FishingEnthusiast.com October Freshwater Fly of the Month
Bivisible Badger
This month's Fly of the Month was chosen after reading through FlyAngler.com's piece compiled by Deanna Birkholm about the nostalgia that comes from older fly tying patterns. The bivisible is a classic fly that was introduced by Edward Hewitt in 1926 in his book, "Telling on the Trout". It has remained a standard attractor fly through the years either mimicing a skating caddis or a midge cluster.
The Bivisible was developed to use two contrasting colors. The darker colors are more readily visible to the trout while the contrast of the light against dark colors allowed the flyfishermen to see the fly on the water more easily. The use of palmering the hackle over the body is a old technique going back perhaps to the 1700's. Mr. Hewitt presented the first Bivisible as a Brown Hackle body with a White hackle wisp at the head. This pattern has been recognized as the Brown Bivisible.
Others used different combinations of hackles. Mr. Charles Merrill of Detroit, MI is credited with the Badger Bivisible sometime in the 1930's and Hank Wilson, a guide on the White River in Arkansas is credited with the Bulbous Bivisible in the late 1970's.
In his A Trout and Salmon Fisherman for Seventy-Five Years, 1948. Mr. Hewitt, in mentioning a few flies that are the most taking, includes:
"The Brown Bivisible with the white wisp at its head, which I myself introduced, although palmer flies somewhat similar had been in use for many years in England. The white wisp enables the angler to see the fly readily, hence the name I gave it - Bivisible because I can see it and the trout can see it. The fly in various sizes is certainly the most universally useful fly we have, and is perhaps more fished now than any other dry fly. Palmer flies are made in various colors and are called Bivisibles in tackle stores, but this is incorrect. The true Bivisible is brown, with a white wisp of feather at its head."
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