Unique Flies of South Africa: The Good Doctor’s Beetle

South Africa offers unique fly fishing opportunities that have spawned fly designs created by local fly-tyers. In this two-part mini-series George Robey highlights the fly fishermen who have designed flies as unique as the species they target. PART 1: THE GOOD DOCTORS BEETLE Dr. Hans van Zyl may tell you he is lazy, but don’t believe him. His distaste for swapping and re-tying cut-rate, soggy flies does not make him indolent. Instead, the South African fly designer and physician from the sleepy town of Harrismith, harnessed his frustrations to create a superior product, aptly named the Good Doctors Beetle. Dr Hans van Zyl; creator of the "Good Doctors Beetle". The good doc, an early pioneer of fly rodding Yellowfish in South Africa found great success early in his career with commercially tied beetle imitations, but soon became dissatisfied with poor quality and vacuous mimicry to local fauna, so he created a purely African beetle imitation, not overly unique, but designed for durability. Dr. van Zyl began using the new creation in earnest and provided many of them to his fishing cronies. Soon after, he was invited to showcase his beetle at an annual Fly-Fishing Bonanza. Anglers became enamoured with the Good Doctors Beetle and news leaked rapidly into the South African fly-fishing pipeline. A few months after the Bonanza, he received a telephone call from the hosts of a popular South African fly-fishing television show, The WildFly. Crew members were working on deadline and not catching fish. The benevolent doctor outfitted the troupe with Good Doctors Beetles, enabling them to film lots of titillating surface action. Beetle-mania was born. After release of the television show, the demand for Good Doctors Beetles became too great for a busy practitioner, so Dr. van Zyl collaborated with Arno Laubscher, proprietor of the Scientific Fly Company for commercial production and marketing. The fly is now sold commercially throughout southern Africa in a black/purple Dung Beetle style, and a coppery colour to represent the African Maize Beetle. The ubiquitous African Dung Beetle, often called a Roller, due to its habit of rolling dung into a large ball, can be found throughout the country. The dark-coloured beetles have a black, glossy back that sheens purple in the sunlight. The scarabs range in size, from small to quite large. Dung Beetles locate food with a highly developed olfactory system and can fly long distances to locate the tastiest dung piles. Interestingly, the beetles are much better at flying than landing and often fall from the sky like a hailstone - into a campfire, onto a lap or atop the water. Beetles account for 25 percent of all animals living on earth and make up a large part of the terrestrial diet for various fish species, so no doubt that the Good Doctors Beetle catches a wide range of fish throughout Africa. Although the African market primarily targets Yellowfish, the beetle imitation regularly catches other species such as trout and catfish, and even the odd carp.

Unique Flies of South Africa: The Good Doctor’s Beetle

Words & Images: George Robey

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