A few buggers utilizing scruffed up dubbing in a loop in lieu of hackle. Hoping to use these at an ice fishing derby this coming weekend.
Olive
Hook: J. Stockard J2 604, Size 10
Bead: Dark Olive Firehole Stone, 4.0mm
Thread: Olive 6/0
Tail: Olive Marabou (Should have added flash got lazy, oh well)
Body: FTD Mottled Olive Atomic Dub and Light Olive SLF Prism in a dubbing loop
Blue
Hook: J. Stockard J2 604, Size 10
Bead: Black tungsten, 4.0mm
Thread: Black 6/0
Tail: Black Marabou and Blue Krystal Flash
Body: FTD Black Bugger Dub and Electric Blue SLF Prism in a dubbing loop
nice looking flies, I tie something similar to them, I use a zonker strip for the tail. started tying them in this manner about 7-8 years ago, I got tired of paying big dollars for terrible hackle, I call them un-wooly buggers
Hackle is just…hackle. You’re right, half the stuff you pay for is unusable so it just makes more sense to me to tease out some dubbing. Honestly the rabbit strip is a great idea; I’ll have to try that because the strung marabou I have is old and probably more useful as a trash bag liner.
another little trick you could try, is to wrap a section of zonked squirrel or rabbit around the hook shank, same as what you would do with a hackle. a few years back a pattern called a pine squirrel cheater appeared on this web site I got the idea of palmering the zonker strip from that posting. I felt like wrapping the entire hook shank with the zonker strip was just a little to bulky for my liking , so I started loop dubbing most of the body and just using one or two wraps of zonker strip at the head. now I loop dub the body, and at the head I insert a zonker strip into a loop, cut the hide off the strip twist It and wrap it around the hook shank. this method give sme a little more control as to length of spun fur and density. one other point, rabbit gives you a much more flowing appearance than the squirrel does, kinda closer to the marabou appearance.
Thank you for the tip! I’ve done palmered zonker on some mouse patterns before and I’ve also done some zonker in a dub loop like you mentioned on some micro leeches before but I’ve never thought to incorporate it into a bugger pattern. Thank God for forums for some refreshing new ideas!
