Ribs1

ding ding ding ding. I forgot I posted this fly on here a while ago. Still, it's a tough search since I don't think it's posted anywhere else on the internet. Nice work :thumbsup: :smoke: :jumpy:

Nope

Now, You are very very close. This fly is an Earl Madsen pattern. The "Madsen Barber Pole Drake" is a mayfly pattern and this is a stone fly pattern. Commonly fished in the mid spring when we have large yellow stones coming off in the afternoon on the Au Sable. I'm very impressed with this guess as both of these flies are virtually unknown outside of Michigan. Just for fun, Here's the Madsen's Barber Pole Drake Also, for the previous Guess of the Robert's Yellow Drake, here it is

You are very close. This pattern was developed by a friend of Clarence Roberts and this fly was named after Clarence Roberts. Actually the fly was named after Clarence Roberts' occupation.

Nope

OK boys, here's a tough one. Clues 1. Developed in Grayling Michigan probably in the 60's 2. That's the only clue ^

I have ordered from these guys before. Jack Gartside also gets his Marabou here. http://www.featherplace.com/ic/fp/product/TURKEY%20FEATHERS/ These are their retail prices. If you have a business account, they have wholesale pricing as well.

I've gotten a lot of pheasants on Ebay for very cheap. Last year I bought a lot of 8 roosters and 2 hens for $25 total. These were nice birds that had been skinned nicely and treated well. I split them up amongst my buddies and kept 2 roosters and 1 hen for myself. I have seen lots of other hen pheasants go on ebay for cheap.

I am only relating what I have learned from the recognized world master of deer hair as it relates to fly tying. There is no one with more expertise than Chris Helm and this is the way he does it. This however is not the only way. I personally have treated about 10 skins and hung out with Chris while treating a few hundred. If you buy hair from Chris it is not treated with borax and doesn't need to be. I've got pieces of hair from Chris that are up to 10 years old and they do not have mold on them.

I went down to Chris Helm's place in Toledo last year to learn how to do this. I took a few hides down and he showed me the program. Here's the steps that Chris follows (and he is the worlds foremost expert on this) 1. Scrape the hide. Chris uses an angled board (ironing board shaped) and a 2 handed knife. Stretch the hide over the board and start scraping the fat and meat off the hide. You have to get all the meat and fat off the hide. 2. Wash the hide. Fill your laundry tub with very hot water and add about a cup of ivory liquid or more. Soak the hide in this for a day then rinse. 3. Drip dry the hide. Hang the hide and let it drip dry for a few hours 4. Tack the hide on a board. Layout the hide on a large piece of plywood hair side down and nail the skin to the board. Prop the board against the wall and let dry for a few days. Cut the skin into whatever size pieces you want. Chris uses an electric carpet cutter. Make sure to cut up the skin outside as this is the messiest part of the job. According to Chris (and me) you don't need any borax, salt or anything else.

Ram is so cheap right now, you could add another 4 gb and make a ram disk for photoshop. http://www.superspeed.com/ramdisk.php I just build a photoshop machine for a client and went this route. It's fast.

Where do yo fish in Phuket? I was there for 2 weeks for my honeymoon. We went on a charter one day fishing for small Tuna. It was pretty much the worst fishing trip I ever had. The boat went about 4 knots and took 3 hours to get to the fishing spot. We fished for an hour and 3 hours back. I got 1 tuna though. It also took me a number of days to realize that no one should ever ride a tuk-tuk. Other than that, it was a great trip.

Nice work. Q6600 is by far the best bang for the buck right now. What OS are you running? Vista 64 bit? Just curious about how you are making use of all that ram. I'm planning to use XP 64 bit on my new machine.

You did good with the video card. These days, the gamers cards are the best option. There is no difference between the graphic designer type cards and the gamers type. When you buy an Nvidia Quadro or ATI Fire GL card you are only paying for the packaging and a different bios. The actual hardware is the same. The only reason to get a Quadro is if you want to pay 2-3 times more money. What processors did you get?

Get A.K.'s book dying and bleaching.

I will be there and I will be parked at Jerry Regans booth most of the time watching the master at work.

I ran outta gas. I had a flat tire. I didn't have enough money for cab fare. My tux didn't come back from the cleaners. An old friend came in from outta town. Someone stole my car. There was an earthquake, a terrible flood, locusts. It wasn't my fault! I swear to God! :rockon:

The grower is responsible for grading the cape. There is no regulatory agency that grades bird skins.

Jack Gartside.

If you meet Bob in person he will tell you that he uses mostly 3366 for his own flies. Mustad 71S SS are about 7-8 dollars per 25. Mustad 3366 hooks are $3.25 per 100. The 3366 hooks are just as durable in fresh water. I fish a lot and tie a lot of flies. I just can't justify paying 7-8 bucks for 25 hooks.

$3.25 per 100. Now thats cheap. These have to be the cheapest possible hook of any kind that you could possibly buy.

I like to use the same hooks that Bob Clouser uses which are Mustad 3366. These are very nice hooks and probably the cheapest fly hooks on the market. I get them for under $4.00 per hundred.

Wait until you do catch a big bowfin on fly gear. I call them fresh water tarpon around here. The bigger ones literally explode when hooked and take off like a small tarpon. These are not trash fish to me (even though they are really ugly).

I love this topic. I also target gar on a regular basis. I have had good success with a small rope fly like the one described by gar man Jack. I also tie a small Gartside Gurgler with a frayed nylon rope as a tail. I am also carp crazy and spend about 30 days a year chasing them. I take a lot of heat locally for not killing carp and gar. There are so many ignorant people that think we should try to play god and get rid of the trash fish. I was fishing the mulberry hatch one day and catching carp one right after another. Another angler waded near me and got very upset that I was releasing my catch. He said "carp are an invasive species and as such should be removed from the river immediately". I asked him "do you fish for brown trout?" He said yes. I told him that brown trout are also an invasive species introduced to this country later than carp and that I would sooner kill all my catch of brown trout before killing one carp. I almost got into a fight over that one.

I took 2 deer hides down to Chris Helm's place last year. Chris showed me his process of preserving the hide. I would consider Chris the worlds foremost guru of processing deer hides for fly tying. All we did was completely flesh and de-fat the hide using a fleshing beam and a 2 handed knife. Next we soaked the hides in a tub of hot water with lots of ivory liquid dish soap. The hot water and dish soap will clean the hair, remove oils, clean blood and hopefully chase any pests out of the hair. We left the hides to soak overnight. The next day we removed the hides from the soak and rinsed. Then we soaked the hides in water to remove soap residue. Once we were done soaking all we did is tack the hides up on a full sheet of plywood and let it dry for a few days with a fan blowing on it. After a couple days of drying the hide we took the nails out and laid out the hide. Chris marks the hides and then uses a carpet cutting device to cut the hides up into squares. I like this method very much. No borax or salt, just flesh, de-fat and dry. These types of methods are definitely preferable to tanning because the tanning process can cause the hair to be brittle although some commercial outfits like Natures Spirit have perfected the tanning process with the fly tier in mind. To make a comparison just use some hair from a tanned piece like the Primo Strips from Wapsi, then use some of Chris Helm's hair. You will notice a huge difference in all your tying especially spinning and stacking hair. That my method.