tying foam flies

[getholdofjoru 0]

Great note on the thread torque.

[wanderinwalker 0]

A pattern I experimented with last summer used a foam overcase, a dubbing underbody, a peacock herl head and some pieces of rubber out of a bungee cord for legs. It was intended to represent a terrestrial spider, though it wasn't a perfect pattern. I only tied a small handful and lost all of them while trying to get them back on the fish! When I get home tonight I may tie one up and see if I can get a picture of it.

 

IIRC, I tied it as follows:

 

1) Prepare hook with black thread.

2) Tie in piece of foam cut to a teardrop shape at hook bend(or maybe I did it oval).

3) Dub body. I used brown and tan to mimick the spiders hanging out in the trees at my favorite trout spots.

4) Tie in two to four rubber strips, just longer than the hook shank. I used white because it was what I had that was scaled to the body and the fish ate them up just the same. Plus the white helped spot the thing on the water. The number of legs didn't really seem to matter.

5) Bring foam case forward and tie down.

6) Wrap a strand of peacock herl for a head, gives the fly a little flash on the water.

7) Finish head.

 

It sounds complicated, but with a little practice it wasn't taking me long to tie them. I am thinking that you could skip the head and it will work just as well. Use closed-cell foam to get the bug to FLOAT. And hold on! This would also make a killer panfish fly, I'm sure.