starting realistic fly tying

[Warm Water Fly Fisher]

what are some realistics that are good to start out with? i've never tried it, but it looks fun. please give pattern and pic, or a link to the fly. feel free to pm me as well. Just doing this for fun, not fishing

Thanks
WWFF

[flyandtie]

sorry no pics or anythng.
but stoneflies are a good place to start.
and the www.flytyingforum.com website has a section or 2 on realistic fly tying. that will probably help alot.

[Warm Water Fly Fisher]

after checking out a few websites, i feel like some of them are impossible. how about fishable realistics for now

[flyandtie]

they do look that way dont they!
i have never tried on for that reason, and the wierd materials needed.
as for fishable realistics.....i have no idea.
i m going to stick to normal flies lol.

[Warm Water Fly Fisher]

CarpCrazy, if u read this...
ur true skin stone pics aren't showing up? i tried the one the BB and the ones u put on the fly tying forum.

[flyandtie]

they came up for me on here.
wonder why they dont work for you?

[Warm Water Fly Fisher]

flyandtie can ya gimme a link to the ones that worked for u?
thanks

[flyandtie]

yep sure can, here you go.
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=18474

[kivory]

Fly Fishing Pressured Water by Lloyd Gonzales is a great reference for tying "fishable" realistics.

Ken

[FlyPimp]

There is a great fishable realistic pattern in about every issue of Fly Tyer for the past couple years. A great online resource for tying both fishable and non-fishable realistics is http://www.realisticflytyer.com

I'd also suggest a stonefly nymph as a good place to start. Get yourself a clear 6" ruler with metric units on one side. The most important thing about realistics is proportions, and they're a lot easier to get right if you've measure everything out ahead of time. Here's a stone nymph I did a while back



There's some other ones I've tied at the bottom of the first page at this link, and I think a couple on the 2nd page.

http://s205.photobucket.com/albums/b...k/Fly%20Tying/

There's a few fishables mixed in as well. For me the big thing with fishable's isn't to make sure that the fly has every detail of the real thing. I've had much more success with fishable's that look halfway close, and most importantly one's that feature the main characteristics of the natural. For example, when stone nymphs are drifting in the current, their body takes a "C" shape, and their legs wriggle like crazy. My best stone nymph on the river is a simplified version of the one pictured above, with rubber legs, and an angora goat dubbed thorax.

One cool thing about tying realistics is your normal patterns will improve because of it, and you'll think of ways to improve them to make them look or act more real. Here's one I came up with based on a parachute dry fly
http://<br /> <a href="http://i205.p...wnwing.jpg</a>

It floats a lot longer than my normal parachutes and still sits nice and low in the film. Plus it has a more realistic profile. It's a good example how you don't have to have 6 legs, eyes, leg hairs, gills, individual body segments, etc. to make a pattern a little more real.

Some great materials you'll probably need at one point or another are
-yellow, brown, and black permanent/waterproof/non-bleeding markers
-Swiss Straw
-Medallion Sheeting
-Broom Bristles or Japanese Nymph Legs
-Latex
-Softex

You'll probably already have many of the other things you'll need. Or if you really want to challenge yourself you can follow in Bob Mead's footsteps and try to create realistics with only natural materials.

Something else that will really come in handy is a pair of 1.5X-2.5X reading glasses.