Category Archives: Fly Tying

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Jake’s Gulp Beetle – 10/22/2015

Jake’s Gulp Beetle 10/22/2015 Photo Album

Jake Chutz is the Sales Manager for Montana Fly Company, and he invited me to join him for a day of fishing on the Elk River near Fernie, BC in August. We floated the river from Hosmer to Fernie on 8/8/2014, and we used a Jake’s gulp beetle nearly the entire time. I landed twenty fish over the course of the day, and all but one or two succumbed to the size 10 foam terrestrial. The west slope cutthroats loved the fake beetle, and quite a few of my landed fish measured fifteen to seventeen inches.

This was my first introduction to Jake’s gulp beetle. My fishing partner, Jake Chutz, was the designer, so he obviously knew it was an effective imitation. During the morning and late afternoon we fished a beetle with a deep purple dubbed body, and during the middle of the day we switched to a version with a red body. Both seemed to produce equally based on my unscientific observation.

A Different Angle

At the end of my trip to British Columbia, Jake allowed me to retain the size 10 gulp beetle with a purple body, so I stuffed it in my front pack. I gave it a try on the East Fork of Brush Creek when I returned to Colorado, but it did not produce any results. I essentially forgot about my gift fly until I visited the Big Thompson River on September 30. The resident trout began to refuse my Chernobyl ant, and I pondered what sort of adjustment to make. Jake’s gulp beetle leaped into my mind, and I knotted my sole size ten to my line. Much to my amazement the Big Thompson trout feasted on my lonely beetle with confidence. Since it was the only one in my possession, and I wanted to use it as a model to tie more, I was extremely protective and checked the line for abrasions frequently. This is something I rarely do, although I probably should.

I landed twenty-eight fish that day on the Big Thompson, and most gulped the beetle. On subsequent trips to Clear Creek, the same scenario played out where fish rejected the large Chernobyl ant but did not waver in their approach to Jake’s beetle. On two separate occasions I sat down at my vice and produced three size 12 gulp beetles, so I was adequately prepared for my remaining fall fishing trips.

Ten Size 12’s Completed

After a long and unseasonably warm fall in Colorado, some cooler temperatures and rain arrived on October 21. This forced me to take a break from fishing, and I used it as an opportunity to kick start my production tying in preparation for the next season. What better way to begin my tying than to crank out twenty Jake’s gulp beetles. I made ten size 12 beetles with a peacock dubbed body, and today I expanded my inventory with ten size tens. Half of the size tens have a peacock dubbed body, and the other five have a red body. The red body worked on the Elk River, so I needed to have some to test in Colorado. I’m also hopeful that the red body will be an answer to the phenomenon of a trout rising to a red strike indicator.

Red Dubbed Underbody

Since I did not have tying instructions, I developed my own through trial and error. Here they are if readers wish to try:

1.  Place a size 12 or 10 Tiemco 2457 hook in your vice. Jake told me to use a heavy nymph hook as it acts as a keel so that the fly lands properly.

2. Attach black thread and wind it a good distance down the bend of the hook. This is important. If the tie down is too far forward, the fly will have too much bare hook shank visible after the foam is folded forward. I also coat the thread with head cement before proceeding.

3. Take a strip of black foam that is cut so that the width equals the hook gap. Create a V in the end that you will tie down.

4. Place the V portion of the foam on top of the thread wraps so that the non-tapered portion lines up with the beginning of your thread wraps on the bend, and then wrap the thread around the V portion of the foam and bind it securely to the hook. When you reach the end of the foam, wrap back to the starting point. I’ve started tying a whip finish knot at this tie down point, but do not cut the thread. Also I coat the entire foam tie down area with head cement. These are all steps that help prevent the foam from twisting around the hook shank after extended use.

5. Dub over the tie down area and the hook shank with a thick clump of dubbing. I use peacock and red, but you can exercise your preference. You want the area from the tie down point to approximately two or three eye lengths back from the eye to be very wide and fat like a natural beetle. Dub a thinner amount over the last three eye lengths and then return to the spot that is three eye lengths behind the eye with your thread.

6. Tie in two sets of fine rubber legs on either side of the hook shank where the thick dubbing tapers to thin.

7. Fold the foam forward over the top of the body and use your scissors to snip a slit on both sides at the point where the legs are tied to the hook shank. Be careful not to snip too deeply as you need a decent amount to remain to securely tie down the foam. I snip the side closest to me, and then fold it back to its original position and snip the opposite side across from my first slit.

8. Once the slits are created, fold the foam back over the top of the body and tie it down through the slits with three or four solid wraps.

9. Carefully cut off excess foam so that it ends just over the hook eye. Make sure your legs are out of harms way when you cut the foam..

10. Carefully create tiny notches where you made slits by cutting out a tiny amount of foam in front of the slit. Again make sure the legs are not in the way.

11. Turn the fly upside down and shape the small foam head by making angled cuts from the end back to the notches. Avoid snipping the legs as you do this.

12. Position the fly right side up, and tie in a narrow section of brightly colored foam as an indicator. I prefer bright orange.

13.  Move the thread underneath and make five wraps between the eye and the point where the foam is tied down underneath the head.

