Hi SMClark,
Thank you. Much appreciated.
Thanks and regards,
Gandolf
Byron, I have been tying that style of extended body for some time. I thought I was in the minority. LeRoy Hyat
showed it to me. I fish it through the ripples and down into a pool, where it is usually taken, as would be any other fly
fished the same way. I use the 90DV hackle and don’t trim off the bottom, so it sits high in the film. I don’t have much
trouble having my flies damaged as where I fish the biggest trout has only been about 12" long, usually about 8"-10"
but there are plenty of 'em. I do add a drop of cement over the pulled back barbles, which, I think adds a little bit of
durability to the fly. I also tie the fly in “Ice Dub Orange” “STS Trilobal Dark Olive”, even BWO dubbing. All have been
very productive at different times of the year. Thanks for the pics.
Crunchy
… it is hard to beat some of the older extended body flies. Some of those flies are just flat out beautiful.
But when it comes to durability, it is hard to beat some of the newer materials and techniques which make for quick and easy tying.
This past summer I’ve developed and fished three new furled antron extended body mayflies - Duck’s Green Drake, Duck’s BWO, and Duck’s Mahogany Spinner ( all named for Bulletin Board member “ducksterman” for ideas that he gave me for making better furled antron extended bodies for certain applications ).
These three flies have all been very productive on my home water and have proven very durable when fished to West Slope cutthroat trout typically in the 10-15" bracket with the occasional 16" or 17" fishy in the mix.
For example, yesterday I had thirteen such fishies on a Mahogany Spinner before I had to clip it off when the last fish of the day took it rather deep. If I hadn’t cutt it off, I could have kept fishing it, or put it back in the box for the next outing.
John
John,
That’s interesting. How long have you been tying?
I recall that the “twisted” extended body flies were really “hot” back in the 80’s. For a while, nearly all stoneflies and hoppers, for example, were tied using the twisted technique.
Byron
… since April '04 - so about eight and a half years. I’ve been doing my own furled antron extended body designs for stoneflies and hoppers and October caddis since '08, and my first furled antron extended body mayfly was a Western Green Drake the year before that.
The latest example is the Duck’s Mahogany Spinner which I first tied and fished a couple days ago, thus the reference to the 13 fish on one fly.
Today, I fished a fresh one that I tied this morning …
… and had 17 or 18 in hand …
… and the fly was still floating and holding together nicely and fishing well.
But then the 4X tippet ( that I had retied after ten fish ) broke off so I couldn’t complete the intended “durability” experiment. I dare say that if the tippet hadn’t broken, all 22 or 23 that I caught on that pattern today would have been taken with a single fly. And it might have ended up back in the box for the next outing.
John
John,always enjoy your posts.It must be awesome to test your flies in such great waters.
Thanks, Ray. Going to the “test lab” several times a week is tough work - but somebody has to do it. 
Actually, the Lochsa pretty much adopted me the first time I fished it in '09 and we have gotten along famously ever since.
John
… question.
Yesterday, I fished this fly constantly …
… for about two hours and caught about twenty four fish on it.
It’s a bit worse for the wear, but it is still fishable and is back in the fly box.
John
Gee, that’s about a fish every 5 minutes?
Think I will crowd into your waters next year…
The fish have been really active the past week. Must be getting ready for winter. Not sure what they are taking this fly for, but they certainly have been on it. Something similar today in one place I fished. About fifteen fish in not much more than an hour and a half. In another place, they must have been napping. Half a dozen fish in an hour or so. In a couple other places, it was even slower.
That 5 minute average doesn’t really tell the story. When the timing is right, i.e. they are actively feeding and you hit a little pocket where they are stacked up, you might get fish on two or three or four consecutive casts. Do that a few times and you end up with a potful of fish in a hurry.
That kind of catching tends to make me move on to try another fly or someplace else. But I was actually thinking about the “durability” issue yesterday and decided I was going to stick with the fly as long as the fishies kept after it just to see how many fish it would stand up to.
Still don’t have the answer. Guess I’ll have to go back again tomorrow. Besides, tomorrow will likely be the last day this year on my home water - got some tough weather moving in Wednesday.
John