I love tying my own flies, but ever since I started, the bane of my existence is the upright and divided hair wing, especially using deer hair or the like. :mad:
It’s not that I can’t do it; I can and I can actually get them to look decent. It’s just that I have tried several “easier” methods, but it just takes me what seems like forever to get it done.
I am currently building stock up on my Green Drake pattern for a trip later this week, and I’m getting fed up with how long it takes me to do the hair wing.
ANY tips and/or advice would be GREATLY appreciated!!! :tieone:
I’ll be checking any answers to this question. I’ve been frustrated with the same thing. Last years batches of royal wulffs look terrible. All the hair wings lean forward over the eye of the hook and don’t want to stay upright.
Well, mine aren’t exactly a work of art, but I have stopped cussing. The trick I found was wing-grade deer hair, the best being from along the spine of the animal. It’s softer and won’t flair. Also, Once I have them standing up straight (at least 8 wraps in front and tight to the post) and divided (four turns back to front and four front to back, I make three wraps thread around the base of each wing. A dab of head cement provides insurance.
Will look forward to hearing how others go about this.
Coughlin
I make a bunch of wraps forward of where the wings will stand as a very early step. Then when I attach the hair for the wings the wraps forward will start the standing before I even think about starting to fight it.
Then I go back, add the tail and tie the body material down. I have very quickly done most of the work you fight and broken it into shorter units. When I then wrap back to the wings I am coming from behind and it is natural to get the first wraps doing real work and pulling the wings back.
Divide with a couple fast X-wraps followed by a couple figure 8s. Now a few wraps around the base of one and then the other…
Where we lose time while trying to get things exactly right is thinking it needs to look exactly a certain way quickly… hair wings take time and breaking it down the way I do it at least makes it seem quicker.
My father always referred to it as “getting away from the problem”. When I experienced difficulties tying (or other things) he would almost always tell me to move on for a minute. With dries you only want as much thread as needed, no more. Fighting the wings will cause you to use excess wraps, wasting time and adding weight… And wings do not float dry flies…
I do size 12 divided wing dries of most flavors in well under 3 minutes when doing them by the dozen with pre-arranged materials, so I think the system works reasonably well.
art
ScottP
Seemed like Charlie was using a lot of thread to stand those wings up and divide them. Not sure if he did it for clarity in the photos or if that is his style. Mine is much sparser on thread…
art
I took a tip from an A.K. Best article and tie my Royal Wulffs using a white turkey T-base feather. Can be stood up and split just like hair or wood duck flank.
Nice and white, easy to see, and much easier to work with than hair.
For some reason T-base only seems to come in white or medium dun, but one can use turkey flats in the same way and they come in a ton of different colors.
I never thought divided hair looked like wings. I only tie parachutes or sparkle duns and that works for me. T-Base turkey is nice and easy to work with.
In the directions he says “3-6 wraps” in each direction to divide the wings; looks like he did the max and it may have been for clarity as you suggested. I’ve been tying a lot of flies lately with calf tail and usually just go with 3 wraps in each direction to divide the hair, 8-10 wrap thread dam up front to get them perpendicular to the hook, then 3 up and 3 down to post each wing, a couple of locking wraps and a drop of Hard as Nails. I use 8/0 Uni because I can lean on it pretty hard and still keep bulk down.
I’m not tying a humpy; I am currently tying Green Drakes. The difference in these drakes is that the wing silhouette is, based on my experience and talking with a fellow last year, the most important part of this fly to the fish. The hair wing is about 2x or a little more taller than you would normally tie them. This makes the fly sooo easy to see on the water, and the fish just crush it.
I tye them in the “standard” way just like in the link ScottP posted (except I trim all of the butt ends of the hair for this pattern since there is no hump) but it seems like it takes me forever to get it to look right. What I am really looking for is an easier, faster way to do it.
For example, one way I read about was to take a straight needle, clamp it in to your vice, then tie a clump of deer hair together tightly. Whip finish it and slide the gathered clump off of the needle. Trim the butt ends and you have a ready-to-go wing that just needs to be attached to the hook, divided and stood up. Make however many you need ahead of time.
I tried that, but didn’t really care for it due to the fact that this process added too much bulk that by the time you had the wing properly finished on the hook, it looked like a big lump behind the wing.
Anyway, tips like that are what I am looking for. Thanks!!!
