My preferred method of fishing is backcountry fishing.  As a general rule backcountry fish tend to be dumber they see fewer flies and are more willing to take an artificial then fish that receive a lot of pressure.  They maintain their true natural predatory instincts while the pressured fish have had their's dulled over time by negative reinforcement from their lips being ripped by too many hooks. Backcountry fishing also differs from normal fly fishing because you usually field strip your fly boxes so save weight in the pack.  A small box with a select group of flies you hope will do the job.  As the years go on your box becomes more and more honed to flies you will use. The closer the season becomes the more I realize I have to hit the vise and get some flies tied. 

I love fishing top water flies to high country trout so the majority of my flies I take into the backcountry are dries. The number one fly I have to have in the high country is a hopper pattern.  For some reason greenback cutthroats are genetically engineered to need to eat these when they see them.  One of my favorites to use has been the hopper juans a wide range of sizes are needed.  You want to match the size of the hoppers they may be seeing usually pretty small but larger sizes get noticed and usually taken.  I do use a few other hopper patterns so experimental personal patterns and some bought patterns.  A good tutorial site for tying the hopper juan is http://hopperjuan.blogspot.com/2009/05/hopper-juan-tying-steps.html.



The next fly that is on my need to tie list because I currently only have one left in my, are stimulators.  I tie these flies with and without legs in a variety of colors.  These are about the buggiest looking non bugs I use since they really don't resemble anything but sort of a lot of different flies.  I have never met a brook trout that doesn't like a stimulator and they attack them fiercely. A good site on tying a stimulator is http://www.hatchesmagazine.com/page/month/345.



Black ants are the next fly that are a must have in my box.  I tie them with and without wings.  I don't use a commercially available pattern but one I tie based off a fly I saw on a Swedish website.  To me it looks more like a real ant then a lot of ant patterns and floats very well, but can be sunk if need be.  This is the pattern I am currently tying, I have finished the ones for the auction and now working one ones for my box. 



Probably my most productive when the flies listed above do not work is a Matt's midge.  Matt's Midge was introduced to me by Jim Wallach one time on the river.  Great small midge pattern for those tiny midge hatches. I tie this pattern in 20-24, you can go smaller if you want it but 24 are about as small as I go.  I also add a paraloop to this fly so it sits lower in the film, I don't know if the fish care or not but I like it better.  A good site for the matt’s midge is http://info.bluequillangler.com/blog/bid/56514/Pat-Dorseys-Hot-Fly-February-2011-Matts-Midge-Adult.



My last dry fly are caddis patterns, I carry 3 or 4 different dry fly patterns and a couple nymph patterns.   I usually have a traditional elk hair caddis, a black foam caddis, and a dancing caddis patterns in my box.  For nymphs I like the Shark's Caddis Larva or bead head caddis larva.  Caddis flies are a standard across the Rockies and you should already have your favorite, all these pattern tutorials can be found on Google or YouTube, so I won't provide links for these.



My favorite subsurface fly is the scud, I only have one pattern I currently tie for these and it's a swimming shrimp pattern.  Scuds are as curved when they swim like most scud flies on the mark are.  They straighten out so my scuds are elongated to match this.  Lakes that have a high scud count usually have bigger fish which are pickier so you need a good scud pattern.   The best one I found commercially is the swimming shrimp from Allen Brother's flies, which is the pattern I mimic when I tie.  I also love Herman deGala's scuds but haven't mastered tying them yet.   I am going to be mixing the two patterns to see if I can come up with a killer high country scud this year.  Scuds are last on my list to tie because of this reasoning.


Lastly my box contains a random collection of midges, mostly thread body midges in red or black.  I don't fish midges very often in the back country and usually only tie them on when the fishing gets tough and I have to many rejections.  Then a hopper dropper setup seems to work well by bringing in the fish with the dry and appealing to their more cautious nature with the nymph or other dropper.  Besides plain thread bodies I do carry some zebra midges, rojo midges, jujus, and bubble back midges, they are midges after all and don't take up much room in the fly box.



OK, one more lastly... I very rarely throw them and they usually are not in my box unless it's a 3 day or more trip.  But streamers in white, green, and black also work in the high country.  Usually you do not catch a lot of fish on them but when you do they are pretty healthy fish.  I make note simply for that reason and a few of my friends love streamers and would give me static if I didn't include them, because they do work in the high country as well. 



Make sure you're ready!