Category Archives: Fly Tying

Blogs related to tying flies

Clump Dubbing Leech – 02/26/2015

Over my many years of fly fishing I have become fairly proficient at catching fish with dry flies and nymphs, but I never enjoyed much success using streamers. When I joined Instagram, I began to follow fishermen who posted numerous photos of trophy trout of all species that gobbled streamers. These are referred to as meat eaters in the Instagram vernacular. I pledged to commit to streamer fishing more often in 2014, and I managed to land a few fish in the fall, but I would be reluctant to say that I truly committed to the method.

Once again during this off season I reassessed my approach and viewed another avalanche of big fish on the Instagram feed and decided to spend more hours tossing streamer flies. In preparation for my trip to Argentina in December 2013, I bought 5-10 streamers from Royal Gorge Angler, and the predominant pattern among my purchase was a big ugly articulated fly that is called a sculpzilla. Unfortunately during my infrequent forays into the world of streamer chucking I snagged and broke off several of these flies.

Given my new found desire to fish streamers and my depleted supply of flies, I searched for new patterns to add to my fly box. The pine squirrel leech was an obvious starting point, but I hoped to create more variety. I flipped through my Scott Sanchez book and spotted a fly named the clump dubbing leech. The fly recipe called for a rabbit strip or marabou tail and clumps of dubbing for the main body. This did not strike me as overly challenging, so I decided to tie one. Since I had a remaining strip of pine squirrel, I elected to substitute that for a strip of rabbit fur. For the body I inherited five clumps of earth toned sculpin wool from my friend Jeff, so I concluded I could use that for the clump dubbing technique.

A Clump Dubbing Leech

I began by threading a large gold bead to the front of my size 8 hook and then covered the shank with thread. I tied a strip of pine squirrel to the rear of the hook as a tail and clipped off the excess. Next I began adding clumps of sculpin wool to the hook shank. I alternated between gray and tan and worked my way forward. I believe I actually applied larger quantities of wool than required by the pattern, and I ended up with a thick body. After whip finishing the thread tight to the bead, I completed the final step. I grabbed my comb and began forcefully pulling it through the clump dubbing. This process removed a large amount of loose wool, blended the colors together, and created a nice body of fibers that flowed from front to back. Initially I was not pleased with the look of the fly, but with the passing of time it has grown on me. If I tie more clump dubbing leeches, I will try to use smaller clumps and attempt a narrower body profile.

Pine Squirrel Leech – 02/23/2015

Last March my friend Steve Supple and I enjoyed our second annual spring fishing trip to the North Platte River below Grey Reef just west of Casper, WY. Our guide, Greg, rigged us up with the standard rock worm and egg configuration, and we certainly landed a lot of fish on these flies. The North Platte at Grey Reef is an amazing fishery, and given its proximity to Denver, I need to schedule more trips to this excellent river.

Best View

Unlike my rig, Steve began with a pine squirrel leech, and as the morning progressed, he began to land a disproportionate number of hefty rainbow trout on the leech. This circumstance caused Greg to tie one to my 2X tippet, and with this strategic shift, I began to land hard fighting rainbows as well. Needless to say, the pine squirrel leech left a favorable impression on my fishing brain. I am always looking for new productive flies, and the leech certainly jumped to the top of my list.

My Best Cone Head Leech

On Memorial Day weekend Jane and I visited our friends the Gabourys in Eagle, CO, and my friend Dave G. insisted that we could catch fish in the muddy and bloated Brush Creek. Despite his confidence I was not experiencing much success until I tied a pine squirrel leech to my line on the second day. Wham! I landed several fish in very difficult conditions as the dark color and undulating movement proved to be irresistible to hungry trout trying to find refuge from the heavy run-off flows.

