As always, Scott, a good SBS and good looking fly pattern.
Steaming really does fluff up chenille, but, having another piece of equipment on my fly tying table is an “accident looking for a place to happen!” What I have found that helps to fluff up chenille, and I do it all the time when using chenille, is once I have the bare thread core tied onto the hook shank, I grasp the other end of the chenille either in my fingers or a material clip and twist it a few times. This makes the chenille material fluff out and eliminates the crease caused by the cardboard edges that the chenille was wrapped on.
I’ll give that a try, too. I do my steaming in the kitchen - since my wife’s always heating water up for tea, I just bonus off that and hold the chenille above the spout. At the end of the day, this is just for show because as soon as the fly gets wet, it won’t make much difference anyway; can’t be tying sloppy flies for an audience, though
That is a very nice looking simple fly to tye. I like the Squirel wing best. I see your using grey squirrel. What do you think about using Fox squirrel instead that I feel might complimnet the hackle. Any way nice looking fly. Thanks for sharing.
Why are you making the wing so long, it’s going to wrap around hook and fish will be hitting it and not the hook itself. For flies such as that the wing should only extend 1/4 shank distance from bend.
My friend sent me pics and asked me to replicate. Since he fishes for SRCs (I don’t) and has had success with this fly (I’ve never used one), I figured he would know better.
I’m not a very good streamer fisherman and don’t fish them often, but I haven’t had too much trouble with the hackle wings wrapping; marabou wings on occasion, yes. Actually did okay with these
I’ll try out the fly as is and if it does foul, I’ll sub some red bucktail for the hackle fiber tail and shorten up the wing.
