Category Archives: Fly Tying

Blogs related to tying flies

Charlie Boy Hopper – 03/02/2016

Charlie Boy Hopper 03/02/2016 Photo Album

Having restored my supply of pool toy hoppers, I turned my attention to another large foam grasshopper pattern, the Charlie boy hopper. I began tying these in 2011 in an attempt to discover a visible yet buoyant replacement for my reliable Letort hoppers. My initial batch was poorly tied, and consequently I did not develop confidence in Charlie boy hoppers. They occupied space in my fly storage bin and did not see much use until late in the 2014 season. I depleted my pool toy supply to a dangerously low level, and quite a bit of hopper season remained, so I substituted one of my largely forgotten Charlie boys. In my mind I was simply using it as a strike indicator.

A Charlie Boy Fresh Off the Vice

All of a sudden I had a hot fly on my hands, and this motivated me to tie up more for 2015. During the past summer and fall I tested the Charlie boy more frequently, and I can report that it is an effective fish catcher primarily in the August and September time frame. In addition it is extremely buoyant, very visible, and can support two beadhead nymphs in a dry/dropper setup.

Since all my foam materials were arranged on my fly tying countertop, I decided to knock out some new Charlie boys for 2016. They are not difficult to tie, but I dislike working with superglue, and the quick dry adhesive is a critical component of the Charlie boy. My plastic container of Zap-a-Gap was over a year old, and when I attempted to apply it to the first work in process, I was dismayed to discover that it did not adhere. Fortunately I bought Jane a small vial of superglue as a stocking stuffer for Christmas, so I searched for and found it. I suppose I should feel guilty about giving myself a gift, but it remains available for Jane to use should she have a need. At any rate I discovered that the new brand applied easier to the foam, and this greatly improved my attitude about tying Charlie boy hoppers.

A Clump of New Charlie Boys

Once a tier gets over the superglue paranoia, the fly is actually an easy, straightforward tie with fewer materials and far fewer steps than a pool toy. A hook, thread, two pieces of foam, rubber legs and deer hair are all that is required to make a fairly realistic fly that floats well and contains the key triggering characteristics of a grasshopper struggling to escape from the current of a stream. 3/0 thread is recommended to allow increased pressure when snugging down the deer hair wing.

Zoomed In on the Leaders

Over the last two seasons I concluded that the Charlie boy and pool toy perform best in the late summer and early autumn season. This makes perfect sense, since this is when the large land bound natural hoppers are most prevalent, and the dense population of adults increases the likelihood of an errant flight path that results in a water landing. I have concluded that the yellow Letort hopper produces fish in the early season, as it is most likely taken for a golden stonefly. The Charlie boy and pool toy are not strong imitations of a stonefly even if they were tied with yellow bodies.

One Charlie Boy, Three Looks

As a result of my new affinity for the Charlie boy, I churned out ten new size ten versions and stashed them in my boat box. I made all of them with tan foam since I have not met with success using any other color. I have a few leftover yellow and green models from my earlier efforts should the need arise. Bring on the hopper season and dry/dropper fishing.

Pool Toy Hopper – 02/28/2016

Pool Toy Hopper 02/28/2016 Photo Album

Three prior posts on this blog thoroughly documented my introduction to the pool toy hopper as well as the evolution of my experience with this fly. If the reader clicks on the link in the previous sentence, he or she will encounter two additional links to access previous posts.

A New Pool Toy

Yikes Up Close

Not much has changed with this fly. It remains a large visible buoyant terrestrial that I select when I wish to fish a dry/dropper arrangement. I particularly appreciate its buoyancy when I elect to fish two trailing nymphs as it continues to bob along on the surface despite the weighty attachments. Occasionally a fish will fall for the large hopper imitation, but most of the time the pool toy hopper serves as a sophisticated strike indicator.

Fish View

One locale where I experienced decent success with the pool toy is on the North Fork of the White River as well as the South Fork of the same drainage. This September pool toy success story seemed to repeat itself on each of my trips to the Flattops. Also it seems that large foam hopper patterns reach their peak effectiveness in August and September, and this probably makes sense since this is when the majority of large juicy grasshoppers get blown into the rivers and streams.

