Over the closed season I will be posting a pattern per week for fishing on Irish Loughs. This will include flies for Brown Trout, Seatrout and Salmon. This week's tying is the Octopus, first tyed by Scottish angler Stan Headley for Lough Melvin and a fly that us Irish have adopted over the years, with a range of colours to suit our style of Lough fishing from Clarets to Fiery Brown. There is even a black Octopus with pink and purple tails for Salmon.

When fishing Lough Melvin or the deeps of Lough Mask it always pulls fish. Some of my best fishing on Lough Melvin has been on a variant of the original tying a Picric Octopus. A few seasons back this particular fly caught me 2 Salmon and 7 Sonaghan Trout.

Another variant that has worked well for me is the Fiery Brown Octopus. I originally tyed this pattern for early season on Lough Arrow and the deeps of Lough Mask. This pattern not only works on Brown Trout but also has caught numerous Salmon on Carrowmore, Inagh and Kylemore Lough.