Martyn White | Thursday, 23 July 2026
I'm organising my boxes for heading to Scotland next week. I'm expecting most of the fishing to be for bass, mullet and coarse fish given the temperatures, but I have put a coastal seatrout box together just in case it cools down -I hope it does because in Japan it's 39 and incredibly humid here today with more of the same forecast.
Anyway, that seatrout box is where I got this week's fly, the mulkkis. I think it Swedish, but it works for sea-run salmonids everywhere. Not just browns in the North Sea and Baltic, North Atlantic char, cherry salmon in Hokkaido, sea run cut throat in North America and (I strongly suspect) all the rest will eat a mulkkis. It's not just that they'll eat it on its own, even when they don't eat it can garner you an eat on a more subdued fly. A neon pink Mulkkis on the dropper will often pull a fish to the cast, it might eat the mulkkis but if you have a little unobtrusive job like maybe a Frede 4 ft away on the point a fish will often eat that instead. Maybe it would have found and eaten the Frede anyway, but an attractor dropper is often the difference between success and failure. Certainly, I'd rather start with one than without most of the time.
An honest look at it tells you one thing, it's a blob pretending to be a shrimp. Unsuccessfully pretending, but pretending nonetheless. AS such, when I tie them I subscribe to the "go big or go home" school of thought there's no sparseness or trimming to shape. I want a block of colour made from densely packed fritz that will displace lots of water as well as offering a strong outline and a bit of fluorescence so the colour pops. To be honest you could just omit the eyes and the wee bit of tail and it'd make no difference, but they seem to make people feel better about the fly.
Here's the dressing:
Hook: Something saltwater suitable- I like the Ahrex trout predator maybe a size 4
Thread: Fluo. pink (gotcha pink) flat waxed nylon
Mouthparts: Fluo. hot pink Rabbit fur
Feelers: Fluo hot pink crystal Flash
Eyes: Black easy shrimp eyes
Body: Fluo. hot pink Cactus chenille (10mm+)
You can tie it in other colours of course, hot orange, chartreuse, white.. anything just make sure it's a strong colour and maybe put a bit of contrast in there.
It's certainly not a fly that everyone is going to like, despite the small concessions, like the eyes, made to the traditionalist's sensibilities. But there's no arguing with its efficacy.