Learn Fly Tying

The Bob’s Bits

Jonathan — Thu, 16 Jun 2011 17:57:39 +0000

This fly has been a favourite with the Stillwater fly fishers for several years. Originally it was devized by Bob Worts for fishing Grafham Water when reservoir trout fishing was in its infancy. It was not long before its popularity spread to other stillwaters. The white hackle wing is intended as a ‘sighter’ rather than imitative. In a ripple it may help to treat with floatant.

Hook Size -- 10—14 Light Weight Wet Fly Hook
Thread -- To suit body colour.
Rib -- Fine gold wire.
Body -- Seals fur, red, black, black or olive.
Wing -- White cock hackle fibres.
Hackle -- Brown Cock Hackle.

Regards Dave C and The Team

www.youtube.com/watch?v=n95ZdAe82RE

The Humungus

Jonathan — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 15:54:29 +0000

This lure has been around now for several years and at the moment is having something of a comeback. It has always been a good early season lure for the ‘stockies’. It was one of the first flies to use chain beads for the head. Once you have tied a couple it gets easier and is worth the effort.

Hook - Wet or long shank hook sizes 10-6.
Thread - Black 6/0.
Tail - Black marabou ( fairly sparse)
Silver/gold holographic 6-8 strands.
Butt - Fluorescent green wool.
Rib - Silver wire.
Body - White micro fritz or silver lurex.
Hackle - Grizzle cock palmered.
Head - Chain bead in either silver, gold or red.

If you intend tying up several flies I would suggest that you tie on the heads in advance and secure them with either varnish or epoxy and give them time to set.

Remember the heads sit on the underside of the hook.

Regards Dave C and The Team

www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpkV1MRvh_o

The Copper Wire Nymph

Jonathan — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 21:29:00 +0000

The Copper Wire Nymph.

This is an under-rated fly for rivers, sometimes known as the Copper Nymph, and usually confused with the more popular Copper John Nymph. Not only is it a very easy fly to tie but the basic materials are all readily available.
Charles Jardine in his Directory of Fly Dressings advocates a tail of golden pheasant tippets. I prefer a tail of a small bunch of cock pheasant tail feathers.
The standard pattern relies on the copper wire body for weight, and the choice of a single layer or double layer, of wire depends on the waters you fish. In the event of faster and deeper rivers the addition of a few turns of fine lead wire under the thorax will help.
It would pay you to tie up several variants with different coloured seal fur. My favourite is orange.

This is a useful pattern in sizes 10 to 16.

Hook -- Wet Fly sizes 10 to 16
Thorax - Seals fur, orange, brown, olive, black or red.
Body - Copper wire.
Tail - Small bunch cock pheasant tail feathers. Option brown cock hackle fibres.
Underbody - Optional fine lead wire

Regards Dave C and The Team

www.youtube.com/watch?v=e62HvcnP4Nw

The Taser Bug

Jonathan — Sun, 20 Mar 2011 21:39:58 +0000

This fly first came to my notice in an article in the Total Fly Fishing magazine written by Chris Reeves.
The component giving the fly its name is the recycled wire from the Taser gun used by the Metropolitan police.
It takes very little practice to produce a lifelike and durable buzzer or nymph. With the addition of various colours of underbody it is possible to tie up a range of flies to match the hatch. I cannot wait to try the version with the peacock herl underbody and a gold bead head.

For as little as £2.50 you can get a pack of at least 2 meters and the proceeds go to the Charity “Fishing for Heroes”. This includes postage within the UK.

Hook -- Wet fly or Buzzer hooks sizes 10/12.
Thread -- 6/0 colour to suit.
Tail -- (optional) White baby wool or hackle fibres.
Underbody -- Tying thread, strand of coloured wool. coloured wires, lurex.
Overbody -- Tazer wire in touching turns.
Thorax -- Peacock herl, Sparton body Czech.
Hackle -- Optional
Head Bead -- Optional

Please visit the website www.fishingclass.co.uk for purchasing the Taser wire.

Regards Dave C and The Team

www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7IplyYTPuo

The Vibrating Daddy

Jonathan — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 19:41:07 +0000

This is not an accepted fly pattern (none of the experts have devised it yet). Over the years the use of vibrating rubber legs has become popular with some anglers. The early flies used flexi floss which did the job but were not as good as the modern materials. Their success on the stillwaters for browns and rainbows led to the development of Sili legs and Micro Rubber legs which give a lot more life to the fly. Both of these are readily available in a range of different colours.

