Tube: 1/2 - 1 inch plastic tube.
Thread: Black.
Tail: Golden pheasant tippets.
Body: Inch worm green Sunrise Floss I-strand.
Body hackle: Any light coloured cock (preferably brown).
Rib: Silver wire, tie a couple of turns under the tail to lift it.
Wing: Bundle of deer hair, Elk Hair Caddis style.
Head: Black.

It’s foreign, it’s ugly, but it certainly has the X-factor when it comes to Norwegian salmon and sea trout in low flows and warm water.

The Salmon Skater skates across the surface of the slow currents you find across the middle and tails of summer pools. It’s very exciting. You constantly have to mend your floating line downstream to cause the fly to produce a tiny ‘vee’ wake as it crosses the flow. And then, suddenly ...

For the past two years this has been the medicine for Norwegian rivers like the Orkla, Driva and many other smaller rivers of the north.

The fly is constructed on a short, plastic tube. Despite its size, it makes considerable wake and is still light enough to allow the fly to skate well. The style of wing is as with an Elk Hair Caddis which again helps it to skate and it also creates a good silhouette.

It is best employed in the early morning for salmon and at night on a fairly short line for sea trout. To make it float even higher, add some grease. The fly was entered into the 2007 'X-factor Fly' competition run by FF&FT magazine. It sparked the following comments:

Judge’s comments
The skated fly is a territory into which British game anglers rarely venture. However, when I think about it, all my (admittedly, limited) experiments on salmon and sea trout – Dee, Annan, Berridale – have often evoked positive response. So why shouldn’t such an approach work in Britain? This pattern has the design to scratch through the surface with confidence, and I like the plastic tube mount which reminds me of Derek Knowles’ Yellow Dolly. This was a also a deer-hair based lightweight tube and it had a remarkable history of catching salmon on northern Scottish rivers. The Muddler often takes salmon too, but I wonder if there’s a commercial opening for the Salmon Skater?
Mark Bowler – Editor

As I have said before in this series, before a fly has a chance at catching a fish, it must first catch a fly fisher! I like the idea of a fly that skates across the water - a very exciting way to fish - but there are other flies out there that I would want to tie on before I tried the Salmo Skater simply because they appeal to me more and that would give me added confidence. The idea of a mini tube skater is not new and we sell quite a few, but perhaps because of the short squat shape I find them unattractive and find myself looking for alternatives. I have no doubt that it has produced, and will continue to produce results, but to me it simply doesn't have 'style'. From a commercial standpoint, the simplicity means it would be easy and cheap to tie in bulk, but that isn't a serious consideration in commercial fly dressing, particularly if sales are not expected to be up to much, which I think would be the case with this fly.
Barry Unwin – Fly Manufacturer

Super Pupa meets Mini Muddler. Traditionally, fly-fishing for salmon means fishing blind; our wet flies sink out of sight, tempting fish to take. The first we know about it is a pluck or pull.
Skaters add the thrill of watching and waiting for fish to swirl and take – probably the most exciting form of salmon fishing – this fly makes me think of clear, low water and grilse.
When tying, for this type of fly I’d avoid lined tubes; they tend to be too fat. The tubing used for lining the inside of tube-flies works well, as does the newer plastic tube used for Scandinavian type flies (several makes now available from Veniard, Guideline etc.)

Plastic tube bends while tying: tube vices which grip the end of the tube are all but useless so mount the tube on a needle which runs all the way through.
Magnus Angus
– Ex-commercial Fly Dresser