Twelve Tan Pool Toys

I often choose a pool toy earlier in the season when fish refuse my Chernobyl ant pattern. I get easily frustrated when fish rise to my top fly and reject it, and this circumstance usually coincides with trout totally ignoring my trailing nymph droppers. In this situation I am more interested in a buoyant indicator that will not attract attention, and the pool toy serves this purpose.

Four Views

Unlike previous winter tying sessions, I settled on a standard combination for my pool toy hoppers in 2016. I made ten with tan and medium olive foam, and I settled on olive barred sexilegs from Montana Fly Company for the legs. I did vary from my established pattern to produce two versions with a pink top foam layer. These should be extra visible under difficult lighting situations.

Chernobyl Ant – 02/24/2016

A Size 8 Chernobyl Ant

Chernobyl Ant 02/24/2016 Photo Album

If I created a hall of fame filled with the most productive flies, the Chernobyl ant would hold an honored position at the top of the list. I documented much of my history with this fly on previous posts, and the reader is encouraged to click on the below links to learn why I revere this foam terrestrial/attractor.

Chernobyl Ant – 02/01/2011

Chernobyl Ant – 02/13/2014

Chernobyl Ant – 01/06/2015

Underside

When I performed an inventory of my Chernobyl ants a few weeks ago, I discovered 23 size 10 versions in my bins and boat box. I was satisfied that this quantity was sufficient for the upcoming season; however, I counted only two large size eight imitations. During 2015 I often utilized two beadhead droppers from my Chernobyl ants, and the size 10’s tended to ride very low in the surface film as a result of the weight of two flies. I decided to go big for the new season, and I tied fifteen new size eight foam ants. These larger flies should be much more visible, and they will probably do a superior job of floating a double nymph dry/dropper configuration.

Creeping Down

I learned during the late summer and fall season that trout began refusing the Chernboyl ant. For some reason the fish seemed to get more discriminating in their choice of surface terrestrials as the season progressed. In response to these snubbings, I experimented with substituting a Jake’s gulp beetle, and I was pleased to discover that the smaller terrestrial was quite effective. The Chernobyl allows me to spot fish and also to determine that they are looking to the surface for their food supply. The more realistic and smaller Jake’s beetle enables me to close the deal when fish are more selective.

Ten New Size 8 Chernoyl Ants

The only significant change to my Chernobyl ant tying approach is the usage of a Tiemco 5262 or equivalent hook. The heavier weight of this hook serves as a keel for the large foam ant, and this causes the fly to land right side up nearly all the time. I learned this trick from Jake Chutz, the designer of Jake’s gulp beetle. I tied all of the new size eight Chernobyl ants on the heavier 5262 hook.

 

San Juan Worm – 02/15/2016

San Juan Worm 02/15/2016 Photo Album

Fishing with worms is woven into the fabric of my fishing existence. I have fond memories of my brother and I trailing my dad with a coffee can and picking worms from the rich black soil as he turned over sod and dirt with his garden spade. We accumulated enough garden worms to fulfill our fishing needs during the early season in Pennsylvania, and they were always very effective in April and early May.

As the season advanced my father and brother and I would visit my grandfather at his house near Boyertown after a heavy rain storm. My heartbeat literally pounded against my chest from the adrenaline rush that resulted when we gathered coffee cans and flashlights and charged into Pop Pop’s back yard. Here we discovered fat juicy nightcrawlers sprawled along all the flower beds and in my grandfather’s large vegetable garden. I am sure the worms were also present in the grass, but it was much easier to spot them in bare soil. Brother Jim and I took turns executing the messy task of picking the nightcrawlers. It took some practice, but fairly quickly we learned to recognize which end was the head, and once this extremity was identified, a very quick gooey snap was necessary to pinch and slowly extract the retreating worm. Collecting nightcrawlers was an exciting nighttime adventure.

