January Flies From the Vise

[Gene L 0]

That will fool a bass.  Tied in hand?

[LisaLou 0]

11 minutes ago, Gene L said:

That will fool a bass.  Tied in hand?

Gene, I tie holding the hook pinched in my fingers, usually my right thumb and ring finger to start.  I use the tip of my middle finger to pinch the thread or feather down on top of the hook shank, to do the stop. But then I switch which hand is holding the hook and applying the thread, and I’ll hold the hook at the eye instead of the barbed end, whatever makes it easier.  I’d make a video, but I know my technique is still sloppy and I’d have to bleep out all the swearing.  
I am fairly ambidextrous and I’ve only used my vise a couple of times.  I’m finding I like to instantly reposition the hook and switch hands, so I’m  not really using my hand vise much anymore.

 I see jokes here about sausage fingers, but anyone tying a fly has better than average dexterity.  Everyone here has artistic hands.  LisaLou

[flytire 0]

Cordon's Favorite

Hook - Single salmon
Thread - Black
Tail - Brown hackle
Ribbing - Flat gold tinsel
Body - Red wool
Hackle - Brown
Wing - White bucktail

Fly-Tying Dictionary - J Duckett

[Poopdeck 0]

On 1/4/2024 at 8:17 PM, Mark Knapp said:

Nice, I'm going to make some.

Me too! Nothing like a little freezing rain to get you to the tying bench

[LisaLou 0]

Beaded Fly  tied in hand

size 6 octopus hook

28 gauge wire  (I could not whip finish it without breaking, but it is craft wire, not good stuff)

black sewing thread

black feather

various beads  (Red, size 6 ) (cat’s eye pale green, unknown and most did not fit, but very nice in real life.) (tail, very tiny tube and seed beads)

basically made a thread dam as a head, fed the wire through the three beads on the shank, fed on the tail beads and doubled back through everything back to behind the red bead.  Wound wire a few times, then added black thread, added in hackle and finished it off.  I made a first one that had too many beads, broke the wire, hackle was beat up by the time I was done, etc…..  I scrapped it and started over, doing the hackle last so it survived all my handling.

I wanted to do something more like dragonfly wings, but I spent over an hour just going through my bead stash that I haven’t touched in three years and had to start over due to not knowing what I’m doing.  It was a lot of fun going through the beads I already have, like Christmas all over again, but ate up my free time.

[MuskyFlyGuy 0]

Poopdeck,

Nice looking Tequeelys. They will fish. 

[Poopdeck 0]

8 hours ago, MuskyFlyGuy said:

Poopdeck,

Nice looking Tequeelys. They will fish. 

Thank you. I have been wanting to fish tequeelys for a while now but I never found the time to tie them even though I had all the materials. You, and a little ice storm, inspired me to get to it. I’m excited to fish them. 

[Sandan 0]

@LisaLou, rocking tie

[Mark Knapp 0]

20 hours ago, Poopdeck said:

Me too! Nothing like a little freezing rain to get you to the tying bench

Nice colors man.

[Mark Knapp 0]

20 hours ago, LisaLou said:

Beaded Fly  tied in hand

size 6 octopus hook

28 gauge wire  (I could not whip finish it without breaking, but it is craft wire, not good stuff)

black sewing thread

black feather

various beads  (Red, size 6 ) (cat’s eye pale green, unknown and most did not fit, but very nice in real life.) (tail, very tiny tube and seed beads)

basically made a thread dam as a head, fed the wire through the three beads on the shank, fed on the tail beads and doubled back through everything back to behind the red bead.  Wound wire a few times, then added black thread, added in hackle and finished it off.  I made a first one that had too many beads, broke the wire, hackle was beat up by the time I was done, etc…..  I scrapped it and started over, doing the hackle last so it survived all my handling.

I wanted to do something more like dragonfly wings, but I spent over an hour just going through my bead stash that I haven’t touched in three years and had to start over due to not knowing what I’m doing.  It was a lot of fun going through the beads I already have, like Christmas all over again, but ate up my free time.

Nice.

[Sandan 0]

Twisted sister midge:

Hook: Size 22 straight eye

Thread: 16/0 black veevus

Abdomen: Coats and Clark's brown something or other

Wing: glamour madeira.

Paramidge:

Hook:Size 24, tiemco 2487

Thread: 8/0 tan uni

Post: orange McFlylon

Hackle: whiting bronze grizzly varient

Abdomen/thorax: tan superfine

 

 

 

[Poopdeck 0]

2 hours ago, Mark Knapp said:

Nice colors man.

Thank you. Here’s another

Hook - size 6 3XH 7XL

Bead - 5MM Gold cone

Weight - .020 lead 

Thread - white UTC 140

Tail - White Marabou/opal crystal flash

Body - Hareline  pearl core braid olive.

Legs - Medium round rubber, white

[Bruce Derington 0]

Getting tuned up with the hair, my last challenge thread with the whit bug got me going. Saw this pattern somewhere out there, anyway thought it’d be fun to tie. Have it weighted at bend, hoping it “sits up”on water

Hook: Ahrex Predator 2/0 or any Stinger 

Thread: Semperfli 200 denier

Tail : Crystal flash and Hen cape feathers 

Body: Stacked deer hair ( dyed belly hair)

Eyes: 6 mm plastic

[LisaLou 0]

Woven fly with woven hackle, based on the Sandy Mite   in the book   Art of the Weave: Weaving on the fly    By the Gretchen and Al Beattie

I want to thank everyone for their  kind words, advice and encouragements.  I found some of the pictures in the weaving book hard to follow too, and watched a few videos on YouTube first.  

Hook 

Animal hair for hackle and for weaving body: deer and something else which I will add when someone identifies it for me

two strands of embroidery floss for body weave

two beads and a piece of fishing line to make eyes

sewing thread

kantan hook

I first made a hackle, but did not follow the instructions in the book or online.  Instead, I did larks head knots using my kantan hook with each hair over a single strand of heavy duty sewing thread, stretched between two hook magnets stuck to my desk drawer.   The normal weaving process is two or even three threads, with the hair woven around and between the thread to lock them on.  I'm sure there is a good reason not to do it the way I did, but it seems to work okay.  Two or three threads sounds kind of bulky to me. Maybe too sharp a bend and they with break off?

 Next I followed the body weaving instructions to make the Sandy Mite, using the BT method of weaving the body, then tied in the premade hair hackle.  I wanted to try and make eyes, so I did and added them on since this is an experiment anyhow. Obviously I did not trim the hackle and I might just leave it as is, since it is the first one I made.  The poor thing has been through enough just getting made.  I did use my vise to assemble the fly, but will probably try one in hand just to see if it would be easier.  Thanks for looking, it was a lot of fun and overall went pretty smoothly.  

Edited January 8 by LisaLou
Recipe error: add floss

[Mark Knapp 0]

5 hours ago, Bruce Derington said:

Getting tuned up with the hair, my last challenge thread with the whit bug got me going. Saw this pattern somewhere out there, anyway thought it’d be fun to tie. Have it weighted at bend, hoping it “sits up”on water

Hook: Ahrex Predator 2/0 or any Stinger 

Thread: Semperfli 200 denier

Tail : Crystal flash and Hen cape feathers 

Body: Stacked deer hair ( dyed belly hair)

Eyes: 6 mm plastic

Very nice.