I was fishing one of my favorite rivers in Idaho last week to some famously finicky trout and had a dry that I had tied myself. I caught a nice fish with the fly and noticed that my dubbing was coming off. I tore off what was loose and continued to fish. A couple of cast later and I was hooked up again. After inspecting the fly, there was hardly any dubbing left and it was loose. I tore the dubbing completely off of the fly and began hooking more trout on the surface on this river than I have ever hooked before. I was just wondering: coincidence, dumb trout for a day, luck, or is there something to be said for no dubbing which would equal a thin thread body. I am fairly new to tying (about 2 years), and am wondering how many people use dubbing on all of their dries and why or why not. Also, does the dubbing help or hinder the flotation of the fly. Thanks in advance.
Sure, I use thread bodies for small (#20 and smaller) BWO’s all the time.
It’s the hackle and tail that keep them afloat, whether the body is made from fur, quill, biot or just thread.
You can use other than dubbing for bodies. Thread, biot and stripped peacock herl are 3 that come to mind.
Synthetic and animal fur dubbed bodies are light, trap air and dry fast when false cast so they do float but the hackle has more to do with floating the fly.
Shaneroyce;
Welcome aboard. Stop by the chatroom some evening.
Punch yarn makes a good strong dubbing material.
Of course some times the fish just don’t care!!??
Why didn’t we learn about Punch Yarn decades ago? :roll:
shayeroyce
where about in idaho are you. my wife and i are headed out to driggs on monday the 9 th for two weeks to visit family.
mike
I usually tie several flies with regular bodys and several with really thin bodys. Some days the thicker ones work better than the thinner ones, some days the thinner ones work best. Most days it doesn’t make a difference. Except for chronimids where thinner is always better IMO
I almost never tie my dries with dubbing. All of them, with the exception of sizes under #22, are tied with either dyed turkey biots or dyed hackle quills for bodies. To my eyes, this produces a more life-like segmented body and I feel it also helps the fly float longer, although I’m sure that this difference is miniscule. Even my Adams’ are tied with a dyed dark dun turkey biot body.
And after all, mayflies are not fuzzy!
-Darryl
Shane,
I beleive that the ‘body’, whether it be dubbing, biot, quill, yarn, or whatever is probably irrelevant on most dry flies when it comes to fooling a fish.
Just covering the tied down tail butts and wing roots with thread would serve in most conditions. Heck, I think just tying the stuff in and leaving it mostly ‘uncovered’ wouldn’t likley change the effectiveness of the fly. Give a ‘nicely mottled’ look.
Fly wouldn’t be as pretty in the shop, fly box, or when showing off to other fishermen though.
If you get a chance to see those photos/videos of what is visible and when it’s visible on moving water, it will open your eyes. Often by the time a fish can even ‘see’ the body of the fly it will have already have to have made the decision to take or not, or miss the fly. This is intensified in faster water.
Now, where ‘floatation’ is an issue, the material you choose for the body may make a difference. Not likely on slow moving waters, but on fast, broken, ‘pocket water’ areas, a bouyant fly is handy when you can’t count on the surface tension/hackle union to keep a fly on top.
In this type of water, the more stuff you can reasonably get onto the hook that floats is going to help. So dubing that will trap air, or is permantly ‘water proof’, hollow quills, even foams, for bodies can be neccessary. Especially if you don’t want to spend all day changing flies or shaking little bottles or messing with chemicals.
For those slower gliding stretches, though, you can dispense with bodies altogether if you want to. Shouldn’t matter much to the fish, and should speed up the tying process a bit.
My opinion is, of course, worth all of what you paid for it…
Good Luck!
Buddy
There are many popular dry flies that don’t use dubbing for the body. The Quill Gordon, Flicks Red Quill, Black Quill, Borcher Special, Dun Variant, Cream Variant and Gray Fox Variant to name just a few are all quill body flies and are all very effective fish catchers.
Get some variety in your fly box and have fun experimenting to see which fishes best for you.
I tie many drys without dubbing. I’ll use peacock herl, floss, thread, yarn, pheasant tail, biots, guills, latex and even flashabou.
Hey shaneroyce, welcome to the FAOL BB
Warm Water
Moose main is another good material for undubbed bodies. Makes a great mosquito dry fly.
I stop dubbing at about a 16 or 18. None of my BWOs have dubbing, just thread bodies. And they work just fine.
Dennis
maybe the fact that the dubbing came off added to the attraction, if there was just the bare hook and a hackle, it would allow the body to sink below the surface slightly, if the fish were on emmergers this would explain the success you had.
I’ve caught large numbers of fish on a bare red hook, just to impress onlookers…fish aren’t smart.
shaneroyce,
Just sharing a little bit of something here. I’m fairly new to trout too…by about 6-7 years. One thing I’ve found really important is to pay attention to your observations. You just were given a prime example. And, trust yourself!
No matter how many questions you ask, no matter how much you read (vey important!!) always…ALWAYS… take the time to pay attention.
Another thing I’ve come to feel about much of what you’ll buy is the size od the actual fly. Try to capture a specimen (or a few) and take note of the actual size. You’ll find on many examples that what you’ll get in many shops is much larger than the actual critter.
This has been my experience. And it makes a big difference. A good friend of mine, a very fine fisherman/tier has a saying that’s appropriate…“Sweat the small stuff!”
Jeremy.