Fly tying

[Belsnickel]

So, having extra time on my hands at home thanks to current global circumstances, I decided to take up a hobby. I picked up a fly tying kit from my local fly shop and am learning how to fly some ties.



That was my first attempt at a size 8 olive wooly bugger.

Anyone else around here tie flies? What is everyone else doing to pass the extra time at home besides descending into alcoholism.

[sandwedge]

I went fly fishing a few times and gotta say it was the most relaxing thing in the world, after you get the action down. Central Oregon and Montana have the best fly fishing rivers in the world. Talk about social distancing, there is no one withing 10 miles of you. Never made my own flies though.
Just doing the best to keep myself busy during this time. Lots of work around the farm, it's gotten to the point I make shit up to do.... Reading and watching movies.

[bengaloo]

(03-28-2020, 03:45 PM)Belsnickel Wrote: So, having extra time on my hands at home thanks to current global circumstances, I decided to take up a hobby. I picked up a fly tying kit from my local fly shop and am learning how to fly some ties.



That was my first attempt at a size 8 olive wooly bugger.

Anyone else around here tie flies? What is everyone else doing to pass the extra time at home besides descending into alcoholism.

Welcome to the awesome world of fly tying! Yes sir I love to tie also! Used to travel around tying flies at outdoors shows, and was and Orvis guide for many years. I still teach classes on both topics! Been tying since I was 8 years old and still going strong at 45. Mostly a lot of bass flies these days.

The pic aint showing up but wooly buggers are a great place to start and never get old. You can tie them in any color and size, with big tails or small tails, with flash or rubber. Pretty much anything goes with those fish catchers. Other than a size 18 pheasant tail for trout, a bugger is my all time fav.

Great hobby. Do you fish on Mossy Creek much? I havent fished it in years, but its nice.

[SunsetBengal]

That is a good skill/hobby to learn. I hope to conquer the art of fly fishing, one day. One of my long time friends and former teammates grew up in Western PA. we often get together and go trout fishing. He pulls out his fly rod from time to time, and tries out various flies that he tied himself. As for me, I stick to the traditional rod and worm, and still catch some trout. Just not the big ones that he lands with the fly rod.

[Belsnickel]

I just saw the broken link; I'm not sure what's up with that. Anyway, here is the Imgur post with some of my recent fly tying endeavors. https://imgur.com/a/9KRgq6P

(03-31-2020, 11:36 AM)sandwedge Wrote: I went fly fishing a few times and gotta say it was the most relaxing thing in the world, after you get the action down. Central Oregon and Montana have the best fly fishing rivers in the world. Talk about social distancing, there is no one withing 10 miles of you. Never made my own flies though.
Just doing the best to keep myself busy during this time. Lots of work around the farm, it's gotten to the point I make shit up to do.... Reading and watching movies.

I'm quite partial to native brookies in the mountain streams around here, myself. Unfortunately, some of the best streams are closed off because they are in Shenandoah National Park and people were stupid. But yeah, definitely a great pasttime.

(04-26-2020, 04:59 PM)bengaloo Wrote: Welcome to the awesome world of fly tying! Yes sir I love to tie also! Used to travel around tying flies at outdoors shows, and was and Orvis guide for many years. I still teach classes on both topics! Been tying since I was 8 years old and still going strong at 45. Mostly a lot of bass flies these days.

The pic aint showing up but wooly buggers are a great place to start and never get old. You can tie them in any color and size, with big tails or small tails, with flash or rubber. Pretty much anything goes with those fish catchers. Other than a size 18 pheasant tail for trout, a bugger is my all time fav.

Great hobby. Do you fish on Mossy Creek much? I havent fished it in years, but its nice.

I posted an album link above so you can seed what I've been doing. But yeah, I'm loving this stuff. I do fish Mossy every other week or so. It's only about a 20 minute drive for me and since Mossy Creek Fly Fishing is my local shop, it'd be wrong not to fish it. Brian Trow is actually one of the folks I've been learning how to tie, from.

I tie a lot of golden retrievers, which is very productive in the waters around here, and I play with the colors and what not. You can see two of my variants on it in the album. I also tie a ton of beadhead pheasant tails. I know that fly is one of the best nymphs out there and you can do so much with it, so I've been working on those. Then I also have been tying up some kreelex for the smallies around these parts. I am keeping it to those three, for the most part, right now. Working on getting the techniques down for different sizes, playing with colorations, trying to figure out hackles, etc.

(04-26-2020, 05:36 PM)SunsetBengal Wrote: That is a good skill/hobby to learn. I hope to conquer the art of fly fishing, one day. One of my long time friends and former teammates grew up in Western PA. we often get together and go trout fishing. He pulls out his fly rod from time to time, and tries out various flies that he tied himself. As for me, I stick to the traditional rod and worm, and still catch some trout. Just not the big ones that he lands with the fly rod.