When I began fly fishing in Pennsylvania in my early thirties, it took some time before I became proficient enough to catch fish on a regular basis. I trusted my worm drifting skills and knew that the tried and true methodology produced success. Fishing with flies however was largely an unproven technique. With this view of the efficacy of flies compared to worms, I formulated a compromise strategy. I knotted a bait hook to the end of my tapered leader and then impaled a worm to my hook. I added a split shot and lobbed this fly fishing/bait hybrid configuration to all the likely holding spots, and this method landed a decent amount of fish. I liked the feel of playing a fish on the long rod, and being able to pick up line and toss to the next hole was more efficient than reeling up line using a spinning reel.

Wapsi Flesh Ultra Chenille

The next step in my fly fishing evolution was our move to Colorado. Shortly after I arrived in 1990 I began to investigate the rivers and streams along the Front Range as well as more distant destinations. It did not take long for me to discover that the closest river to my home near Castle Rock was the South Platte, and fortunately the area downstream from Deckers was a premier trout fishery. I began to make frequent forays to this beautiful stretch of river, and in an effort to accelerate success, I also read as much as I could about the gold medal tailwater fishery. The books and magazine articles that I studied repeatedly mentioned San Juan worms, pheasant tail nymphs and RS2’s. Naturally I accepted this advice willingly and began to add these flies to my fly boxes.

24 Finished San Juan Worms

These were the halcyon days of the South Platte River in the Deckers area, and I can remember numerous visits when large brown trout and rainbow trout chomped on tan, flesh and chocolate brown San Juan worms. The most fortuitous aspect of this discovery was the ease with which I could generate a dozen San Juan worms. All that was required to produce a San Juan worm was a hook, a spool of thread and a section of ultra chenille. Meanwhile the South Platte River trout seemed to relish San Juan worms in April and May more than any other time of the year. These months coincided with elevated releases from Cheesman Dam in response to snow melt descending from the Rocky Mountains. The elevated flows scoured the river banks and flushed natural worms into the South Platte, so the hungry trout gorged on the delectable morsels, and my simple ultra chenille imitations represented a close approximation.

Blend of Old and New Flesh Chenille

Unfortunately the South Platte River was greatly impacted by the Hayman Fire in 2002 and remains a shadow of its status in the 1990’s. For this reason I fish there infrequently, but I discovered that San Juan worms continue to tempt trout in many other western waterways. The worm pattern is particularly effective during high murky water conditions, and for this reason I decided to replenish my dwindling supply. I possessed a small remnant strand of flesh colored ultra chenille, and my efforts to locate replacement material were thwarted last winter. Undeterred I once again embarked on a search, and on a trip to Charlie’s Fly Box I was elated to discover a skein of Wapsi flesh ultra chenille. This was a close match to my remaining sample so I purchased a spool. I produced ten flesh worms, five tan, five red, and four bright pink; and I am now prepared to tempt trout during spring conditions with an array of tasty worms.

 

Slumpbuster – 02/05/2016

Slumpbuster 02/05/2016 Photo Album

Once again I visited the North Platte River below Grey Reef in 2015, but as a result of other commitments, my friend Steve Supple and I were forced to make the journey in mid-April rather than the end of March. We had excellent fishing, but it was not as spectacular as our previous visits during the end of March. The end of March trips coincided with the annual flush period, when the water managers released large slugs of water from the dam to simulate run off. This action washed aquatic worms from the banks and stirred the sediments on the stream bottom making eggs and leeches available to the hungry trout.

The flows in mid-April were stable but high, and we enjoyed most of our success on egg imitations and blue winged olive nymph replicas. Unlike our visit in 2014 we did not employ pine squirrel leeches to any extent. After the success of 2014, I tied ten natural pine squirrel leeches, and I was prepared to experiment with them. Although the leeches were not utilized on the North Platte River, they did produce positive results on two other early season outings.

A Natural Slumpbuster

The first pine squirrel leech success story unfolded on March 28 when I fished the Eagle River between Wolcott and the town of Eagle. I was quite pleased to land two trout in cold early season conditions on my conehead natural pine squirrel leech.