A Lineup of Leeches

With these experiences in my mind, I purchased some pine squirrel strips and watched a video on YouTube last weekend. I sat down at my vise and churned out five size eight leeches with red thread heads. The tier on the video insisted that the red head was critical for success on the North Platte, although I do not recall using red head leeches during our March float trip. Once I completed five, I threaded a gold cone head bead on to the hooks and tied five more. For these I wrapped a section of lead around the hook shank behind the bead and then pushed it forward to fill in the vacant space at the back of the cone.

Ten Leeches in the Boat Box

I’m pretty excited to have this new tool in my fly box as I anticipate my assault on the Rocky Mountain trout in 2015.

Deer Hair Caddis – 02/16/2015

Last winter I sorted through my four canisters of damaged and unraveling flies and consolidated all the caddis into one container. As I resumed my off season tying in October, I placed the plastic caddis cylinder on the counter top, and it remained there as I worked my way through nymphs, terrestrials, attractors and mayflies. Last week I completed the green drake inventory, so I dumped the clump of bedraggled caddis on to my magnet.

Damaged and Unraveling Caddis Flies

I separated the flies into four piles by body color, and I discovered peacock, olive hares ear, gray, and light yellow. In excess of forty mostly size 16 flies were arranged on my fly tying counter top, so I began the process of rescuing them from a date with the landfill. I began with the peacock and quickly completed five.

A Neater Head on This One

For the most part the misfit flies exhibited unraveling thread in the head area, possessed cut hackles, or suffered from hair loss. In a few cases I could reattach my thread and simply tie a new whip finish knot to lock up the loose thread, but the prevalent situation called for replacement of the hackle and deer hair wing. In these instances I used my X-Acto knife to slice through the thread head and the hackle tie down point. I simply removed the thread and hackle waste along with any remaining deer hair and reattached my thread in front of the dubbed abdomen.

A Closer Look

I essentially saved forty dubbed hooks, and I was only required to complete the final two steps of the tying process. The resulting finished flies look nearly new, and I transferred five peacock, twenty olive hares ear, ten gray, and five light yellow caddis to my Montana Fly Company boat box. At this point I estimate that I have enough of the various body color caddis to take me through 2015, and I did not have to tie any new versions from beginning to end. Recycling has never been more fun.

A Group of Gray Rehabilitated Deer Hair Caddis

Green Drakes – 02/13/2015

The western green drake hatch has been a roller coaster ride for this avid fisherman. I’ve encountered them on the Big Thompson River, St. Vrain Creek, Roaring River, Clear Creek and South Boulder Creek along the front range in the state of Colorado. One year not long after I moved to Colorado I chanced upon a decent hatch on the Fraser River near Tabernash. In the south central part of the state I was fortunate to meet large green drakes on the upper Conejos River one July. These fish were not the least bit picky, and they smashed my large bushy green drakes with reckless abandon.

Moving west my best green drake experiences have been on the Taylor River and Frying Pan River. I remember one fine day on the Eagle River when I spotted one or two in the air during my lunch break, and I then switched to a green drake imitation and enjoyed a great afternoon attracting fish to the surface.

The most dependable source of green drake activity remains the Frying Pan River. Nearly every afternoon that I visited this reliable tailwater after mid-July resulted in some level of green drake emergence, and this continues into October. I have enjoyed spectacular days when the feisty residents relished my flies like no other, but I have also had days of frustration when large dark olive mayflies blanket the river, and yet my various offerings went ignored. This is the roller coaster ride that I alluded to at the beginning.

The worst scenario is when I have a very successful outing on my last trip to the Frying Pan, and this leads me to believe I solved the puzzle. I make a note of the type of fly that produced success, and when I sit down at my vice during the winter, I churn out five to ten specimens with the misplaced notion that these flies will yield many more days of double digit fish counts. Typically when I return to the Pan and tie on my fresh killer pattern, I experience disappointment. This cycle repeats itself from season to season. Last winter I did some online research and discovered there are two if not three species of western green drakes on the Frying Pan River.

