There's a story goes with this fly. I'll try to write it up at some point.

Wondered how my old cat lost its tail.
Tried fishing today. yuck. 32degrees and blowing like mad. temp will drop to around 20 by daybreak tomorrow. it'll soon feel wintry.

My mother told me that one day a cat we had disappeared and that it would soon return. I have been wating more than 50 years, now I know where it went!

Rick N

RE> "Nice Jig Rigged lure. What is the intended target?"

I'm trolling for purists. I love to see them wriggle. :=))

I also like catching larger trout in my local waters. Fly fishermen using tiny midges, nymphs and dry flies catch a few big fish every year. I have too. On small flies. But when you fish more often with streamers (rather than traditional English Gentleman style flies) the percentage of large fish you catch increases dramatically. Streamers don't always work. You do have to recognize the right times: spring and fall are generally better times to fish streamers than high summer, although dawn and dusk to tend to work well with streamers at all times. Bad weather is best. I've caught more large fish on streamers when it was raining or snowing than any other time.

If you add wiggle to the flure, with either a homemade diving lip or a Paddle Tail, your success rate increases yet again. Even small fish will chase a flure that wiggles. Your chances at big fish move up yet again. Paddle tails and diving lips are hard to cast with a fly rod. But not that hard. They definitely have their place in my menagerie of flies.

"Articulated Streamers" is a category that has gained a significant following in last decade and a half or so. Articulated Streamers tend to be traditional streamer patterns tied in two segments that hinge in the middle. They're good stuff but they don't really add that much action. When you strip an articulated streamer back in it turns into an actionless straight line of feathers, fur and fibers.

Paddle tails and diving lips step the action goal up into a different category.

I wrote the following (published in Fly Rod and Reel 1965) in 1984. I got a lot of flak for that article, published 35 years ago. I loved every minute of it. When purists bite I set the hook. Extra hard.

https://montana-riverboats.com/?robopage=Flies/Sandy-Pittendrigh/Articles/Roadkill-streamer.htm

Oh I see.....this is what you used to catch my cat. I bet it would work well along rocky underwater ledges in murky waters for bass and trout.