond in Maine.

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