The method demonstrated I have found to be the simplest to tie to get the legs to sit well on the hook. The use of colours on the legs and bodies is only limited by your imagination. I do find a ‘hotspot’ at the tail helps.

Hook Long shank lt. wt 10
Thread Brown/black
Hotspot Fluorescent orange/red/green floss
Body 2 Strands of 4 ply nylon wool brown/black/olive
Hackle Long fibre cock hackle brown/black/olive
Legs Sili Legs/Micro Rubber colour to match body

Give this one a try and let me know how you get on !

Dave C and The Team

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hnnleopp9-I

The Prince Nymph

Jonathan — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 21:43:22 +0000

This fly is a popular American pattern which is not tied to represent any particular nymph. It has found favour with quite a number of stillwater fly men here in the UK. The use of paired goose biots to represent the tail and wing is unusual but should not present a major obstacle in the tying. If you have difficulties the clipped wing Coachman is a good alternative and I will give you the dressing for that one also. Peacock herl is very fragile and I would recommend two strands wound on together with the tying thread for extra durability.

Hook -- Wetfly 8-12.
Thread -- Black.
Tail -- 2 Goose biot ( black or brown).
Body -- 2 strands Peacock herl.
Rib -- Fine flat gold tinsel.
Hackle -- Brown or Black Hen (2 or 3 turns).
Horns -- Two slips white Swan or Goose biot tied in at head after the hackle is secured.

Clipped Wing Coachman

Hook -- Wetfly 10-14.
Thread -- Black.
Tail -- None.
Body -- 2 strands Peacock herl.
Rib -- Fine gold/copper wire.
Hackle -- Brown Hen( 2or 3 turns).
Wing -- Tuft of white feather fibre. ( ½ length of body.)

Dave C. and the Team

www.youtube.com/watch?v=_b6viUjXnJc

The Green Beast

Jonathan — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 17:06:34 +0000

The green Beast is an old pattern devised by a gentleman called Alan Pearson. He enjoyed a reputation for catching a lot of big trout in small still waters. It is a simple fly to tie and I thought you might like to give it a try. Originally it was supposed to imitate aquatic beetle larvae but I think it is more likely to be taken for a damsel nymph. With this in mind it might be worth trying a rib of blue or green lurex.

The Dressing

Hook - Long shank 8 ( Kamasan 830).
Lead -- wire underbody optional.
Thread -Green.
Tail -- Green Cock hackle fibres fairly short.
Body -- Green floss tapered to tail.
Rib - Silver wire. ( blue or green lurex optional).
Hackle -- Brown partridge back 2 turns.

Regards Dave C. and the Team

www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTdaUo7GKLg

History of the Buzzer

Jonathan — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 13:53:08 +0000

Buzzers (chironomidae) made their first appearance on the flyfishing scene in the 1920s. The first pattern I can find recorded was the Blagdon Buzzer devised by a Dr. Bell. It was devised for fishing Blagdon Reservoir. It featured many of the elements which are similar to modern dressings in use today. It was tied on a small hook and had a black wool body with a flat silver rib with a tuft of white wool behind the eye of the hook.
Little more was recorded about buzzers, possibly because little Stillwater flyfishing was available in England at the time. However the fly fishers on the rivers have been using wet fly spider patterns for a very long time and in all probability these were taken by the trout for the river versions of chironomidae.
In the 1960s there was a revival of interest in buzzers, probably due to the upsurge in availability of trout fishing on reservoirs and some commercial fisheries. C.F. Walker with his passion for exact imitations was one of the first to write a book of imitative patterns in his book, LAKE FLIES AND THEIR IMITATIONS, published in the 1960s. About the same time Geoffrey Bucknall devised his Footballer buzzer which was an imitative pattern, using black and white horse hair and tied on hook sizes 14and 16 John Goddard devised some quite elaborate buzzer patterns in the same era. His patterns incorporated many of the features used in the modern patterns.
Since the early days of the 1960s there has been an incredible availability of reservoir and Stillwater trout fisheries throughout the UK. In the early days the emphasis was on lure fishing with long shank patterns, up to size 6, with names like Baby Doll, Geronimo, Matukas and many, many more. The traditionalists fished with the seatrout patterns they had successfully used in the rivers.In the course of time nymphs became popular and proved to be just as effective without the hard work of thrashing the water endlessly with lures, It was just a question of time before the thinking flyfishers rediscovered the buzzer .
The buzzer can be fished individually or in a team of two or three with a floating line. There is no hard and fast method of fishing your chosen buzzers. You can retrieve your line in long slow pulls, or figure of eight retrieve, short intermittent pulls or best of all let the wind do the work for you and just wait for the line to bow and wait for the line to tighten. You can speed up the drift by either taking one or two steps back or slow it down by stepping forward along the bank. All the fishing magazines regularly have articles by experts who extol the virtues of their preferences.
Before we go down the avenue of tying buzzers I would like to emphasize that there is no chance of inventing a ‘new pattern’. At some stage someone will have tied something exactly the same or embellished the dressing with something exotic, given it a fancy name and one of the magazines will have given it a two page spread. Within two months no one will remember it. If you do come up with a ‘new’ pattern that works for you keep it to yourself, or share it with friends, but be aware that it is just a question of time before it loses its charm.

