I have always been fascinated by the process of designing flies bases onimitating what the fish sees. One of my earliest forays in fly design isbased on this premise. Years of guiding and fishing on my own, taught howmuch trout love that vulnerable stage of insect emergence between nymphand adult. With mayflies, one of the most striking feature is the darkeningof the wing case. A drop of epoxy coating the surface of a dark turkey tailslip and the Poxyback series was born. Trout climbed all over these newnymphs with reckless abandoned. They still do to this day!

– Mike Mercer