The second situation where the pine squirrel leech produced excellent results was the morning that my son, Dan, and I spent on the Tuckasegee River in western North Carolina. In this instance we had no idea what to present to the trout in a tailwater that we never before fished. By some stroke of luck I tied a pine squirrel leech to my line and began to catch fish at a fairly frequent pace. I shared one of my flies with Dan, and he also discovered that the North Carolina fish favored a natural leech. Dan and I landed fourteen trout in 3.5 hours of fishing, and all succumbed to the pine squirrel leech except for two that favored a salvation nymph. Needless to say I was quite impressed with the performance of the heretofore seldom used leech on waters distant from Colorado.

Olive Slumpbuster

Since I completed most of my production tying of nymphs and dry flies, I decided it was time to address my diminished quantity of pine squirrel leeches. Only two or three remained in my boat box, and they were the versions that did not contain a conehead. Prior to my trip to the southeastern United States I tied some streamers for my friend David Luther. David and Becky hosted me for several days in eastern Tennessee, and David guided me on some fine local streams, so I manufactured some streamers as gifts. I knew from prior fishing trips with David that he loves to fish streamers. One of the streamers that I researched and produced for him was called the Slumpbuster, a John Barr design.

A Clump of Slumpbusters and Olive Pine Squirrel Zonkers

When I tied these simple streamers, I realized that they are effectively dressed up pine squirrel leeches. The main ingredient is pine squirrel leech zonkers, but they also have a gold braided mylar body. The pine squirrel leech is simply a zonker strip lashed to the hook shank covered with thread. In a bit of a gamble, I decided to tie slumpbusters instead of pine squirrel leeches. I used up my natural pine squirrel zonkers to make one size 8 and two size 6 slumpbusters, and then I produced another seventeen versions using pine squirrel strips dyed dark olive. The quantity was split between size six and size eight. I am very excited to test out these new streamers that take advantage of the soft undulating characteristics of pine squirrel fur.

Olive in Foreground Is the Best

Parachute Ant – 02/03/2016

Parachute Ant 02/03/2016 Photo Album

It has been several years since I replenished my parachute ant supply, so I was not surprised when I performed a quick inventory and discovered 5-10 size eighteens in my fly bins. In addition to a dwindling supply, I was not pleased with the quality of my ties from two or three years ago. For these reasons I jumped into parachute ant production over the last couple weeks of January.

A Bright Green Joins Pink

I do not utilize ant imitations frequently, but I would not want to venture onto a stream anywhere without an ample supply in my fly box. I have discovered that a black size eighteen parachute ant covers nearly all ant scenarios, It is small enough to mimic naturals, yet with a highly visible wing post I can follow it reasonably well in poor light and riffled currents. The parachute hackle causes the fly to land upright and to ride low in the surface film like a natural ant, and in the rare occasion where flying ants predominate, the wing serves its purpose.

Nine of Ten New Parachute Ants

Over my many years of fly fishing I have discovered two main situations where an ant ends up on my line. The first is during blustery days, and these are more frequent than one would desire in the western half of the United States. I have vivid memories of days on the upper Colorado River near Parshall when I was not having much success with a dry/dropper or a single dry fly presentation. Periodic gusts of wind caused a brief flurry of rises, and I reassessed my approach only to guess that the wind was blowing terrestrials into the river. I swapped my subsurface beadhead nymph for a parachute ant behind a large visible foam attractor that enabled me to follow the small terrestrial. This ploy yielded several fifteen inch brown trout that sipped the low riding parachute. Trout seem to have a strong craving for terrestrials and especially ants. The scene that I described on the Colorado River has transpired on other streams, and my success is probably only limited by my inclination to test other flies before resorting to an ant.

Zoomed on Green

The second application of a parachute ant is the fussy fish situation. We have all been there. We sight a fish sipping something from the surface film in a fairly consistent rhythm. In my case I abandon my usual “three casts and move on” style of fishing, and I dwell on a sighted riser. I generally cycle through a series of fly changes in an attempt to dupe the selective fish in front of me. The menu usually includes a mayfly and caddis. If neither of these fool the reluctant fish, I default to a parachute ant. There are few experiences in fly fishing more rewarding than duping a difficult fish after numerous fly changes with a tiny parachute ant riding flush in the film. These scenes remain permanently etched in my memory bank.

