dry flies

[Joshpilon08 0]

alright guys and gals,

 

im looking to beef up my dry fly skills. looking for some easy to tie, deadly patterns. (more easy to tie than deadly). so throw some ideas and i will try them. possiblly post some pictures in the porcess. thanks in advance.

 

joshpilon08

[vicrider 0]

Basically all dry flies using a simple tail of hackle, a body of dubbing tightly wrapped on thread, hackle tip wings and wrapped hackle in front of and behind wings are the same and learning to do an Adams well, with or without the double hackle in front, will open the door to any number of flies. There are any number of SBS and videos on this and other dry flies

 

Another good teaching fly is the simple mosquito. Just need a couple of Grizzly hackles. Grizzly hackle tail. Stripped Grizzly hackle quill wound touching turns for body, Grizzly hackle tip wings and Grizzly hackle wrapped in front and back of wings.

 

Once you start tying some of these very basic flies you can begin to branch out into hair wings, CDC wings, split hackle wings, and other body types. Begin with no hooks smaller than a 12 while getting the feel of tying dries. Smaller flies will come easier once you have good basics learned on 10 or 12 hooks.

 

Get started, don't get discouraged, keep a razor handy, and learn early a lesson many of us take too long to learn. If you're on a pattern and something is screwed up, don't just keep going but back up and fix it step by step and you'll be shaving a lot fewer hooks.

[Flat Rock native 0]

Trudes, if you have the correct materials. Elk hair caddis. CDC & Elk. Then Quigley Cripples. Then Blue Winged Olives. Great advice from vicrider on larger, medium, small sizes and the Mosquito that is actually a Calibaetis mafly

[Joshpilon08 0]

Pretty much the only dry fly I've tied is the Griffiths gnadt. In a couple different sizes. Works well sometimes but is harder to see on the waters surface.

[fishinguy 0]

CDC&elk! Super easy, 2 materials, works great.

[Kentuckysteve 0]

Just a few:

 

Elk Hair Caddis

 

Adams Dry Fly

 

 

Blue Wing Olive

 

Yellow Sally

 

Griffith's Gnat

 

 

 

[flytire 0]

adams parachute

 

comparadun

[DrVette 0]

One of the hardest to learn...because of size...is the mosquito. You just use a small tuft of hackle for the tail, 2 moose mane(one dark, one light) to make a body and about 3 twists of badger hackle. But you must get it down to at least #16 (20 is best) to work. When you get good try adding Hackle-tip wings.

These will rise fish sometimes when nothing else will.

They will build your skills and confidence if you stick to trying them.

[Flat Rock native 0]

One of the hardest to learn...because of size...is the mosquito. You just use a small tuft of hackle for the tail, 2 moose mane(one dark, one light) to make a body and about 3 twists of badger hackle. But you must get it down to at least #16 (20 is best) to work. When you get good try adding Hackle-tip wings.

These will rise fish sometimes when nothing else will.

They will build your skills and confidence if you stick to trying them.

This true IMHO, hope things are good for you😎😎😎

[Cold 0]

.

[Philly 0]

Let me add one that uses a single material. The Usual. The only material you need is a Snowshoe Rabbit's foot. I tie them from size 12 to size 20. I often use a CDC feather tied in the same way as on the CDC and Elk for the body. Gives me a better variety of color to "match" the hatch. Actually, I looked at my dry fly box and all I have are simple patterns. Gone are the parachutes and the winged flies. Nothing to complicated for my fat and now slightly arthritic fingers to tie. One caddis pattern, the CDC and Elk. Tied in different colors and sizes. If your planing on tying a bunch of deer hair caddis, see if you can get hold of a deer's mask. Already mentioned the Usual and a variation of the Quigley Cripple, that use Snowshoe hair for the wing and tail, and a CDC feather for the thorax. They work.

[DrVette 0]

I would also recommend the Renegade, and variants, around size 14-18. They will build you hackle control while tying and are a very good attracter dry.

Having a Nor-vise to make peacock Chaniel made these my favorite. 3 wraps of a fine thread over a regular herl twist will protect it from toothy fish a little. Don't worry about the color of the hackles.

[Crackaig 0]

Not going to give you a list of flies because I have no idea what you will find useful where you are. Even some insects that have the same name are different insects this side of the pond. However, here are some things to think about.

 

Dry flies don't float! They stand on the top of the water (meniscus). Flies that float sink into the surface; those are buoyant flies. There is a big difference. The smaller the fly you tie the larger percentage of it is steel, and we know how well that floats. Therefore think about spreading the weight across the hackle and tail.

 

If a material is going to help a fly float it must come in contact with the water. Scientifically floating occurs when a body displaces water of a greater weight than the thing immersed in it. So if, for example, you ever think of using CdC (which can help a fly float) as a parachute wing, you gain nothing. The CdC used this way does not come into contact with the water. Only the air above it. Therefore for a CdC parachute post to help, it would have to be lighter than air.

 

Look at the insects you see fish feeding on. Tie something like that. That is imitative fly fishing! Don't think you must stick to patterns.

 

Height, even a tiny amount, can make all the difference.The thickness of the body difference in how the fly stands on the water can, and often does, mean the difference between success and failure. I use one pattern for all my dun flies. That is adult up wing flies (what are often inaccurately called mayflies) standing on the surface. I vary the size and colour to match the hatch, but the tying method is the same. The pattern can easily be tied as a parachute, but I don't. I have tied it as a parachute and it works sometimes. It does not work half as well as it does with the hackle tied around the hook shank, and trimmed flat below the body. The difference between the two is that the trimmed hackle sits one body width higher on the water.

 

On the tying side, almost all dry flies can be tied with one pass each way along the hook shank. There is never any need to keep running the thread back and forward along the hook shank. Plan what you are doing and cut out the waste of effort and material. Also, as always, fly tying is like computing... Garbage in garbage out! The best flies can only be tied with the best materials.

 

Having watched a lot of fly tying videos, I have come to the conclusion that most tiers believe that, to take turns of thread off is the worst kind of blasphemy. It is not. If something is not right take the turns off and do it again, Right this time. If your thread is in your way when you manipulate a material take a couple of open turns to park your thread by the eye, then take them off when you continue. If you tie in a material, then pull it out by accident, take off the turns you used to tie it in before tying in again. Those turns are loose. Tight wraps over loose wraps slip. Believe me, no bolt of lightning will fall on you from the sky if you take wraps of thread off. There really is no commandment stating "Thou shalt never remove a wrap of thread from thy fly".

 

Cheers,

C.

[Dave G. 0]

Pretty much the only dry fly I've tied is the Griffiths gnadt. In a couple different sizes. Works well sometimes but is harder to see on the waters surface.

If you tie the Griffiths Gnat already, you have made the first two steps of three to tying an Elk Hair Caddis. You could either use the peacock herl body as is or sub in dubbing and learn an extra new step. But if you look at an EHC, you can see that under that elk hair wing is nothing but a Griffiths Gnat, maybe with some different colors is all.

[BoSmith 0]

https://tieflycast.wordpress.com/2016/05/16/easy-to-tie-easy-on-the-eye-dry-fly/

 

Something from my blog for tying an easier dry fly when getting down to the <20 sized hooks. This can also be useful for >20 sized hooks. Also makes them far easier to fish. The pattern is based on a BWO but can be translated into any parachute pattern.