What Are You Tying Today?

Beautiful! Did you strip one side before tying it in?
Yes, I actually clipped the one side off with a scissors very close to the stem (it ends up leaving some very short stubble on that side). I really like the technique. I tied all of my flies for Kim’s current swap using that same technique of clipping off the one side. I need to get them in the mail to Kim before they get buried in a pile of crap on my tying desk! 😉
 
Just playing around at the vise. Size 14 Sulphur like egg laying type of critter.

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Size 14 Orange Fish Hawk. Old school pattern out of Ray Bergman’s book “Trout”. I usually keep a few of these in the box. I occasionally like to throw one on my wet fly leader when I’m swinging wets and the sulphurs are popping. The pattern always seems to produce some fish.

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Size 14 gold ribbed hare’s ear soft hackle. Simple but very effective pattern.

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I tie a variation of this where I use a slightly longer shank hook and tie a fairly pronounced thorax, then wrap the hackle over top of the thorax. It's been one of my go-to patterns for many, many years.
 
An old school wet fly pattern, the predecessor of the Wooly Bugger, the Wooly Worm. The original pattern called for a red yarn tail, not having any red yarn available, I substituted with the fuzzy fibers off the lower part of a red Schlappen feather (the stuff that usually gets tossed in the trash can). Of course it’s tied on a vintage size 10 Mustad 3906B hook. I enjoy thinking back to the days when I first started tying many decades ago.

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When I fished more freestones in PA I had some wonderful fishing ar times with that fly. Like to the point of "What the heck are you using?" That particular day I had stopped in Barry Becks shop for some odds and ends and saw the fly recommended on the chalk board ... no great sluething on my part. I like to trim the hackle a little closer to the body on some ties. Its a good fly especially when caterpillars are about.
 
When I fished more freestones in PA I had some wonderful fishing ar times with that fly. Like to the point of "What the heck are you using?" That particular day I had stopped in Barry Becks shop for some odds and ends and saw the fly recommended on the chalk board ... no great sluething on my part. I like to trim the hackle a little closer to the body on some ties. Its a good fly especially when caterpillars are about.
I used to tie them in olive and yellow as well, with grizzley or brown palmered hackle. Cree hackle palmered on any of those body colors would also probably be a pretty good look (may have to play around with that this year). I’ve caught a lot of fish on them as well over the years. Great memories!
 
Getting things organized for my winter tying. Starting with zebra midges, soft hackles, PTs and elk hair caddis.

Hope to work in Jim Leisenring's favorite 12 and Sylvester Nemes favorite 14. I want to tie them with period correct Pearsall's, hackle, etc. and donate them to the local TU chapter for fundraising. May have to compromise on some hackles and use currently available substitutes.
 
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