Good morning,
I was tying some green butted Elk Hair Caddis this morning, and was thinking of how few caddis patterns, these days, actually use elk hair.
I have my single reason that I usually use deer hair on caddis patterns, and am wondering if it is the same reason most don’t use elk hair for their caddis patterns?
Just a couple examples, the CDC & Elk is tied with CDC & Deer. The X-Caddis is tied with deer, on and on. I’m sure a few folks will say they always use elk, but certainly the vast majority of commercial tiers use deer hair for most caddis patterns.
What’s your reason for choosing deer hair over elk hair.
This is actually elk hair…
And, thinking of Al Troth:
Often, he is remembered only as the originator of the EHC.
Here is a picture of a plate of flies he tied which hangs in Blue Ribbon Flies.
NJ,
Funny, but I prefer not to use comparadun hair for caddis patterns.
I use comparadun deer hair on Sparkle Duns because it flares so easy/well/completely. To get a caddis sillouhette, I try to select deer hair which does not flare like comparadun hair.
And your reason is? Certainly not thrift, which is about the only justifiable reason I can think of to restrict oneself.
I’d always assumed most tiers used the best material available, whether it be elk or deer. Sure some will cut corners for convenience sake, but I cannot achieve the exact same results across all patterns with a single choice, so I use both.
Availability! When I first learned to tie you could get “Deer Hair” here, that was it. Ask, “What kind of hair?” And the clerk would look at you funny, and say “Deer Hair!” So it really didn’t matter what the pattern called for. It got what you had. If it worked you continued to use it. If it didn’t work you looked for a pattern that did. Then in the mid 90s variety packs of deer hair started to appear, as did dyed belly hair. (You still can’t get belly hair dyed green here though, I have to import mine). If you try to sell someone, who has been successfully using an EHC tied with deer hair for years, a patch of elk hair “because it is what the pattern calls for” you have no chance. Even less if it costs more than the deer hair which has always worked just fine.
I have always been impressed by the huge ranges of deer hairs stocked by some of the shops in the States. Here you get a two inch square patch that was once part of the hide of a deer. Where it came from on the beast is pot luck.
Deer stalking is a major activity here. Well it is something of a classic image of the highlands. Thousands of deer are shot every year. Mostly the skins are left on the hill to rot. A waste of a resource, but trying to convince the stalkers there is a value to them is near impossible.
My reason is probably the opposite of NJ.
I like the floatation of elk over deer hair. But, I don’t care for the somewhat extreme flaring of elk hair.
I like the deer hair which is less flaring than the comparadun deer hair. At Blue Ribbon, they stock patches of deer hair marked “X-Caddis”. This deer hair seems best suited for general caddis patterns. It doesn’t flare too much.
Elk or deer? There are a lot of variables that determine what the hair looks like and how it behaves. Where the elk or deer came from geographically has a lot to do with quality of the hair. As does how old it was when killed; the time of year when it was killed; its diet; how the skin was treated(chemicals); where on the hide a particular patch of skin came from; How was a skin cut up into patches and how were the patches designated for specific uses; etc. To make a blanket statement that elk or deer hair floats or flairs more or less then the other (also, what species of deer) makes no sense. If you’re looking into a bin of patches, elk or deer, you need to examine the patches to see if the qualities you’re looking for is evident. As Alan wrote, often the choice of what to use depends on “availability”.
I have two deer hides that were harvested early before the tips oxidized. There are a lot of different grades of hair on a single hide. Some that flairs a lot, variety of colors from white to brown, different lengths, etc. I find the deer is a good substitute for elk hair, although a little more fragile, or brittle, it still fishes very well. Also it is easier for me to color the hair to suit my purpose. the variety of hairs also allows me to experiment a bit to get different results.
I also “Generally” find Coastal Deer Hair to work well with caddis patterns.
Tig:
As to the whole hide or a big part of it:
Many years ago, I took a 2 day tying class from Jack Dennis. Dennis is sort of a “hair king” in tying. Because his home water was the big Snake River (I presume) he really preferred flies tied with hair.
Anyway, when he sat in front of us and tied, he had a whole deer hide over his lap. He would select the hair he thought was most appropriate based on the pattern he was tying - nearly all with deer hair.
When I first started fly fishing about 14 years ago I received a tip from a friend about where to go and what type of fly to tie for this small mountain stream. He said to use an Elk Hair Caddis and as a beginning tier I followed his instructions and used Elk Hair when tying it. He also said to tie on a BIG size hook and for him that was a size 12. Have fished this stream many times during the year and an EHC will work every time. Tried other flies from time to time and they will sometimes work but no way will they beat the EHC. I call this stream “One and Done” cause if you don’t sneak up low and quietly you’re out of luck and if you catch one in a pool or short run that’s it and you best move on and don’t waste your time. For those that are curious as to the stream’s whereabouts it’s somehwere in the Amazon jungle and that’s as close as anyone needs to know!
Got a bunch of hide pieces from a taxidermist a decade ago. There was this piece of really light colored deer, still brown, not belly hair, that I started using for EHCs just because I could see it easily. Flares just enough, floats well (but I waterproof all my dry flies, so I can get almost anything to float.) Haven’t used anything else since. I have enough in this one piece to tie all I’ll ever need.
The thing is, it seems to not matter to the fish whether we use deer or elk.
As long as it’s what you want or need to use, and it works, it just doesn’t matter.
Byron, I’m also a fan of coastal deer hair. But mainly for haystacks. In larger patterns I would tend to agree with you on elk vs deer. But on #12 and under comparadun hair I feel is more manageable for most.
I lean towards elk in all my hair patterns. But feel availability of comparadun hair drives the choice for most.
