buggybob

The fly has a very distinct similarity to the Dirtdiver stone that Dave Goulet of Classic and Custom Fly Shop ties. The only real difference that I can see is that he uses a black bead at the head as well. And yes, they get down fast, wiggle and work well.

I have one, had it for maybe 20 years. Bought it with my wonderfull income tax refund. It's nice for the flies that I tie on it, mostly presentation flies. For the bulk of my tying both for pleasure and sale (> 20,000 dozen) I use a Regal rotary. Yeah, I know it's not a real rotary but I can look at the fly from the angle that I need to.

To be blunt, I like them both but would have spent much less if there were other versions of the rotary vise available 20 years ago. The Barracuda is a good vise though.

Hoppers, PMD's, golden stones, Turcks tarantula, chernobyl ants, caddis on top and pick your favorite nymph for subsurface. Big black stones, prince nymph, pheasant tail, golden stones, caddis, lightning bugs, etc.

As long as you fly is tied to have one side up (baitfish) its easy to make a tube fly with the hook up. Use a ring eye hook and a short piece of vinyl tubing (like aquarium hose). Put the vinyl tubing onto the rear end of your tube then put the hook eye into the tubing in the position you want it to stay. It's called keying the hook.

There's a couple of books out on tube flies. This technique is in the books.

Watch for those long skinny sticks with rattles on one end and big teeth on the other around those small streams.

The Mohawk was developed by Heather Lafontaine, Gary's daughter. Look in his books to find the pattern.

Unless you are independently wealthy you might want to consider living in Helena or Great Falls. Personally I'd choose Helena. Not that much work year round in the Wolf Creek or Craig area. Fishing is great on the Missouri though. Think 100 yard wide spring creek.

Besides, from Helena you would only be a couple of hours from West Yellowstone, the Beaverhead, etc. Winters can be a bit atrocious though.

Nice. That would b a great lake caddis emerger pattern. I fish some similar ones.

If you don't want to order up tubing go to a sports card shop. They have tubes for storing collectable baseball bats that are resonably priced if you only need one or two.

The Daiichi 1770 is also a swimmng nymph hook, should be easy enough to find it.

I've fished chironomids for about 40 years and whatever hook you want to use works fine. The original hooks used were just normal wet fly hooks and did well. If you like the shape of the hook and the chironomid you tie on it you will fish it much more confidently.

It also makes a very different kind of spey hackle when twisted into a wire. Just have to make sure it is sparse like a real hackle.

Good looking crabs.

I make my eyes the same way but using Loon Hard Head. Dip and put it into the wheel. Takes a bit longer to cure but no mixing of epoxies. Try different color beads, they make an interesting variation for an eye.

If you are fairly flexible in when you can go Yellowstone or Colorado are great. Just remember that snow runoff happens in June and sometimes into July depending on the final snowpack in your chosen destination. Standing next to a blown-out river is not that fun.

As others have said, there are many possibilities depending on the type of water you want to fish. I've fished the Yellowstone area every year for about 30 years and every year is different so when someone tells you the stoneflies or what ever always come off on a certain date, they are blowing smoke. If they give you a broad range of when the hatches come of you are probbly getting good information. I can tell you that I no longer try to target the giant stonefly hatch, but I've been into it at least 10 of those years and one of those years runoff happened about a month before they came off. There are a lot of good hatches that come off all summer long, so be flexible if you can.

Love the color combination, subtle with a bit of color. That would fish well over here on the West Coast during summer.

Great proportions on the fly. I never would have thought it was 6xl !

Look, I and others are just trying to give you some pointers to make the fly better. Your skills are evident on the fly, it is very nicely proportioned and tied. The humpy is not an easy fly to tie.

That being said, I've been tying flies for 45 years and have sold well over 20,000 dozen not counting the flies I tie to fish with and I've fished 80 to 100 days a year for almost 20 years. I've tied Humpies from size 2 for steelhead down to size 24. I've been around the block a few times. So before you criticize someone who is trying to help you should know a bit about them.

Before you come unglued, do this, drop the fly from about a foot off of a table and see how it lands. As you know with 20 years experience tying dry flies, any dry fly with hackle and a wing should stand on the hackle mass and tail with the wing upright. With the humpy, that large body behind it doesn't help when the pivot point of the hackle is about 1/4 or more of the way down the hook shank from the eye. Been there done that. I fish this fly a lot.

I've seen Charlie Cravens humpies, as well as Jack Dennis, and inumerable others both famous and unknown. The wing on theirs is positioned close to the middle of the hackle to keep the balance of the fly.

Radio controlled car antenna tubing. It's plastic, straight, is 1/8 OD and cheap. Check out hobby shops.

Great looking fly. Change the wing to an olive dyed grizzly and you would have a good perch imitation.

I can see the hackle in front of the wing but my biggest concern is that the wing balance is so far forward in the hackle that the fly will tip over on it's face on the water with a leader connected. In the past I've tied several thousands of these as a commercial tyer and you only need a thread head as wide as the hook eye width to cover up all of the uglies.

Tie your marabou pointing over the hook eye. It will be pulled back over the top and bottom of the body and tied down as the last tying step to create the tail.

Lived in the northwest all my life so I don't even want to think about counting all of the eatrthquakes. Back in the late 80's or early 90's when I was fishing around West Yellowstone there was a series/swarm of earthquakes. They reported a total of about 1500 in a weeks time that were recordable. Most of them were 2.0 or less but you could feel a few.

Nice buggy looking fly for the summer and fall out there in the desert.

Body feather from a silver laced Wyandotte chicken, sometimes called a lace hackle.

Available from Whiting Hackle, your local chicken grower, or ebay.

That stickiness is probably fat/grease from the hide. Groundhogs are well known for being very greasy. As has been said, wash in Dawn dish soap and then in non-scented hair conditioner or Woolite. Then you can dry it by hanging or using borax. That will clean up the hide and preserve the softness of the hair. Cut it in pieces (half or quarters) if you want before washing to make it easier to handle.

First I had to think of the feather orientation on the bird. I'm so used to grabbing the feather without thinking. I use a feather from the left side for the far wing. Pretty much it gives you a wing that comes to a point in the back, kind of looks like the bottom of a boat with the bow at the back of the fly.