Caddis fly project 2013 – #2 – 3

Number 2 & 3 in the Caddis fly project.

First is one of the most famous caddis imitations there is; the G&H Sedge! Developed by John Goddard and Cliff Henry many years ago it is used by trout fishermen all over the world. It mimics the silluette of a hatched caddis fly and it was originally menat to be fished actively to imitate the newly hatched caddis as it is swimming to shore, and I have had my best fishing with it when I fish it very actively. Sometimes I fish it across a current and then fish it actively on the swing and against the current to make it dive down underneath which can produce some nice takes!

Next one is a real personal favorite of mine, a pattern that imitates a fluttering caddis: Nalle Phu, by Simmo Lumme from Finland. Nalle Phu means Winnie the Poh in Swedish, and the original fly was tied in orange/yellow colours from which is supposedly got its name. Originally it had a wing made from bear hair, I use Poly yarn or any other syntetic material instead. This dark variant in size 14 has probably been my most successful variant! You can fish it exremy active on the surface, hold the rod high and make it skip across the current!

Caddis fly project 2013 – #1

I’ve started a fly tying project that will lead up to the Swedish fly fishing fair “Sportfiskemässan” in April. I wanted to have a better theme to my show this time after having done quite similar stuff for many years now. So I have undertaken a project of tying 20 different caddis fly imitations from around the world. Some of them are real favorites of mine and others are more or less new patterns recomended to me.

So I’ll be presenting them one by one here on the blog too, and I’ll start with one of the most well known caddis imitations here in Sweden. Streaking Caddis!

Created by Swedish fly tyers Lennart Bergkvist & Kenneth Boström some 30 years ago mainly as an imitation of the big Prygranea grandis caddis that can drive any trout crazy when it hatches! It’s also a very successful pattern in smaller sizes, and I’ve probably had more success in sizes 12-14 than the big ones.

Hook: Partridge YK12ST size 8
Thread: Veevus 6/0
Body: Olive seals fur
Head and wing: A big bunch natural deer hair

En garde!

The way of the /:fly:/ baby!

BFF

I’ve never been a huge fan of Big Fly Fibers but after having seen two really cool tying videos from Andy Weiss and Daniel Dietrich Holm the other days I decided to dust off a few packs of the tying materials and give it a try again. Using a reversed tie white bucktail to tie on I’ve then used white BFF, red whiting bird fur and red goat hair as well as pearl flash, red fin rac hairs and red Senyo’s laser dub. And some grizzly sadle feathers in there too! 😀

A little bit of everything = something really good?

Sometimes you end up just borrowing a little bit of everything from different patterns that you feel have been successful and it end up to look better than you imagined it from the start! This is a good example of that, I’ve used a little polar bony as a back bone, pearl flash, white bucktail, chartreuese soft Bird fur feathers, white and chartreuse Fin racoon hair and more! A big head with a lot of possibilities to push waters, really soft and moving bird fur feathers ties both inward and splayed out will add a lot of fluttering movment bot on retrieve and when stopped. The rac hair will add extra movement in the head with its vibrating abilities and of course the color combo of white and chartreuse is THE most successful spring color (and quite a good autumn color too)! The size is about 25 cm (10 inches) which is also kind of perfect when you look for unweighted flies with a lot of “self movement” so to speak, i.e. flies that when stopped will keep pulsating and flutter instead of being actively fished with jigging movememt. Bucktail as a support also have the effect where it can make the fly go out to the side when hard retrieved. Something that is extra special when you tie them articulated, which I feel I really need to do!

Oh well, as you guess I am rather please with how this one looks! 😀

Fry pattern with integrated tungsten bead

A friend of mine asked me to tie some weighted down small streamers for him, so I did this simple but very effective little fly which has an integrated tungsten bead inside it. Sybai holografic angle hair on top, senyo’s laser dub on the bottom and a head from Bug Bond!

Musky inspired

There’s suprinsingly few flies for pike you see that look to american flies for Musky. Sure there’s bits and pieces like reversed bucktail being used, but that’s more of a saltwater hollow fley Bob Popovich style. So I’ve been starting to look around a bit on Musky patterns, there aren’t that many original patterns to be found online, but there’s a few names that come up where ever you go looking. One is Brad Bohen and his patterns The Buford and the Hang time. So last night I decided to try me a little variant of the Buford pattern.

It’s a very classic musky pattern featuring bucktail and sadle feathers as its main materials. I didn’t have the right colors of Sadle feathers so I ended up using barred Schlappen feathers instead.

The idea is to fish it on an intermediate or faster sinking line to draw in under the surface and to have the big buctail head make all sorts of “noise” under the water and make it skip irregularly from side to side and up and down.

Hook: Partridge Ultimate predator X 6/0
Thread: Veevus 6/0
Tails: Two yellow barred schlappen feathers and Sybai tinsel hair
Body: Bucktail, orange and yellow barred schlappen and Sybai tinsel hair
Head: Butt end of bucktail, spun and clipped down.

I don’t pack the head very hard, and I don’t clip it down very neat either, just like on the original Brad Bohen fly, I don’t want it to be super buoyant, my intermediate line  need to be able to get it down a bit.

Rich Strolis Hog Snare!

Richard Strolis is a great american fly tyer who ties some very inovative big streamers for big trouts and more. A few weeks back I had a go and tried to tie one of his top notch streamer patterns: The Hog Snare! If you want to check out Rich’s work make sure you visit: http://www.catching-shadows.com/ and then also check out the link to all his great fly tying videos!

Juice em up!

Articulated pike fly with a trick I learned from Steve Silverio to use the plastic inside cap from a juice pack. Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle!