Renowned Fly-Fishing Writer Doug Swisher Passes Away at 94

Legendary fly-fishing writer Doug Swisher passed away September 18 at his home in Corvallis, Montana of natural causes. Swisher grew up in Bay City, Michigan, and began fly fishing at the age of 8. He wrote or co-authored dozens of books and magazine articles on fly fishing and was an esteemed fishing guide for many years. He was listed as was one of the 50 most influential fly anglers in a Fly Fisherman article from 2018 and was a noted caster, fly designer, and angler. 

In 1971, Swisher and friend Carl Richards turned the angling world upside down with the publication of their groundbreaking first book, Selective Trout, which married the science of aquatic entomology to the sport of fly fishing. The book became a best-seller, and remains in print (after several revisions) to this day. It is said to have sold over 200,000 copies.

Selective Trout also introduced a revolutionary fly pattern: the No-hackle, based on the authors’ determination that a fly’s wing and body profiles are the primary triggers that prompt trout to strike. The No-hackle spawned other patterns based on the same minimalist principles, including the Compara-dun and other variants.

Swisher and Richards wrote other acclaimed books, including Fly Fishing Strategy, Stoneflies, and Emergers, all based on the authors’ encyclopedic knowledge of trout stream insects and their behavior, especially from the perspective of the trout. They wrote extensively for Fly Fisherman over more than two decades, including “The Western Green Drake” in July 1971, “Stillborn Duns” in Feb. 1975, and “Methods of Emergence” in Feb. 1991.

Lefty Kreh noted that Swisher was one of the two or three best trout fishermen he had ever fished with.

“His casting has deceived all sorts of difficult trout, under some really tough conditions,” Lefty said in his article “Big Tarpon” that ran in the May/June 1972 article of Fly Fisherman. “Doug is unassuming, eager to learn, and the type of guy who delights in finding new challenges in fishing.” 

He, along with Richards, was inducted into the Catskill Fly Fishing Hall of Fame (CFFHF) in 2011.

“Championed by Joe Brooks in Outdoor Life and drawing upon the works of such legends as Flick, Schwiebert and Marinaro, these two gentlemen went all over the eastern and western US trout streams collecting bugs, taking pictures, classifying their findings and then developing entirely new types of life-like trout flies,” says their entry on the CFFHF website.

Swisher continued to innovate into his 80s by developing special dubbing blends (“Swishers Elite Dubbing”), new fly patterns like the UV "Scorpion" Soft Hackle Streamer, the Strymph, and the Aurarebel, and terminal tackle like his tippet sleeves that were an alternative to crimped-on split shot weights that slid up and down a leader. Tutorials of many of his fly patterns are available on YouTube. 

“Doug Swisher was one of the famous ones in the fly fishing world,” said Bill Kiene of Kiene’s Fly Shop in an online tribute. “His son Randy is carrying on in his father's footsteps. I spent a little time with both of them having been in the fly-fishing industry myself. Doug had a long and amazing life in the outdoors, fly fishing all around the world. He was an author, fly developer, and world-class fly fisher. We are losing many of the great ones now.”

Tributes can be read or left at dalyleachchapel.com/obituary/Doug-Swisher.

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