Turks Olive Tarantula Fly

About the Turks Olive Tarantula Trout Fly

The Turk’s Olive Tarantula is an exciting hopper-style dry fly and muddler attractor, combining a buoyant deer-hair style head with long rubber legs for extra movement. Its olive colouring gives it a natural, versatile profile, while the leggy silhouette creates plenty of life when fished in a ripple, twitched across the surface or pulled through the waves.

Originally successful for brown trout on Highland lochs, the Turk’s Olive Tarantula has since become a useful pattern for stillwaters throughout the UK. It is equally at home on lochs, reservoirs, lakes and slow river pools, especially when trout are looking up for terrestrials, hoppers, sedges or wind-blown surface food. Fish4Flies lists it for Dams & Reservoirs, Rivers & Streams and Still Water, with Scotland given as the country of origin.

This is a lively, confidence-building fly for anglers who like to cover water. Fished dry, it can wake, skate or sit high in broken water; pulled harder, it becomes a disturbance pattern capable of drawing aggressive takes.

Fishing Tips:

ish the Turk’s Olive Tarantula on a floating line, either static, twitched or pulled through a ripple. In calmer water, allow it to sit before adding the occasional small twitch; the rubber legs will move with very little effort and can tempt trout that are cruising just below the surface.

On busier water, use it more aggressively. The combination of a muddler-style head and mobile legs makes this pattern very effective when pulled through waves as a wake fly, and it can also be fished just below the surface when trout are chasing.

The wider Turck/Turk Tarantula style is associated with buoyant, leggy attractor flies that can be dead-drifted, twitched, skated or pulled under.

• Best for: Brown trout and rainbow trout
• Imitates: Hopper, terrestrial, sedge, wake fly or general surface attractor
• Best conditions: Highland lochs, rippled stillwaters, windy banks, wave and broken water
• Fishing style: Fished dry, twitched, skated, waked or pulled subsurface
• Key feature: Rubber legs for added movement

Country of origin for this trout fly: Scotland

This trout fly is designed to be fished on Dams & Reservoirs, Rivers & Streams, Still Water