Some thoughts on materials and patterns

[rainbowchaser]

I seem to be seeing a lot of new tiers concerned because they don't have the right material to tie a given pattern. Remember that that pattern was developed by someone using the materials they had at hand. The start of every fly is a vision in the tiers mind of some sort of fish food or lure. If this is a natural insect or minnow etc. begin by observing the real thing if you can or research it on the web if you can't. Find a picture on the web. This alone puts you miles ahead of where I started tying. Read about the way it lives and acts when it is available to the fish. Then look at the standard patterns for the thing you want to imitate. If you find one that you have the materials to tie and that seems to match your research your all set. If not then look at the materials you have and think in terms of creating an impressionistic image of your target fish bait. You will be influenced by the patterns you've seen of course. There is little or nothing that is totally new in fly tying. Think in terms of floating/ sinking, smooth/rough and buggy, bulky/ slender and delicate etc. Think of how you need to present the fly and apply the techniques you have learned as well as any you come up with to make a fly. Maybe we'll be reading about your fly next.

[Eight Thumbs]

I don't think that there is a single fly tying material that can't be successfully replaced by something else. A fisherman might notice the change and not like it but the fish seldom care. I agree, use what you have! 8T

[jeffnles1]

You mean I really don't have to get one micron thin shavings from fossielized possum toenails for the shell back on my FPT (fossilized possum toenail) nymphs?

My wife will be happy that I'll no longer be digging holes in our yard looking for fly tying parts.

Serioulsy, I was tying some Adams flies a while back and didn't have girzzly hackle, all I had was brown. So, I tied with what I had. 6 trout in the Lynn Camp Prong of the Little River didn't seem to mind at all.

I do enjoy the "art" part of tying and like to tie a fly that looks just like the pictures in the books and that's what I strive for. But I'm not really the fish care about all of that.

As long as it's the right size, shape, and looks like something good to eat, I'm not sure a fish cares much if the eye spot is real jungle cock or magic marker (or even not there at all).

I've only been tying for a couple months, but have been fishing for years and have caught many fish on the "wrong" fly.

Interesting thread.

Tie, fish, and be happy.

Jeff

[rainbowchaser]

I had intended this to be the first paragraph of a longer post with examples of various substitutions. I cut it off rather quickly when a lightning storm started. I have already replaced one computer with a burned out mother board this year and that is enough. In retrospect such a list might have become itself a limiting set of recipes. One point I really would like to add is that your fly does not have to look like something you would be willing to buy in a fly shop to catch fish. My first attempt to imitate a bug I had seen on the water many years ago was an emerald damselfly that was very visible on the Pere Marquette river. I found a segment of hombre yarn that was the same color as the bugs. I knew the damsels had no visible tails but I used several moose main fibers anyway to get the fly to float on a #6 hook with a body of wrapped yarn that was much too thick (It didn't occur to me to break it down into a single ply). I did get the very dark gray wings right and finished with grizzly hackle because that was all I had that was that big. It looked more like a big green cigar that was shredding apart as it burned with a blackish smoke than a damsel fly. It caught trout even on that heavily fished river with it's educated trout. Remember you are trying to catch fish not impress fishermen with your flies.

[Eight Thumbs]

Jeff,

Unfortunately, fossilized possum toe nails are the single exception to the substitution rule. A micron difference, one way or the other, will result in a complete refusal of any fish to hit the fly. Sorry, it's back to the digging for you. 8T

[Deezel]

While I generally agree with the idea of substitutions, there are some items that just don't look like the real thing. Does it matter to the fish? Perhaps not but it does to the fly tier and/or the fisherman and therefore, it does have an effect on the fish. Here's an example of what I mean: You are standing in a river fishing a streamer when you spot some Hendricksons (or any other bug) beginning their hatch. You fix your tippet accordingly and reach into your vest for the flybox containing flies for that hatch. You open the box and see a dozen flies that will 'match the hatch'. Some have wings that are an imitation of what the typical recipe calls for. Some have bodies that are a little off in terms of color. A few are tied with wings and bodies that are in the original recipe and look buggier. Don't tell me that how you view the flies is not going to effect which one you select to use and if the ones you don't select stay in the box, the fish will never get a chance to see them.

Sure, if you happen to be at a camp and need to tie up some flies to match something and you have no alternative, by all means you have to substitute and use the flies you tied. However, if you go to a river and have a choice of flies tied with 'something' versus flies tied with its substitute, I'm guessing that, all other things being equal, you'll choose the flies tied with the 'something'.

Oh, yet to find any good substitute for jungle cock.

Deezel

[flybinder]

Yeah, the most fish catching fly. in the history of the obsession,The Royal Coachman, sure looks like a lot of insects I've seen on the water!
As stated, so well, "Flies to catch fish, flies to catch fishermen".

Tying God; I hope, as you continue your search, you take 8T's advice to heart!?!
He's right, when it comes to this pattern.
Also, on that particular nymph, (if you're tying to fish it and actually expect results, that is), the shavings must also be from only;
"THE LEFT, REAR, FOOT-CENTER NAIL OF THE OPOSSUM"!!
Be sure to shave the nail, about an 1/8th" out, from where the nail forms on the foot,as this is the thickest part and far less likely to break when tying it in.
And, for God's sakes, DON'T FORGET to use saliva stained cheek fur, for dubbing the thorax! (it's easy to differ, from other cheek fur. It has that "chewed tobacco brown" color to it).

[rainbowchaser]

Eightthumbs, you missed the other absolutely irreplaceable material. Your iron blue dun hackle must be from a rooster killed by a maiden at midnight on the dark of the moon or you just won't catch fish. The mere presence of other iron blue dun hackle in your tying kit will significantly impact you fishing success. I keep a couple of maidens chained in my dungeon just for the purpose of killing these birds. so contact me to get your sorcerer's hackle.

[Eric-WD]

c'mon fisher people use your imagination, I have often used scrapings from a knitting needle that was soaked in tea for a week to simulate fosilized Possum toenail. and you guessed it "The fish don't seem to mind"

Eric

[Clay]

I'm one of those new tyers and really haven't been fly fishing all that long. Two comments: one concerns matching the original food source. I never saw a bass eat anything like a buzz bait or a safety pin type spinner bait in the wild. I believe that there are times durring a hatch that the fish are so keyed into a food source that you must, but most of the time, it it looks fishy it can and will catch fish. One guys opinion only.

The second point that I remember from a presentation by Gary Borger a few months ago was that he keyed in on 4 main points of a fly. Size, wing type, color and the final one was what he said most people did not consider and that was movement. In other words how the fly acted in the water. If you dead drift a match the hatch type pattern when the real deal is moving franticly in a repeatable way you aren't doing to catch as many. If you are fishing an emerger on the very top almost out of the water, you will do better fishing an emerger in the film instead of on top of it.

As far as substitutions go, my material selection is no where what a fly tyer of 20 years has in their room full of stuff. I have to substitute.