You just put 'stuff' on a hook

[Greg H]

To quote from another post on the board here,
"I happened to get my hands on dark brown mink. I have been looking around but haven't found any patterns for trout made of mink (or dark brown hair). Maybe I could use some patterns for Hare, any ideas?
Thorarinn"
By no means do I mean to pick on the author (Thorarinn). However, having tied several thousand flies (not professionally), I am at the point of believing it is just 'stuff' on a hook. Some stuff is short and used as dubbing, and some is long and used as tails, wings, or wrapped as a body.
You could use fur from any mammal on the planet and come up with another nymph, depending on the size and colour of the fur, and the (appropriate) size of the hook. That is to say, a GRHE (no wingcase) is a Fox Squirrel Nymph is a Casual Dress Nymph is a ..., you name it, just the fur has changed. So I think any pattern that uses fur as dubbing or as a strip would work with mink.
I have made excellent nymphs by using coloured bucktail for the tail, body and wingcase, tied in the manner of the Sawyer PT nymph - twisted bucktail makes excellent segmentation.
A friend gave me a bleached fox tail (like on a 50's hot rod). Not good for much except long streamer wings, but when chopped, dyed and blendered, it provided 4 basic colours of spiky dubbing I can blend how I like for large nymphs, but I have never seen a pattern recommending fox tail fur dubbing.
And so on, and so on.
My point (especially to tiers with less experience) is to NOT get stuck believing that a pattern (or material) is valid ONLY when a material (or pattern) is attached to it. Tonight at a presentation on Aurora trout I saw a muddler minnow tied with cream carpet fibres for the body - excellent.
So, if it looks like dubbing or wing material, or material for a wingcase or some other part of a fly, and is the colour and size you think you need - put it on a hook and see if it looks 'fishy' or imitates the creature you have seen in the water. If it works you can go on to design a whole series of flies as good as any others. That's probably how so many variations got into the tying books in the first place.
Cheers,
Greg