Orange Wings

During the latter stages of January I churned out twenty parachute ants. They are all exact size eighteen replicas with varying wing colors. I made ten with a bright pink wing, five contain a bright green wing, and five more present an orange wing. Hopefully these will cover the many varied lighting situations I encounter in the upcoming season. All my parachute ants are tied using the detailed tying steps that I learned from Tom Baltz at the Fly Fishing Show in 2012. Tom’s method assures an excellent visible wing post and symmetrical hackle while maintaining the all important narrow waist of a natural ant. Check out my black parachute ant – 01/11/2012 post to follow the documented steps and the recipe for these valuable assets in my fly fishing arsenal.

20 Parachute Ants

Yellow Sally – 02/02/2016

Yellow Sally 02/02/2016 Photo Album

The yellow sally is a small stonefly that is fairly abundant on Colorado rivers and streams. Yellow sallies overlap with pale morning duns, green drakes and caddis on many freestone rivers; and the aforementioned insects tend to hatch in denser quantities. For this reason I opt for mayfly and caddis imitations more frequently than yellow sallies. It does seem, however, that the yellow sally hatch endures longer into the hot days of August, and it is during these times that I knot a small yellow down wing fly to  my line.

Tilted

I have experimented with various versions of yellow sally imitations including A.K. Best’s design with a yellow quill body and a yellow hackle tip wing. A couple winters ago I also whipped out some prototypes without hackle that utilized snowshoe rabbit foot hair as an under wing. None of these deviations seemed to outperform the basic style that mimics the deer hair caddis in a yellow color, so I decided to produce more of the old reliable.

16 Yellow Sallies and Materials

During late January I positioned myself at the vice and cranked out sixteen additional yellow sallies. Eight were size 16 and an additional eight were size 14. For four of the size 14 versions I used green thread and began the abdomen with a small amount of bright green dubbing. I have seen some larger yellow sallies with a light green hue in the late July time frame, so the size 14’s are intended to cover the likelihood of encountering light green sallies in the future.

Close Up of Yellow Sallies

Deer Hair Caddis – 01/30/2016

Deer Hair Caddis Olive Hares Ear 01/30/2016 Photo Album

Deer Hair Caddis Light Gray 01/30/2016 Photo Album

A size 16 deer hair caddis is one of my workhorse flies. In my previous post I described the experience that led to tying some size 18’s, and this was a deviation from my normal winter tying regimen.

Now that I completed the size 18 project, I refocused on the size 16’s that have faithfully served my needs since my earliest days of fly fishing. Generally I limit my color choices for the body to light gray and dark olive hares ear. I abide by the theory that caddis adults are on the water for a very short amount of time, and the fish recognize only a dark or light body.

Facing Each Other

I counted my stock of each color and determined that I had roughly 25 carry overs of each. In February 2015 I tied a batch of deer hair caddis, but they were all refurbished flies. I concluded that it was time to tie a fresh batch of ten dark olive and ten gray for the upcoming season. By tying them from scratch I assured myself that they would be relatively  consistent.

Ten Size 16 Deer Hair Caddis with Olive Brown Bodies

One of the most desirable developments in the realm of hackled flies is the availability of size 16 saddle hackles. I pulled out two Whiting 100 size 16 grizzly hackles, and these two feathers provided enough material to produce twenty deer hair caddis. As described in the size 18 deer hair caddis post, I tie these small caddis in a very sparse manner. I keep the abdomen relatively narrow; the deer hair wing does not flare more than a quarter inch beyond the hook; and three turns of hackle suffice for the collar. If I want a bushy look for prospecting and fishing frothy water, I opt for one of my stimulators. If I am matching a caddis hatch or prospecting smooth water, I knot a deer hair caddis on my line.

