Deer Hair Caddis – 02/02/2025

Deer Hair Caddis 02/02/2025 Photo Album

One can delve deeper into this fly by starting with my 02/11/2024 post and then following the links back in time. This fly has been a mainstay in my arsenal, since I began fly fishing in Pennsylvania in the 1980’s. This is not surprising given the prevalence of caddis flies throughout the world.

Olive-Brown Ligas Size 14

The fly is rather simple to tie with only a dubbed abdomen, deer hair wing, grizzly hackle, and dubbed thorax. The most difficult aspect of this tie is preventing the wing from rolling around the hook shank. My steps to prevent this are a solid pinch, twisting the thread clockwise to create a narrow cord with bite, and then winding forward a bit through the deer hair stubs in the same manner utilized for stimulators.

Light Gray Size 14

When I am fishing a dry/dropper and experiencing refusals or a single large dry fly that results in similar snubs, I often switch to a large lead dry with a size 14 or 16 deer hair caddis as the trailer. The large front fly enables me to follow the earth toned caddis, and quite often the fish suck in the trailer. The hippie stomper/deer hair combination can be quite effective.

Fresh Supply of Deer Hair Caddis with Materials

I have narrowed my supply of deer hair caddis down to two body colors; Ligas olive-brown and light olive, and these seem to serve my needs. I also carry some with a light tan body, but I rarely resort to them. I determined that I needed four additional olive-brown in size 14 and five more in light gray, and I quickly produced them for my fly boxes. I also tied four light gray in size 16 because I had them in an unraveling state in my damaged fly canister. Bring on the 2025 caddis hatches.