The first question my guide, Curt Hamby, asked when I met him at the South Fork was “What technique are you most comfortable with fishing day-in and day-out?” I told him nymphs. He smiled and pulled out a small box of weighted size 14 Tungsten Pheasant Tails. Aided by strong coffee, he had tied them at 3:30 that morning. With a confident nod that only years of guiding can exude he said “This is the one then.” You could tell there was a lot of goodness wrapped-up in what was otherwise a pretty simple pattern. The remarkable thing was this tiny nymph’s capacity to turn big fish as easily as smaller. Saturday, about mid-afternoon, a deep drift in a side pocket produced the “big pull” which turned out to be the events big fish, 21.25”. We raised 18 fish (8 measurable) on Curt’s Tungsten Pheasant Tail that Sunday. — John Holland