Close Up of Light Gray Caddis

Deer Hair Caddis Size 18 – 01/26/2016

Deer Hair Caddis Size18 01/26/2016 Photo Album

During a fishing outing on the Frying Pan River on September 15, 2015, I encountered some small caddis that provoked sporadic rises. As I did not carry size eighteen caddis imitations in my front pack, I was frustrated in my attempts to dupe the wily inhabitants of the tailwater below Reudi Reservoir. While on the river I resolved to tie some size 18 deer hair caddis during the off season in case I faced a similar situation in the future. Over the last couple weeks I honored my pledge, and I tied twenty-three with various body colors. I also experimented with a tan deer hair wing and a darker gray wing. I recall that the caddis fluttering above the river were tan, but I never caught any so that I could inspect the body color or wing color more closely.

Dark Olive

The deer hair caddis has been a mainstay for me since my earliest days of flyfishing in Pennsylvania. I tie elk hair caddis as well, but I possess a large array of natural deer hair patches that display many colors. I feel that these subtle shades imitate the natural caddis found along the streams. I also prefer a very sparse tie in the smaller sizes such as 16, and for this reason I applied the same style to my size 18 additions. If I want a high riding fluttering appearance, I generally opt for a stimulator, as it features the palmered hackle over the abdomen. When the trout are locked into smaller sizes along the edge of the river, and they reject the fully hackled stimulator, I knot a sparse deer hair caddis to my line, and in many instances it works quite well.

Dark Olive and Mustard

The sparse tie consists of only three materials besides the hook and thread. First I dub a body, and next I tie in a deer hair wing. The last step is to attach a neck hackle of the appropriate size, and then complete with three or four turns and whip finish. The hardest part of this fly is preventing the deer hair wing from rolling around the hook shank To avoid this pitfall, I make sure to have a solid thread base in front of the abdomen. In addition I like to add a dab of head cement to the thread base. Pinch an appropriate sized bundle of deer hair at the tie down point in front of the abdomen, and make one loose wrap followed by a second wrap. Once the second wrap is in place slowly cinch the thread down with strong pressure. Maintain a firm grip on the hair bundle and made two or three tight wraps forward. Do not worry about trapping some stray hairs between these wraps as it only serves to secure the deer hair, and the stray fibers will be removed by an angled cut.

23 of Various Colors

I produced twenty plus size 18 deer hair caddis, and hopefully this will allow me to avoid the situation that frustrated me on September 15 on the Frying Pan River. Spring cannot come soon enough.

Stimulators – 01/25/2016

Red Stimulator 12/27/2015 Photo Album

Olive Stimulator 12/27/2015 Photo Album

Black Peacock Stimulator 12/30/2015 Photo Album

Yellow Stimulator 01/02/2016 Photo Album

Yellow Stimulator Size 14 01/03/2016 Photo Album

Size 16 Stimulators 01/10/2016 Photo Album

During 2014 I experienced several superb outings when stimulators proved to be extremely productive flies. The most memorable was our trip to Idaho, and the stimulator was highly attractive to the cutthroat trout in the small tributary streams of the South Fork of the Snake River.

Red Stimulator

In 2015 I continued to opt for stimulators with various body colors, and once again they proved to be worthy occupants of my fly box. I seem to recall better results on stimulators in the early summer time period when run off subsided to levels that accommodated dry fly fishing. The large heavily hackled attractors might also excel during the summer and fall, but I probably do not give them the playing time on the end of my line that they deserve.

Zoomed

In preparation for the 2016 season I hunkered down at my vice during the latter part of December and early January and manufactured 20 plus stimulators. My favorite body colors are red, olive, black peacock, yellow, gray and tan. I split my production fairly evenly between size 14 and size 16; however, I tied these buoyant flies on 3XL hooks.

Countertop View

For the size 14 yellow versions I made some modifications in order to match the golden stoneflies that I observed along the Conejos River in July. These bugs approximated the size 14 3XL hook size, but they displayed traces of orange at the tip of the abdomen and in other areas. To mimic this color nuance, I tied a small orange section at the tip of the abdomen and also used orange thread and orange dubbing under the collar hackle. I omitted the palmered hackle over the abdomen on all of these flies, and for half of them I used the Letort hopper technique which translates to no hackle whatsoever. I purposely designed these larger flies to ride relatively low in the surface film. Hopefully I will encounter another golden stonefly egg laying event during the upcoming summer, and these new flies will fool an abundance of trout.

Two Styles and Materials