Armored Drake—In Mono

This profile of a green drake mayfly on a fly rod uses shadow and light to give the small details high resolution: veins popping in the forewings and smaller hindwings, the high sheen of its armored abdomen, its robust thorax and delicate tails. Although the drake still has the upright wings and tails of its primordial ancestors, its genus name Ephemera refers to the insect’s transient lifespan. Fly fishing anglers’ obsession with the mayfly is comparable to the Edo-period samurai and the cherry blossom. This drake was a part of the Green Drake hatch on the Henry’s Fork in southeastern Idaho.