Walk into any fly shop and take a look at the streamer bins. What you’ll find is a conglomeration of double articulated meat flies, meant to fool the river’s top predators, but that was not always the case. Up until the 2000s, anglers relied on classics like the Mickey Finn, Grey Ghost, Muddler Minnow, and Woolly Bugger. These tried and true patterns had been around for decades and had no doubt caught some big trout.
In the last 20 years, these timeless patterns have been brushed aside for bigger and flashier patterns. But where and why did this shift come from? While streamer fishing is synonymous with big Western trout rivers, the revolution started in the Midwest. Michigan’s Upper Peninsula is where it all began.
Michigan’s UP
Streamer fishing as we know it today largely originated in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. The rivers in this region hold some truly giant brown trout. With that also comes waters strewn with log jams, stemming from logging efforts in the late 1800s. Nymphing on many of these rivers is not an option, and when there are no dry fly hatches, streamer fishing is the go-to technique. The streamer fishing game rose out of necessity thanks to the minds of legendary anglers and fly tyers Kelly Galloup and Bob Linsenman.
Modern Streamer Revolution
The modern streamer revolution kicked off when Kelly Galloup and Bob Linsenman released Modern Streamers for Trophy Trout in 1999. This book outlined the patterns and techniques needed to effectively fish streamers for big trout. But long before they released the book, the two refined these techniques on the fabled waters of Michigan. Kelly Galloup would frequently dive the rivers, learned where trophy trout held and how they behaved. They paired this with revolutionary new flies like the Zoo Cougar, Kiwi Muddler, and Butt Monkey—patterns much larger than the classics like the Woolly Bugger and Grey Ghost.
The book was a success, and in large part, the rest was history. Anglers took these tips and techniques to their home waters and started hunting rather than hoping for giant trout. Sink tips and sinking fly lines became the norm, and the old school style of swinging streamers began to phase out. Soon after, Galloup moved to the Maddison Valley and started the Slide Inn, a shop synonymous with streamer fishing.
Streamer Fishing Today
Walk into any fly shop today, and you’ll find bins full of articulated streamer patterns, like the Sex Dungeon (another Galloup Pattern). In the years following Modern Streamers for Trophy Trout, other tyers took these teachings and continued to develop new patterns that would fool big trout.
These days, streamer fishing is almost exclusively done with sinking lines and large flies. It’s a proven technique that has been refined on Western Rivers over the past 20 years. But, without the technical rivers over the Midwest and Galloup’s and Linesenman’s work, who knows where streamer fishing would be today?