Dark and Light Wing Color

According to my findings, the early green drake is larger in size and darker in color, and a later species is a hook size smaller and possesses a lighter olive body color. Armed with this information, I tied some size 14 comparaduns with a lighter olive body. On my trips to the Frying Pan in 2014 I met with mixed success. During two memorable days I had decent success in the early stages of the hatch, but once the density of adult flies peaked, the fish ignored my offering.

Tissue Background

So what is a fly fisherman and fly tier supposed to do? I’ve reached a point where I tie three different styles of fly in two sizes with two types of abdomen. The three styles are a bushy version that is a heavily hackled Catskill style. This fly is quite buoyant, rides high on the surface and seems to work well when the emerging green drakes create a frenzied commotion as they try to become airborne. I usually tie these flies with a fairly dark olive dubbing and rib with a maroon section of thread. I make these flies mostly in size 12 with a few size 14’s to cover my bases.

The second style is a parachute green drake, and I tie these in both size 12 and 14. These flies have a moose mane tail and white calf tail wing post that I color black, but I keep the tip white for visibility. I wind a dyed olive grizzly parachute hackle around the wing post, and the body is the same color as I described previously for the Catskill style. These flies float quite well and are very visible, and they seem to work quite well early in the hatch. In the two hour period before the expected hatch time I like to prospect with the paradrake because it is quite visible in fast riffles and pockets. If green drakes are present, the fish will generally hammer a paradrake opportunistically.

A Green Drake Comparadun

The final style that I carry in my fly box is a comparadun. I’ve had some superb days with the comparadun style, but mostly the smaller size 14 3XL version. I make these flies with a splayed microfibbet tail, and I use three fibers on each side. These stiff tailing materials serve as outriggers to keep the large comparadun afloat. I tie some comparaduns with a very dark wing of coastal deer hair, but I also arm myself with several that utilize a lighter charcoal coastal deer hair wing. For the body I make some with the medium olive/maroon ribbed combination, and then I supplement these with a sampling with olive antron yarn and no rib. Several of my best days developed when I tied the antron yarn size 14 comparadun to my hook.

Green Drake Comparaduns with Antron and No Rib

I am sure the reader’s head is spinning my now, but at least you understand the complex nature of finding success on the Frying Pan River during a western green drake hatch. Of course I have not even mentioned the simultaneous hatch of red quills, pale morning duns and blue wing olives. What are the chances of selecting the correct fly during these frenzied feeding orgies on the Frying Pan River? It is fun to continue attempt to solve the puzzle, so I have tied a bunch of the above versions, and I anxiously await the opportunity to continue the experiment in the outdoor lab.

Cinnamon Comparadun – 02/01/2015

Every once in a while something occurs that feeds my penchant to horde and stockpile flies. I’m perpetually reading articles about traveling light, carrying only a minimal supply of flies, and preparing fly boxes for the season of the year and the stream being fished thus leaving behind the excess flies that rarely come into play. Unfortunately my personality imposes a level of thoroughness to everything that I do that dictates that I carry four or five fly boxes just in case some rare event comes that causes me to dig deep. One of the small fly boxes that I always have with me contains flies that I tied for my trips to Pennsylvania even though I fish in Colorado rivers and streams most of the time.

On a trip to the Frying Pan River in September 2013 with my friend Jeff Shafer, I observed some pale morning duns that had a light olive and maroon body. The combination of these two colors yielded a hue close to cinnamon. The fish were feeding actively on these flies, but the pale morning comparaduns that I normally use with great success were generating only refusals. My favorite PMD fly is a size 16 light gray comparadun. Besides not being a close match from a color perspective, it also was a size larger than the mayflies on the water.

A Nice Close Up

I systematically began rummaging through my fly boxes and eventually came upon the Pennsylvania box. There along the edge I spotted a size 18 comparadun that was tied with a  blend of light olive and maroon dubbing. I recalled tying these fifteen years earlier after a trip to the Dolores River in southwestern Colorado. I tied this fly on to my line and experienced an exceptionally fast paced hour and a half of hot action as the Frying Pan trout slurped my antique comparadun.

