It's Official

[sandfly]

The Sandfly
After months of searching for the fly and all the stuff i found this a British wet fly;

wings: landrail
Body: lightest part of a hare's neck
Ribbing: Orange silk
Hackle: Ginger

My namesake

 

[MKern]

Looks like you Bob.

Can you find the MKern fly now? (really handsome I bet)

 

[jayL]

I tie the same fly without the wing, and it is freaking killer on a particular southeast pennsylvania stream.

 

[sandfly]

Yeah wing is a rare feather now, of course you can use a sub. but I liked the real thing..Hook is an old mustad 3159A sz. 9

 

[troutslammer]

sandy is that a march brown pattern for little pine ? lol

 

[sandfly]

Believe it or not its name is "The Sandfly"

 

[franklin]

I thought Lou said the fly was called "The Outlaw"?

 

[sandfly]

Naw franklin, he called it the Moron fly!!

 

[osprey]

My "Pap" used to fish that style wet-fly , i still have a wallet of his old wets , he always fished either a brace of three or he'd have bait on the point and two wets for the droppers , he bought flies from Herters until i started tying for him in the late 60's. He always had his flies rigged up with a snell , loop to loop connection , before i started tying he'd get the flies from Herters and i'd put the mono part together for him , he changed flies until he scored and then he'd leave it alone. What is the range of Landrails? If we have them here maybe it's legal to bag one? I was "sure" the name Sand-Fly came from those suckers that bite ya in Jersey. And man do they hurt!!! kinda like the picture in your Avatar. I have a Caddis i tie called the "osprey" , extended foam body tied seperate on a needle , tie that in at the top of the bend then tie a downwing caddis fly with a z-lon wing back to partially cover the foam.

 

[sandfly]

osprey I had the name sandfly excursions as my guide service for years. named for hanging out at the beach all the time. the excursion definition means short round trip there for the name. I guided on the Delaware river and jersey shore for years. name stuck and use it on all the forums. while looking at old wet flies I came across an old English pattern with the same name. thought it was pretty cool. as for land rail its an english bird related to the plovers.

 

[BradFromPotter]

Hey Bob,
Why didn't you ask me? It's been sitting on my desk for years!
I found it in here...

The funny thing is looks like Ronnie made copies of this book....

and put his name on it!
http://www.sportingspirit.com/index.html?trig=manuf&manuf=Willmarth%2C%20J.E.&startatsb=521

 

[sandfly]

cool brad, thanks that seems different from the one I found, man I'm gettin famous....lol

 

[beadhead2]

You have been famous for years ,I see your picture in every post office I go into lol

 

[sandfly]

SSSSShhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, the feds are watching Henry !!!!

 

[surveyor06]

I also tie something similar, using copper wire in place of the silk, and partridge hackle. Not claiming it to me my creation, but it works pretty good as an emerging caddis. Very easy to tie also. I like the orange silk, I will have to use that.

 

[jayL]

surveyor06 wrote:
I also tie something similar, using copper wire in place of the silk, and partridge hackle. Not claiming it to me my creation, but it works pretty good as an emerging caddis. Very easy to tie also. I like the orange silk, I will have to use that.

Yep. Basically any combination of hare's ear dubbing, a rib, and soft hackle is killer.

Years ago, I found wild trout for the first time in a stocked SEPA stream by frogs fannying that fly and waking it through the surface every pool on a warm late-april evening. Since then, it's been one of my favorite flies, though 99% of the time I am fishing it subsurface.

 

[surveyor06]

I fish it dead drift, but will let it swing at the end of the drift. I get some mean strikes on the swing sometimes. I think the fish take it for a caddis coming to the surface quickly

 

[gfen]

Surveyor, JayL: take a look at "flymphs" or fuzzy nymphs, which are
basically soft hackle wets with dubbing looped bodies.

Basically, form a dubbing loop with your thread, apply some wax, and
then touch it up and down. Spin the loop and then wrap it like you
would anything else.

You'll get really gnarly bodies, and you can pretty much make your
dubbing out of anything, or everything, on your desk or scrapes. I've
seen some really nice CDC dubbing loops lately, and all the ones you
see there are blended in a coffee grinder from rabbit skin, and various
shades of "plastic canvas yarn" (basically antron, as far as I can tell).

The thread body will show through the fur really well, you can see one
of those is tied over green thread, the rest are over orange.

Grouse, partridge, hen or you can see there's a guinea hen in there,
too. All works.

I've also done touch dubbing over wire, which works pretty well, but
they definatly get wispy fast.

For comparision sake, there's a regular spider amongst them. He has a
tiny bit of touch dubbing for a collar, but the body is just regular
Persall's.

 

[LouM]

Your ego was big enough before this discovery, now ,god help us.

 

[beadhead2]

It's a good thing hats have that expandable strap in the back