Thanks for taking a look at the flies in the contest. I decided to tie a pattern I had never tied before and logistically it was a challenge. Not a lot of room when you’re tying two streamers on a single hook and leaving room to attach a third streamer as a stinger hook.
Actually, the contest is over on Facebook and I got knocked out in the first round of the competition. No worries though. I joined for the fun of it and figured I tie something completely different as a challenge to myself. The contest was sponsored by Norvise. There were 64 tiers from all over. It’s run much like the college basketball March Madness and is called the Norvise March Madness tying contest. They paired us up against another person as our competition by drawing names out of a hat. The 64 has been pared down to 32, and after next week, down to 16, etc. etc. They had 20 categories of diffenent types of flies and each week they select a new category for the remaining tiers to tie. Many of these folks are guides and pros who tie all the time, so I knew I would be challenged. You have to tie the flies on a Norvise and show the pattern in the vise half finished and then finished. At the end of the contest, all the flies will be auctioned off to donate to a chariety like healing waters. There’s a total of $6,000 worth of prizes from different sponsors including Norvise. I’ve been tying on my Norvise system for the past 25 years and love the system with the vise and the autoretractng bobbins Also, the guys that bought the company after Norm Norlanded passed away provide AMAZING customer service and support. Weekly live feed videos by different Norvise Ambassadors as well as Youtube videos on topics like disassembling and servicing your vise or new products or tying techniques. I’ll be sending this fly off to Norvise to auction it off, but I’ll be tying some more since I now live on a lovely 100 acre lake in Central Florida and I’m sure the big bass would find it attractive.
I freely admit that I tie for the pleasure of tying and to catch fish with the flies I tie, not fishermen. That said, when I had been tying for a couple of years, I entered a number of contests sponsored by Whiting Farms. I won three of the five contests I entered and received embroidered Whiting Farms hats which I wear as small trophies when I attend fly tying/fishing shows. Maybe I should have quite while I was ahead;)