>>>What Are You Tying Today? Part IV

[nfrechet]

Giant Stonefly

Hook - Salmon or nymph style
Weight - Multi-layers of flat lead strips to create a tapered underbody
Thread - Black and orange
Tail - Black goose biots
Body - Black larva lace, v-rib etc
Wing cases - Black 2mm foam (1mm would be better)
Thorax - Black dubbing
Legs - Black/white centipede rubber legs

Reference - Youtube video

 

[Dave_W]

Crayfish!

This rascal is ready to get out this summer for some smallmouth bass fishing.

 

[1manwolfpack]

That crayfish is fantastic!

 

[Dave_W]

1manwolfpack wrote:
That crayfish is fantastic!

Thanks!

It's got pretty good movement in the water too as the claws are hinged to the body with a rubber band so they can flap around when action is imparted.

(Stay tuned as a big ole bullhead is making his forum debut soon.)

 

[nfrechet]

Professor

Hook - Wet fly style
Thread - Black
Tail - Red goose quill fibers or red hackle fibers (depicted)
Ribbing - 5 wraps of flat gold tinsel
Body - Yellow floss or uni -stetch (depicted)
Throat - Brown hackle fibers
Wing - One 1/4 - 3/8 inch wide strip of mallard flank folded in half

 

[drakeking412]

wow dave that crayfish is extremely impressive. I wouldn't mind a video tutorial of that bad boy

 

[nfrechet]

The Cinberg

Hook - Dry fly style
Thread - Tan
Tail - Brown spade hackle fibers
Body - Tan/cream dubbing
Hackle - Brown or dark ginger fronted with wood duck. The WD is not wound like the hackle, it is tyed on first with the tips pointing forward, the rest of the fly is tied, tail, body and hackle, then after tying off the hackle the wood duck is pulled back, the thread wound through to the eye, and the wood duck gets worked back with a thread dam in front of it, forcing it back towards the hackle.

 

[nfrechet]

Hopper Buck

Hook - Curved style
Thread - Tan
Tail - Brown hen hackle
Body - Cream or yellow dubbing
Ribbing - Gold wire
Wing - Mallard flank
Hackle - Brown hen

It is believed this fly is most likely taken as a hex nymph. Tie them in both weighted and unweighted versions. 

 

[Dave_W]

drakeking412 wrote:
wow dave that crayfish is extremely impressive. I wouldn't mind a video tutorial of that bad boy

Thanks for the compliments.
I'm not doing video tying tutorials yet, but plan to in the future.

This crayfish is one of a series of flies I have designed using a custom material I have worked up involving acrylic paint and shoo-go.

This particular pattern is built almost entirely with this stuff and is tied on a rubber worm hook. There is a dumbell weight under the back fin to make the fly swim or drift hook upward, a style I prefer in almost all my streamers meant to be fished low in the water column.

This is also the case with the bullhead in the other thread.

 

[dennisl]

Vulgata emergers

Followed instructions here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBOyga1Kzgg

 

[nfrechet]

Parachute Adams

 

[dennisl]

So I don't really fish with CDC flies and have never tied with the material before but here goes.

I put the finished flies in a glass of water and they stay afloat for only about 10 seconds before they sink like rocks. What did I do wrong?

 

[afishinado]

dennisl wrote:
So I don't really fish with CDC flies and have never tied with the material before but here goes.

I put the finished flies in a glass of water and they stay afloat for only about 10 seconds before they sink like rocks. What did I do wrong?

First of all, putting a dry fly in a glass to see if it floats is not a good test. Test your flies on the stream tied to a tippet.

Second, the design of your fly is such that the entire thorax will be under the surface near vertical and the hackle will be left to support the fly.

Third, it looks as if your hackle is not dry fly quality. Without actuall seeing it, I cannot tell for sure. If you look at the pic above of the parachute adams that nfrechet tied, you can see that the hackle fibers stand straight out and appear to be stiff, and also the hackle is tied in very densely. You hackle is bent on the ends and appear to be softer, plus it is not very dense.

Fourth, the CDC wing is not very dense either and will add very little buoyancy to the fly

I would check your hackle, tie it denser and maybe even rethink the pattern design.

Good luck.

 

[nfrechet]

Viking Queen

Hook - Standard streamer style
Thread - Black
Body - Flat silver tinsel
Throat - White marabou
Wing - Yellow bucktail over blue bucktail
Shoulder - Jungle cock

Reference - Professional Fly Tying, Spinning and Tackle Making - George L Herter

 

[dennisl]

afishinado wrote:
First of all, putting a dry fly in a glass to see if it floats is not a good test. Test your flies on the stream tied to a tippet.

Second, the design of your fly is such that the entire thorax will be under the surface near vertical and the hackle will be left to support the fly.

Third, it looks as if your hackle is not dry fly quality. Without actuall seeing it, I cannot tell for sure. If you look at the pic above of the parachute adams that nfrechet tied, you can see that the hackle fibers stand straight out and appear to be stiff, and also the hackle is tied in very densely. You hackle is bent on the ends and appear to be softer, plus it is not very dense.

Fourth, the CDC wing is not very dense either and will add very little buoyancy to the fly

I would check your hackle, tie it denser and maybe even rethink the pattern design.

Good luck.

I think this pattern would have been better on a hook with a lesser curve so that, like you pointed out, the fly isn't supported by just the hackle. The hackle is from a Whiting Farms intro pack (4 half-capes in various colors). I'm sure they don't put their best stuff into these packs. Anyway, I didn't want to waste the biots so I carefully reworked the flies into hi-viz Klinkhammers.

I also tied up my first Goddard Caddis!

 

[Steeltrap]

dennisl Posted on: 6/5 15:16
So I don't really fish with CDC flies and have never tied with the material before but here goes.

I put the finished flies in a glass of water and they stay afloat for only about 10 seconds before they sink like rocks. What did I do wrong?

First, I agree with the quality of your hackle. It doesn't appear to be a good "dry fly" quality of stiffness.

Also, your CDC wing appears sparse. Look at this video by Orvis of tying a BWO using CDC. Orvis Video The CDC in the video....he uses the tips of the CDC feather. I've done this and if I'm not happy with the density of the CDC wing, I will use 3 or in rare cases 4 CDC feathers to make the wing dense.

In addition to using a good dry fly hackle I will also treat the fly with a floatation agent to help prevent it from sinking.

FWIW

 

[Out4Trout]

Here is a CDC Sulpher that has been working great for me in Mud Run the past few weeks. Not the best looking but floats great and seems to get the job done : )


I agree that adding more CDC makes it stay up with added GINK.

 

[riverwhy]

Is that CDC or hackle I see on the bottom? Also, you only add Gink to the body not the CDC right?

 

[Out4Trout]

There is hackle around the front as I think it imitates legs but the top is 2 or 3 pieces of CDC and I use the top of the feather. Also, I gink the entire fly. I try to gink and flatten the top CDC with my fingers to help it imitate wings and so I can see it better. Stays on top real nice and trout love it. Even when there are multiple hatches going on, if I see any sulphers and I throw this to a rising trout, 9 times out of 10 they take it immediately. It is my own pattern and not much to it but again, it works every time : ) size 18

 

[Fly-Swatter]

O4T: I like it! I'm curious to learn how you get the hackle/thorax/head to look like that. It seems like you wrap the hackle then dub between the hackle at the base of the wing and at the head before tying off at the ehad. Is that correct?