Having completed my production tying of proven producers, I began to search through books and saved magazine articles for interesting fly patterns that I could tie and add to my expanding inventory. Several years ago I made some soft hackle emergers from Charlie’s Flybox, and these flies proved to be mainstays in my box and very effective during blue winged olive hatches. Charlie Craven writes a column in Fly Fisherman magazine, and a recent pattern from that source caught my eye. It is called a juju emerger, and it has several materials in common with the soft hackle emerger. Given my success with the soft hackle emerger, I resolved to tie some juju emergers.
Yellow Quill Body Emerger
When I reviewed the material list, I discovered that I was missing one key ingredient – olive superhair. I immediately tried to visualize a replacement material and after a short pause, I remembered the quills that I purchased to make quill body flies as described in A.K.’s Fly Box. Unfortunately these require soaking in water to soften them sufficiently to wrap around a hook. I immediately placed some light yellow and medium olive in a cup of water, but when I attempted to wrap the olive one around the hook shank on my first juju emerger, the surface layer cracked and separated from the base. I was anxious to tie an initial prototype, so I improvised again and sorted through my antron yarn supply until I settled on gold antron. I manufactured my first juju emerger using the prescribed materials and steps in the Fly Fisherman article and ended up with a nice wet fly with a gold antron body. I was reasonably pleased, but I still yearned to tie the pattern using the body materials specified in the Craven recipe.
Brown and Olive Super Hair on These Jujus
The following evening I adjourned to my fly tying area and produced two more juju emergers with quill bodies made from the softened quills in the plastic cup. I liked these better than the dubbed body version, but I remained curious to create the specified emerger with a two-toned super hair body. I made one additional deviation from the Craven pattern on these two flies, and that was the substitution of brown pheasant feather fibers for the microfibbet tails. The pheasant fibers are much easier to tie on, and I’m hopeful the microfibbets are not essential to the effectiveness of the fly.
New Juju Emergers Ready for Action
The next weekend I drove to Charlie’s Flybox store in Old Arvada and purchased olive super hair along with an assortment of other needed fly tying materials. With the missing ingredient now in my possession, I cranked out six more juju emergers, and I am quite excited to give them a try. The CDC tuft and the white flouro fiber topping should be great fish attracting attributes.