Cinnamon Comparaduns

I purchased some cinnamon dubbing the next winter and produced 5-10 cinnamon comparaduns in case I visited the Frying Pan River again during 2014. On several occasions during the summer when I encountered pale morning dun hatches I tried the cinnamon comparadun and had reasonable success. During a trip to the Frying Pan River in September, it produced a few fish, but I did not encounter the dense PMD hatches that I expected. In addition, I believe several were in the fly box that I lost while trying to untangle a massive monofilament snarl.

20 Cinnamon Comparaduns

As I moved through my fly bin stocking process during January, I decided to tie twenty new cinnamon comparaduns; fifteen size 18 and five size 16. Hopefully this supply will carry me through another summer season, and I will be prepared for pale morning dun hatches on western rivers.

Charlie Boy Hopper – 01/24/2015

As I mentioned in a recent post on the pool toy, I became reacquainted with the Charlie Boy hopper during 2014. Several winters ago I tied approximately ten in my ongoing quest for an effective imitation of a grasshopper that also floats well, is visible, and supports a size 14 beadhead nymph. The Charlie Boys fulfilled the need for visibility and buoyancy, but I was dissatisfied with their fish catching capabilities.

Fish Eye View

If you read the pool toy post, you will learn that my dwindling pool toy supply caused me to fish a tan Charlie Boy simply as a sophisticated strike indicator, and I was surprised to discover that the old Charlie Boy was in fact a strong attractor. I landed quite a few nice fish that succumbed to the allure of Mr. Charlie, and in fact two of the foam specimens were mauled by a series of teeth cuts.

Three Life-Like Charlie Boys

With this new perspective on the Charlie Boy hopper, I manufactured another ten to replenish the supply that I created in 2012. Hopefully the foam hopper proves to be a lasting winner, and not just a one season flash. Stay tuned.

Accumulating a Bunch

Pool Toy – 01/17/2015

I’ve written several posts on the pool toy hopper imitation, and you can read them at Grillos Pool Toy and Pool Toy 02/14/2014. I’ll avoid being redundant by resuming my commentary where I ended on my post from 2014.

I made another four last winter to put my supply at around fifteen, and I carried three or four along with me on my trip to Argentina, but they never got wet. During the spring, summer and fall season I did indeed cast a pool toy as a top fly in a dry/dropper configuration more frequently than in the previous year. This resulted in a few more success stories, however, I still feel that a Letort hopper or parachute hopper would out fish a pool toy if used a comparable amount of time.

Top View

The pool toy does offer great buoyancy and visibility, thus, it spends more time on my line admittedly as a sophisticated indicator. Because of its ability to remain afloat while a size 14 beadhead nymph is suspended two feet below, the pool toy was used fairly frequently. This resulted in the loss of quite a few flies mainly in situations where a fish grabbed the nymph, and in its valiant efforts to escape broke off both flies.

Yellow Underside

By the end of August my supply of pool toys dwindled to the point that I began opting for a tan Charlie Boy hopper to preserve my few pool toys for September. Guess what happened? I rediscovered the tan Charlie Boy and experienced some hot hopper fishing in September and October on this forgotten fly that was exiled to the end of my fly bin. Days on the Arkansas River and Yampa tailwater stand out as two examples where the tan Charlie Boy yielded numerous good sized fish. In fact, the tan foam bodies became so mangled that I had to replace them.

Zoomed in on Pool Toys

The pool toy was effective enough to merit a decent supply for another season, so I tied thirteen over the last couple of weeks including eight tan, two gray and three yellow. I have approximately 15-20 in inventory, and I’m anxious to continue experimenting with the pool toy in 2015.

