Some warm water flies

[Philly]

Just finished tying these up for my trip to Ontario in late August. Main targets are smallmouth and pike.

Some crayfish patterns.
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What one looks like in a clear container of water

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A couple of top water sliders.

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[lastchance]

Cool! They ought to do the job.

[BadBug]

The Dad's look great. Should please the Smallies.

Dennis

[john52948]

nice looking craw dads

whats the pattern, I think I can use them on the white

[Philly]

nice looking craw dads

whats the pattern, I think I can use them on the white

One of my own. Claws are Zonker strips. The body is either variegated, ice or crystal chenille, two saddle hackles or two schlappen feathers. The eyes are small map pins. Black, orange or white colored with an olive permanent marker. The large ones are tied on 3/0 Eagle Claw Aberdeen hooks. They're about 3 inches long, the average size of the crayfish in the lake I'm going to be fishing. The smaller ones are tied on size 1 or 2 of the same hook. Weight plain dumbbell eyes, not sure of the size, either small or medium.
Steps
1. Tie in the dumbbell eyes on the top of the shank. The eyes on these are tied in Clouser style, 1/3 of the shank length behind the eyes. You can tie them in closer to the eye if you want.

2. Tie in the eyes on the side of the shank. I bend the pin shank so the eyes form a V shape just in front of the bend and about half way up it

3. Tie in the claws, on the side below the eyes. I like to have the leather on the claws vertical.

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4. Tie in a piece of chenille on top of the wrap the thread to just behind the eyes. I like to make a couple of wraps between the eyes, not required. If I do make the wraps, when I finish
I wrap the chenille down just behind the eyes.

5. Tie in two feathers, butt end, one on each side of the chenille.

6. Take hackle pliers, grab the chenille and the tips of the feathers and twist them together tightly, make sure the barbules separate. Wrap the chenille/feathers back, I usually make a wrap over the dumbbell eyes and a couple in front before I wrap them down, and then build a thread head and finish.

Colors, that varies. Mixes of light to dark shades of olive, orange and tan seem to work. I vary the colors. The front view one is, root beer ice/sparkle chenille for the body, feathers one orange and one olive, claws are black-barred crayfish orange Zonker strips. Suggestion. Turn over some rocks, and see what colors and size the crayfish are in the river.
Tony Spezio showed me a fly a friend of his tied, called the Chili Pepper. Basically a Wooly Bugger it had a Burnt Orange Marabou tail, copper chenille with red-brown hackle tied with orange thread. He said it worked for both trout and smallmouth.

[john52948]

thanks for the pattern, ill tie some up and give them a try in the fall

thanks again