Dave Cammiss
Author

Introduction to Buzzers

Jonathan — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 13:42:20 +0000

Buzzer is a common name given to the larval stage of the midge which spends the greatest part of its life in the water. To a great extent this stage was ignored by the early fly fishers. They tended to concentrate their efforts on fishing the dry fly, probably unaware of the existence of the larval stage of the flies they were fishing.
Frank Sawyer, the renowned river keeper on the River Itchen was one of the first to break with tradition. His Sawyer Nymph tied with copper wire and wool was the first to be deliberately fished sub surface to stalk trout and grayling. This practice was frowned upon by the traditionalists of the day and was banned, and still is, on some waters.
Oliver Kite became famous for his upstream nymphing with the weighted Pheasant Tail Nymph with a copper wire rib and was probably responsible for the practice being generally accepted in the south country rivers.
I can remember the opening season at Chew Valley Reservoir in the early 1960s. Prior to that I had only fly fished rivers and streams with wet flies. In my first two days there I had stumbled on buzzer fishing, without realising it, and did not appreciate it until several years later.
My first visit to Chew was a blank and the locals were having a field day. After trying to match their casting distance with my 10ft. Hardy Palakona split cane rod and a badly cracked level fly line I was absolutely shattered and demoralised. The following day I tried again and initially had no success. One of the locals took pity on me and asked to have a look at my tackle and flies. He had a look in my fly box and picked out a size 10 Teal and Red wet fly. He took out his scissors and cut off the teal wing. He handed me my mutilated fly and told me to give it a try on the point.
It was with little confidence that I cast that fly into the wind, but after a couple of takes that nearly took the rod out of my hand, I did eventually net a brown trout well over 2lbs. It was the biggest brownie I had ever caught. When I got home I checked the stomach contents. It was full of reddish wriggling larvae up to half an inch long plus an odd earthworm.
I was hooked on Stillwater trout fishing and it was time for a tackle change. I went into Bristol and bought a ‘state of the art’ glass fibre rod and a Cortland double taper fly line. The flies were a different issue. I had already decided that I would try to copy some of the larvae. I took a size 8 wet fly hook and wound claret wool well round the bend with about a quarter of an inch hanging over as the tail and ribbed it with silver wire.
After years of tying traditional wet flies I felt guilty for using this monstrosity. I dread to think what my old mentor, Wilf. Proud, would have said. In the following weeks I caught a fair few fish but never dared show anyone the ’fly’ in case I got banned. Compared to the lures and other ‘flies’, which suddenly appeared with the opening of the Midland Reservoirs, my ‘Claret Buzzer’ was positively mundane.

Dave Cammiss
Author

The Water Beetle

Jonathan — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 20:48:52 +0000

This fly is one I have devised after getting some dark green straggle fritz and struggling to find something to do with it. In past years I have had some success with snails which I have tied using black plastazote foam. I know that some waters do well with terrestrial insects and beetles blown on the water. I have not come across a convincing pattern for a water beetle, which I know do get taken by trout. The braid under body imitates the air bubble and the straggle fritz makes the legs when the overbody is pulled over. Leave enough foam after tying off to imitate the head.
This pattern should be fished on a sinking line with a short leader and long slow retrieves. Tie a couple up and give them a try and let me know if you have any success.

The Dressing

Hook - Long shank light weight size10 (Kamasan 830).
Thread -- Black.
Underbody - Orange/white Diamond Braid / Parton Body Czech.
Hackle - Black/Dark Green Straggle Fritz in open turns..
Overbody -- Strip Black Plasazote 3-4 mm. Square.
( It is easier to cut from the block with a knife with a serrated blade. )

Kind Regards Dave C. and the Team