The warm water season is pretty much over for our Northern members and has slowed to a crawl for all but our deepest South members. I’m sitting at my tying bench and planning for the spring. I’m composing my mental list of replacement flies that I need to tie and new flies that I want to try. So far, it looks like I will start with a bunch of Czech nymphs, a couple dozen woolly buggers (plain and beadhead) in black or olive, a couple dozen Clousers in plain white and chartreuse/white and a dozen small Deceivers in plain white. I’ve still got a good supple of Gurgle Pops and Crease Flies so they’re on the back burner for a while.
What have you got planned to refill your fly box and to experiment with in the upcoming Spring? 8T
I have a backtsock of so many trout flies that I decided to stop tying for a while. I simply feel like I have to many. I have plano boxes full of nymphs, dries and streamers. Each compartment in the box has at least half a dozen to a dozen flies in it.
So for now I have stopped tying until I at least donate some to fish and trees.
…Those Czech nymphs look like fun to tie…Nevermind…
I tied this as an experiment tonight. It’s an attempt to combine the attraction of a full dressed deer hair bug with the easy casting properties of a gurgler. If I still like it in a few days I’ll tie some more.[](http://i138.photobucket.com/albums/q269/crockeryflytyer/IMGP0254.jpg)
This is a variation on the Cat’s Whiskers. Use a bit of Rabbit for the tail, say Yellow. Then make the body two-tone by tying the back half with say White chenille and fisnishing with yellow. Instead of the hair trailer, tie in a few strands of silver flash cut just past the hook point. Finish with the bead chain eyes. You can mix and match any colors. The guy that created this fly calls it his spinnerbait fly. I’ve caught Smallies, Rockies, Gills, LM, and a Perch on this fly. Yeah, a Perch. I was in the Cuyahoga River.
I’m on a softy kick, and was so impressed with a fly Rick Z sent up as a surprise, one of his Goldies. I’m thrilled he has posted the FOW. Otherwise I have a variation of a Dremmel worm I’m working on mentally. A bass/northern fly combining a length of zonker strip with a Dremmel’d foam diving head. Otherwise, my typical fly box fillers. JGW
I’m glad to see that some other warm-water fly fishermen are already thinking about Spring. Here in Upstate South Carolina, the beginning of March is usually the start of better times on the lakes. It isn’t all that far away.
Flyandtie1, you really do need those Czech nymphs! 8T
I’ve been tying a lot of poppers and Clousers for Largemouths/Smallmouths and Striper/Wipers. This year, I am doing away with Hair Bug Poppers and divers, due to last year’s success with rainy’s foam poppers I tied. I zap a gap hollow mylar tubing over the bodies and tie an inner tail of hackles and flashabou on an Alec Jackson hook. The result is a long, slender, flashy, baitfish profile that stripped and popped fast or slow, drives the fish nuts.
For Clousers,(Half and halfs really), traditional hooks are slowly being replaced with 60 degree jig hooks, for a little more confidence for fishing weed beds and rocks. A buddy of mine and I stumbled upon a lake this past fall chocked full of Smallies, with a lot of rip rap around it, hence the sure-ride Clousers/ Half and Halfs. They will be tied in as many colors of bucktail and hackles I can find. I am going to need a bigger box.
We also are going to be on the hunt for huge carp this year. I caught a lot of them last year, but I want to focus on locations with bigger fish. I usually fish leeches or slump busters for them, so we’ll need to get some of those tied too.
Gee, Fishbum, are ya’ sluffin off?
I just read an interview article about A.K.Best, in a Cleveland newspaper, (don’t ask me why, when I live in Oregon), and he was complaining, because;
“With all his weekends tied up with shows, demos and such… he’ll probably only be able to turn out about 500 dozen, flies this season”. (yeppers, that’s 6,000 flies).
It’s an excellent fly! Check the archives, here, it’s there!
On the home page, type “crackleback” into the top, left side, search box…hit enter and the first thing to come up, will be the Crackleback article #259.
Thanks flybinder. My problem was I was putting a s on crackleback. It looks like a very interesting fly. Is the hackle suppose to be dry fly or wet fly? It looks like I am tying these for spring.
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