Currently browsing… fly tying
-
Tying the Black and Tan jig
Fall across North America generally means low and clear water, particularly on freestone trout streams where flows aren't manipulated by upstream dams. And that means wary trout in skinny conditions. Chasing fall trout during low water can be a lot of fun for sight-fishing, but fish are also on high alert for predators and, in…
-
Tying a simple baitfish pattern
'Tis the season for baitfish patterns. Not only is it about time for brown to start their annual migration, but baitfish, come fall, are important for everything from bass that are fattening up for cooler weather and coastal predators like redfish and speckled trout that are starting to move into coastal estuaries and marshes. Below,…
-
Tying the Franke Shiner baitfish imitation for migrating browns
Baitfish imitations work great in the fall, particularly where migrating brown trout are found. As these fish move out of lakes or upstream from big water to spawning habitat, they just get more and more aggressive. Giving them something substantial to chase — and something that looks like a dependable source of food, too —…
-
Tying small dry flies using UV resins
I’ve been using UV resins on my flies for several years now, all with the intent of making flies last longer on the water
I’ve always been something of a ham-handed fly tier, and, generally speaking, the bigger the fly, the easier it is for me to tie. I’m a big guy at six-foot-five, and my hands correspond to my height. They just aren’t meant for detail work. But I live in eastern Idaho, and right about now, my…
-
Tying the Travis Para-Ant for later-summer trout
The first couple weeks of September are usually pretty great dry-fly weeks as things cool off a bit and trout look up for big bites of protein
Parts of the West got a taste of things to come this week — Colorado and Wyoming got some snow, and here in Idaho, a brutally cold wind chased summer away for a bit, littered the streets with broken branches and left thousands without power. But summer's not over just yet, and that means terrestrial…
-
Is it good … or bad to obsess?
Fly fishing is arguably the ideal pastime for someone with obsessive tendencies. Inches matter on the stream, as do thousandths when it comes to spools of tippet or fly-tying thread. A guy I once fished with said he never saved leftovers from home-cooked meals; it was a sanitary thing. Sure. I remember thinking he probably ironed his underwear before putting them away, but…
-
Use dubbing to make a solid base
Certain materials, when tied to a hook shank, just don't take well to being secured with thread. The lack of friction between the material and the metal of the shank makes it very easy for some tying materials to spin, even after multiple wraps and efforts to tightly bound them to the shank. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2hV1KNILIhM Above,…