I've found that it is very relaxing for me. Not as relaxing as actually fishing, but pretty darn close. I go to my office, pull out my vise, and just get to tying while listing to music. A great way to kill some time.

[bengaloo]

(04-26-2020, 05:36 PM)SunsetBengal Wrote: That is a good skill/hobby to learn.  I hope to conquer the art of fly fishing, one day.  One of my long time friends and former teammates grew up in Western PA.  we often get together and go trout fishing.  He pulls out his fly rod from time to time, and tries out various flies that he tied himself.  As for me, I stick to the traditional rod and worm, and still catch some trout.  Just not the big ones that he lands with the fly rod.

You wont regret giving it a shot! Lots of reasons to love fly fishing. When I was younger I liked how it involved it was right away. That I was moving, working a stream from bank to bank for long stretches of stream. Sticking my casts and drifing my flies. There was never a dull moment, even if that mean me pulling my fly out of the tree behind me lol. But it wasnt sitting there in a lawn chair looking at a bobber with a worm for hours and waiting for it to sink (which can be fun with booze and a guitar lol). What fly fishing does though, is over time it gives you a good reason to really get in tune with the experience. You'll learn to read water and current like you never did before, just by the nature of it. You'll learn about the real natural foods trout eat, and how that can change from season to season, and how to match that with your flies. That can be taken very far or just novice far and its fun either way. It can be as simple or as complex as you want it to be.  When I teach, everyone says they want to cast like Brad Pitt on River Runs Through It lol. And thats fine they can learn that with practice, but it is not required to catch fish or be a fly fishermen and have fun! Some of the best fly fisherman I know arent the best casters, but they can catch fish like crazy.

My favorite thing about fly fishing, is that over the years it has taken me all over the country to some of the most beautiful places I could dream up, that I would've never seen otherwise. It is relaxing, its calming, its fulfilling and we all could use more of that in this day and age. You can really find your center out there. I would say that it has literally helped me be a more confident and calm person in life. So its personal for me, but I started young and really put my life in it lol. These days its more weekend warrior, but it doesnt matter even 2 hours on the stream is refreshing and relaxing.

[SunsetBengal]

(04-26-2020, 08:26 PM)bengaloo Wrote: You wont regret giving it a shot! Lots of reasons to love fly fishing. When I was younger I liked how it involved it was right away. That I was moving, working a stream from bank to bank for long stretches of stream. Sticking my casts and drifing my flies. There was never a dull moment, even if that mean me pulling my fly out of the tree behind me lol. But it wasnt sitting there in a lawn chair looking at a bobber with a worm for hours and waiting for it to sink (which can be fun with booze and a guitar lol). What fly fishing does though, is over time it gives you a good reason to really get in tune with the experience. You'll learn to read water and current like you never did before, just by the nature of it. You'll learn about the real natural foods trout eat, and how that can change from season to season, and how to match that with your flies. That can be taken very far or just novice far and its fun either way. It can be as simple or as complex as you want it to be.  When I teach, everyone says they want to cast like Brad Pitt on River Runs Through It lol. And thats fine they can learn that with practice, but it is not required to catch fish or be a fly fishermen and have fun! Some of the best fly fisherman I know arent the best casters, but they can catch fish like crazy.

My favorite thing about fly fishing, is that over the years it has taken me all over the country to some of the most beautiful places I could dream up, that I would've never seen otherwise. It is relaxing, its calming, its fulfilling and we all could use more of that in this day and age. You can really find your center out there. I would say that it has literally helped me be a more confident and calm person in life. So its personal for me, but I started young and really put my life in it lol. These days its more weekend warrior, but it doesnt matter even 2 hours on the stream is refreshing and relaxing.

I totally get what you're saying.  However, most of the streams that we fish are small, and difficult to even get the fly to cast effectively.  Don't get me wrong, there are a few rivers that we fish where I could effectively fly cast.  I just need to dedicate the time to learning the art.  When I'm worm fishing for trout, I'm active, in the stream, and frequently moving as well.  No bobbers for me.  I like to drag the holes in the bends, fish the ripples, etc.  It's fun catching my limit of average size trout by lunch time, but it's time to move up to getting the trophy looking ones.

[bengaloo]

(04-26-2020, 06:18 PM)Belsnickel Wrote: I just saw the broken link; I'm not sure what's up with that. Anyway, here is the Imgur post with some of my recent fly tying endeavors. https://imgur.com/a/9KRgq6P


I'm quite partial to native brookies in the mountain streams around here, myself. Unfortunately, some of the best streams are closed off because they are in Shenandoah National Park and people were stupid. But yeah, definitely a great pasttime.