14. Whip finish and coat the thread wraps with head cement.

15. Trim the legs and indicator to the proper length.

Size 10’s

Cathy’s Super Bugger – 03/12/2015

Cathy’s Super Bugger

While searching for tying instructions on YouTube for Cathy’s Super Beetle, I encountered a video showing the tying steps for Cathy’s Super Bugger. As I was looking for ideas to augment my supply of streamers, this caught my attention. I possessed all the materials required to produce this variation on the ever popular woolly bugger, so I scheduled it for my next tie.

The woolly bugger is one of the simplest yet most effective flies ever created. It is typically the first fly that beginners attempt as only a few materials are attached to the hook, and it introduces the novice tier to wrapping chenille and hackle.

Four Completed

I made one modification to the YouTube video instructions by substituting a cone shaped bead for barbell eyes, but everything else followed the script. I added crystal flash to the tail, and wrapped a very webby hackle from my grizzly cape. The other enhancement over a traditional woolly bugger was the addition of long speckled silicone legs dangling just behind the cone head. I think that the reader will agree that these flies look like certain fish attractors. The combination of the marabou tail, oversized grizzly hackle and wiggling legs should create constant movement in the water and attract any fish in the vicinity. I made six with grizzly hackle and two with brown hackle. One never knows what color the fish will prefer.

A Brown Hackle Version Featured

Cathy’s Super Beetle – 03/08/2015

Terrestrials are top producers among my dry fly collection, and in fact I love to use them as visible surface attractors while I probe the more shallow parts of the river with one or two nymph droppers. I frequently prospect the rivers of Colorado with four different grasshopper imitations: the Letort hopper, a parachute hopper, the Charlie Boy hopper, and the increasingly popular pool toy. A Chernobyl ant is a mainstay attractor and supporter of beadhead nymphs, while small parachute ants have worked for me when sight fishing to selective risers.

Side View

The main category of terrestrials missing from my fly inventory is coleoptera or beetles. I suspect that contrary to its name, the Chernobyl ant actually imitates a large beetle, so the frequent usage of a large foam ant probably fills the beetle void. There are frustrating times, however, when fish rise to inspect my Chernobyl ant, but then turn away and drop back to the depths of the river. Once the trout refuse my Chernobyl ant, I am usually unable to induce a take from the trailing nymph. I’ve often wondered if a smaller beetle imitation that more closely resembles naturals might be a strong second option when fish reject the Chernobyl ant.

A Better View

As I browsed through my notebook of flies that I copied from the various fly fishing magazines, I spotted a pattern named Cathy’s Super Beetle. This foam terrestrial was designed by Cathy Beck, and I liked the simplicity of it, so I decided to tie a few to test during the upcoming season. The fly did in fact prove to be quite easy to tie, although I never like dealing with super glue. Nevertheless I produced eight super beetles and placed them in my new boat box. They feature black foam bodies over under bodies of black peacock. I made five with white antron yarn as an indicator, and then I created two with a pink poly indicator wing and one with a visible orange poly tuft. Speckled silicone legs add life-like movement and the final step involves folding the foam back over the front of the fly to create a beetle head.

Pretty in Pink

Perhaps these super beetles will thwart the selective trout that refuse my normally productive Chernobyl ants. I’m quite excited to toss them on local waters during the approaching spring season in Colorado.

JuJu Emerger – 03/06/2015

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.

Parachute Adams – 02/27/2015

When I began tying flies in the 80’s, the classic Adams ruled top five lists of “must have” flies. It did not imitate anything; it imitated everything, if that makes any sense. It was characterized as a general buggy looking dry fly that could pass for many different aquatic food sources of trout. I can remember reading several articles where accomplished fly fishermen swore they never carried any flies on the water except for a size 14 or 16 Adams. A classic Adams possessed a pair of barred grizzly hackle tips for wings, a medium gray body, brown hackle fiber tails and grizzly and brown hackle wound around the hook shank behind and in front of the wing. The distinguishing characteristic of this tie to me was the barred hackle tip wings.

Fast forward to 2015, and as with most things, there are all manner of permutations of the Adams. There are Adams wet flies and Adams dry flies with wings that are angled backward. Some were created with egg sacs, and an array of materials have been substituted for the wings, body and tails. At what point does an Adams cease to be one and become a totally different fly? Of course I probably skipped the most significant variation of the Adams; the parachute Adams.

A Parachute Adams

My fishing friend Danny has been joining me for fly tying sessions on Tuesday nights, and I introduced him to many of my productive favorites. Two weeks ago, however, I completed my standards so I asked him what he would like to tie. Danny quickly replied, “parachute Adams”. I had not tied any of these for quite some time, so I agreed we would produce some. Before we started, we viewed a YouTube video where a tier demonstrated how to tie off the parachute hackle against the wing post instead of to the hook shank. I prefer this method as it greatly reduces the risk of trapping hackle fibers in front of the wing while tying off and whip finishing. Danny began with a white poly wing post while I elected to attach calf body hair. The originator was probably shuddering at this scandalous defamation of the classic Adams and the substitution for two barred hackle tips.

Five Parachute Adams Ready for Action

Danny produced a very passable first prototype and then proceeded to knock out eleven more and took home a dozen beautiful parachute Adams dry flies. With each fly, Danny’s wing post and tie off improved until his flies surpassed the quality of store bought imitations. I meanwhile churned out five, and three left the vise with calf tail wings while two possessed pink poly wings. After I completed five, I moved on to another new fly pattern I planned to test in 2015, but that is the subject of another post.

May the Adams live forever in all its different forms. It appeals to all fishermen and all fish.

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.