Chernobyl Ant – 01/06/2015

Nearly all that I can say about the Chernobyl ant is contained in my three previous posts on this workhorse fly. In my last post which can be accessed using the link above, I mentioned using a new method of tying the foam body that would hopefully eliminate the spinning problem that plagued my ants previously. After using flies constructed in this manner during 2014, I can report that the fold over method does in fact largely eliminate the problem of the foam layer spinning around the hook shank.

Chernobyl Ant Tying Time

The Chernobyl ant continued to be my favorite large buoyant attractor fly during the past season, and I deployed it often in a dry/dropper configuration. I cannot support this statement with statistics, but it did not seem to be as effective as previous seasons. There was a period during the early summer when I was having great success with size 14 stimulators, and then in late summer and early fall the Charlie Boy hopper surprised me with its effectiveness.

Closer Top View

Despite these deviations in performance, I remain an enthusiastic proponent of tying a Chernobyl ant to my line, and I will continue to do so frequently in 2015. For this reason I sat down at my vice over the weekend and churned out 15 new Chernobyl ants. In addition I refurbished three more that resided in my broken fly canister. I cut the black foam strip to a point and then tied the arrow point to the shank of the hook and then folded it over the top. For legs I used primarily barred sexi legs, and I cut them to 1/4 – 1/2 inch in length. I discovered that the longer legs cause the fly to land upside down more often than desired.

Underneath

I’m anxious to toss a Chernobyl ant on flowing water in 2015 because that will mean that milder weather has arrived, and fish are looking toward the surface for their meal.

The Ants Go Marching

Craven Soft Hackle Emerger – 12/29/2014

The Craven soft hackle emerger has risen from an experimental fly to a fly I select ahead of the trusted RS2 during blue winged olive emergence periods. I first tied a batch of these flies during the winter before the 2013 season, and I experienced quite a bit of success with them. Consequently I produced enough to begin 2014 with 50 in my storage bin. As a testimony to their improved status in my selection ranking, I consumed roughly half of my beginning inventory over the past summer, and as a result I decided to tie 26 new soft hackle emergers to bring my stock back to 50 for 2015.

A Completed Craven Soft Hackle

Despite my increased confidence in the soft hackle emerger, I recall several situations where the circumstances seemed perfect for the soft hackle wet fly, yet I was disappointed with the results. During one outing on the South Platte River in Eleven Mile Canyon in April a dense hatch of blue wings evolved, but the soft hackle did not entice the numerous feeding fish to devour my offering. I fished it using a dead drift, but I also imparted movement with numerous line manipulation techniques.

Soft Hackle Emerger Without Bead

I gave these situations some thought and concluded that perhaps I was fishing the soft hackles too deep. Quite a few mayflies were emerging from the surface of the river, but because of the strong wind, they tumbled and skittered across the surface before the trout could respond. Perhaps the trout were tuned into blue winged olive emergers or wind blown cripples just below the surface. My weighted offering may have been drifting beneath the fish’s field of vision.

Another View

For this reason I tied ten new emergers with a tiny nickel bead, and the remainder were tied with no bead. In addition I completed ten on a Tiemco size 20 2457 hook with no bead. These are very small and hopefully will cover situations when the smaller broods of olives hatch on Colorado rivers. If I need to go deep with the emerger pattern, I can always combine it with another larger beadhead nymph as the top fly.

29 Craven Soft Hackle Emergers

Zebra Midge – 12/23/2014

My previous post on the zebra midge largely covers the effectiveness of this diminutive subsurface fly, and I have little to add here in late December 2014.

Black Zebra Midge

I counted 18 in my fly bin, so I decided to tie an additional two to bring my total to 20 as I approach the 2015 fishing season. In addition my supply of dark olive zebra midges dwindled to only a few in my fleece pocket, so I produced an additional three of that variety.

Olive Zebra Midge

How can fish see these tiny morsels as they drift in the large rivers of Colorado? It remains a mystery to me, but I do know that they produce, and I will continue to tie them to my line in likely midge feeding situations.