I posted an album link above so you can seed what I've been doing. But yeah, I'm loving this stuff. I do fish Mossy every other week or so. It's only about a 20 minute drive for me and since Mossy Creek Fly Fishing is my local shop, it'd be wrong not to fish it. Brian Trow is actually one of the folks I've been learning how to tie, from.

I tie a lot of golden retrievers, which is very productive in the waters around here, and I play with the colors and what not. You can see two of my variants on it in the album. I also tie a ton of beadhead pheasant tails. I know that fly is one of the best nymphs out there and you can do so much with it, so I've been working on those. Then I also have been tying up some kreelex for the smallies around these parts. I am keeping it to those three, for the most part, right now. Working on getting the techniques down for different sizes, playing with colorations, trying to figure out hackles, etc.


I've found that it is very relaxing for me. Not as relaxing as actually fishing, but pretty darn close. I go to my office, pull out my vise, and just get to tying while listing to music. A great way to kill some time.

I will be checking in on this! I got to figure out how to see the album though lol. If you are 20 minutes from Mossy, you are in a great place. Brookies galore in the blue ridge mtns! I would imagine there are a lot of those tiny little mountain streams around there loaded with brookies.

Golden retriever is a great variety! They will catch about any species of fish too. The BH PT's thats my go to on most wild trout streams. Sometimes on pounded waters I ditch the bead and go straight PT. Fly tying is basically like another sport on top of the fishing. It can be more involved really. Before long you'll be tying perfect dry flies, and small stuff down in the size 20's lol. Or giant musky flies! That is getting popular.

Very glad to know we got some fly fisherman on here. We should keep this thread going. I'll dig around and find some fly pics to post as well.

[bengaloo]

 

Quote:SunsetBengal
I totally get what you're saying.  However, most of the streams that we fish are small, and difficult to even get the fly to cast effectively.  Don't get me wrong, there are a few rivers that we fish where I could effectively fly cast.  I just need to dedicate the time to learning the art.  When I'm worm fishing for trout, I'm active, in the stream, and frequently moving as well.  No bobbers for me.  I like to drag the holes in the bends, fish the ripples, etc.  It's fun catching my limit of average size trout by lunch time, but it's time to move up to getting the trophy looking ones.

You already know how to work the current, eddies, ripple runouts, etc then and that is literally half the battle or more. I usually ditch the cast on small streams and just flip it. I use a technique call high sticking a lot, and really only ever have a small amount of line out. Roll casting, and just flipping sideways upstream, at least until you really find a place to make a back cast. I havent looked, but I bet there are some good vids out there for roll casting and even high stick drifting, but dont let the high sticker guys fool you into buying a 50' long high stick rod lol. Any rod will do, and even a walmart rod will catch fish. I have $1000 fly rods laying around all over my house, but my go to is a $150 Orvis clearwater. Love that little thing. I find a 7'  4weight rod will fish a lot of trout streams in the east, if not all of them. Out west Ill go bigger, and some streams I'll go super small, but a 7ft 4wt will cover a lot of eastern trout streams

You'll catch bigger wilder fish for sure. They eat bugs more than anything in the wild!

[Belsnickel]

(04-26-2020, 08:33 PM)SunsetBengal Wrote: I totally get what you're saying.  However, most of the streams that we fish are small, and difficult to even get the fly to cast effectively.  Don't get me wrong, there are a few rivers that we fish where I could effectively fly cast.  I just need to dedicate the time to learning the art.  When I'm worm fishing for trout, I'm active, in the stream, and frequently moving as well.  No bobbers for me.  I like to drag the holes in the bends, fish the ripples, etc.  It's fun catching my limit of average size trout by lunch time, but it's time to move up to getting the trophy looking ones.

This is one of my regular fly fishing streams.



It is one of the most densely populated brook trout streams in the mid-Atlantic. Not saying you should start off fly fishing in these small mountain streams, but it can be done once you get into it a bit.

[SunsetBengal]

(04-26-2020, 09:29 PM)Belsnickel Wrote: This is one of my regular fly fishing streams.



It is one of the most densely populated brook trout streams in the mid-Atlantic. Not saying you should start off fly fishing in these small mountain streams, but it can be done once you get into it a bit.

That doesn't look much different than some of the mountain streams that I fish in Western PA.  However, the foliage is typically a little more dense near the banks, than your stream appears to be.  But yes, perfect looking trout stream.

[Belsnickel]

(04-26-2020, 09:54 PM)SunsetBengal Wrote: That doesn't look much different than some of the mountain streams that I fish in Western PA.  However, the foliage is typically a little more dense near the banks, than your stream appears to be.  But yes, perfect looking trout stream.

Well, there is a reason for that. The mountain stream you see there is from the Ridge and Valley section of the Appalachian Mountains, whereas the Alleghenies that dominate western PA are of the Appalachian Plateau, just to the west of the R&V. That particular picture is taken on a mountain that sits at the border of VA and WV.