How about a smaller steelhead fly that has a lot of movement, is easy to cast and is tough enough to withstand the occaisional (or in my case frequent) errant spey cast? I tried small intruder-type flies and they were OK, but not quite what I was looking for.
Now, you have to realize that what I am looking for and what a fish is looking for are sometimes and very often, two different things. But first I need to please me when I look at new patterns or changing old ones. A lot of the time I like to tie for colors and shapes that just look good to me. Then, if I really dig it, I’ll fish the hell out of it and maybe get a fish to eat it. Some of these turn out to be real winners while others give me the short term pleasure of dreaming it, thinking it, tying it and swimming it.
Other times I set out to tie a fly of real purpose with specific requirements attached to it. That is the case of this newest pattern idea. I’m pretty excited about it, actually. It is not a totally new concept. I’ve seen similar techniques used in large saltwater flies, but this use is new to me and those I’ve shown it to.
First Thought - I like (as many other tiers do) to fish long-flowing-slinky flies for anadromous (not Andromeda) fishes. So, I have several saddles with varying amounts of dyed hackle attached to them. When you first check out these saddles in the package they look great. Then after yanking out the best hackles for several flies you see that a good number of the hackles are perfect except the tips are missing, creating a little “V” at the end. Where did they come from? No matter, they’re here, now. First reaction is to discard them as unusable, but you leave them on the skin not really wanting to toss an otherwise perfect hackle. In reality, they could easily be used without any adverse consequences except for the nagging thought that while fishing for steelhead only the best (complete) hackles should be used. What self-respecting tier would use a decapitated feather on a steelhead fly? Unheard of! We’ll leave this whole situation, for a while, bouncing around where ideas do that sort of thing.
Ever notice (especially you steelheaders) how you hold up flies in front of your mouth with the eye of the fly close to your lips and you blow across the fly like a river current might do? You can then watch the fur, hair and feathers move so you can imagine it swinging through a run. I’d just finished a fly with saddle hackles tied on at 10, 2, 4 and 8 around the fly so it would have good movement. It was a smaller fly (#7 AJ) so just the tips of the hackle feathers were used. It just wasn’t the same as larger, longer flies. They were not moving enough. It seemed too stiff. I picked up one of those long saddles with the tip out of it. I was playing with it and stripped some of the fibers off of the stem leaving about a 1/4″ of the “V” at the end of about two inches of stripped stem. It had kind of a “twangy” action. Those few fibers at the end of the stem caught the air and moved more than if it were just the whole hackle tip.
Second thought – Attach this stripped arrow-looking hackle to the hook in such a way to give it a lot of action while swinging through the currents.
Now since I want a lot of water hitting and moving it, I use materials in front of it that will skinny down to allow this to happen. I used dub and mixed dubbing (depending upon the color I wanted) for the body ( a little red Ice Dub mixed with black angora)and rabbit fur (red) with the guard hairs dubbed and tied as a collar. The one in the picture to the right was tied on a size 6 Daiichi #1120. It seems right for the size of the fly. Once a pattern idea is established, then I go gcrazy with the colors and even the shape somewhat until I find what I or the fish like best.
The one pictured above is a different variation from the first. Tied on a number 7 Alec Jackson hook. The body is much more compact dubbing or you could use yarn and it is ribbed. The collar is dyed mallard flank tied in by the tipand wrapped a couple of times, then tied and cut.. The wing/tail is one hackle stem on each side. You can see that on this one I left some fibers at the base of the stem to create a wing. And then seemingly suspended out back of the fly is the tail. And who could stop here?
This one (above) is shown with 4 arrow tails, a blue dubbed body, black pheasant rump collar behind rabbit hair collar. One of my favorite steelhead color combinations is black and blue. Also tied on a Alec Jackson hook.
I have already tied up some carp flies using the “Arrow” idea and I am incorporating it into some saltwater patterns. Bonefish beware!!
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