buggybob

There's plenty left of that mask. I had an operation on my wrist last winter and my tying area is upstairs in an old attic space so I didn't get up there between early December and early March. I'm still finding the damage but a mouse or two had a great winter up there. The total is up to 8 bucktails, a partridge skin, golden pheasant, sharptail grouse, 4 grizzly hen necks, and several picked over grizzly saddles. Somehow they made it up there past 6 cats and two dogs. Traps worked after I discovered the problem but every where I look I find where they have taken a nip out of here and there. They completely ate the hide from the bucktails and made a mess of the hair so I couldn't even use it.

Since it comes in clear originally, you will have to find a dye that is capable of dying the tubing.

I'm guessing that you use chenille for the body of your woolly buggers. Try this, stop the chenille one turn before you have been. That will give you enough space to wind the hackle and a whip finish. Commonly a lot of people will try to squeeze that extra turn of chenille and end up with a problem.

I've been tying on a Regal for over 20 years now and wouldn't have the other bells and whistles they charge you foron other vises. I do tie commercially and have put well over 20,000 dozen flies through mine and it's still holds like the first day.

Very nice. Look like very fishy flies.

I'm thinking the head could be either furry foam or spun wool, but the key thing is it looks like a siliclone style head like Bob Popovics makes.

Clouser minnows, Clouser minnows, and Clouser minnows.

Give them a good wash in Dawn dish soap or Woolite. Any vermin eggs will be washed away and any grease that may have gotten on the feathers will be too.

I cut the tips of the guardhairs off of possum hides then shear the fur off the pelt for an imitation seal fur dubbing. Like you said it can easily be dyed whatever color you want. Makes great nymphs and scuds.

Nice tight packing job. That's going to float like a cork. The ostrich in the tail will slim down a lot and may almost dissapear. Might want to mix a bit of marabou or other fiber in if you want a strong tail silhoutte.

Longer working time so you can do several bodies at one time and the epoxy doesn't turn yellow over time (six months to years) if you don't use the flies right away.

What you find in fly shops as sparkle yarn is Aunt Lydias Sparkle yarn. Look in craft shops, yarn stores, or google it. In the past it's been under a dollar for a full skein. I loaded up years ago but I know it's still available.

Someone dummped smallmouth in one of our quality trout lakes around here. We caught smallmouth on anything we were throwing at trout, chironomids, mayfly nymphs, damsel nymphs, dragon nymphs, and of course the best nymph, a wooly bugger.

My wife doesn't worry, our anniversary is usually right at the lake opener, and she's ready to go. We also had a horse born last year on our anniversary. makes it all easy to remebre. Now her birthday on the other hand. . . .

It's a knockoff of the Regal made by Integra sometimes under the label of Sunrise tools.

I was fishing with a friend years ago in Montana. I had grey lenses and he had amber/yellow. One day I had a horrendous headache from the glare and he didn't. Next day I put on my amber/yellow (the old Orvis $12 specials) and haven't used any color but since. I've upgraded my sunglasses since then but always stick with the amber/yellow.

That puppy will fish !

That almost looks like an Owner mosquito hook.

Since the bear hairs are a bit slippery, try tying in a small wing before you add the front hackle, put on the hackle, and pull the hackle fibers down to exposes the wing, and then tie in the remainder of your wing. That reduces the bulk of the tie down and makes sure that the wing stays on the fly.

Look on bigger chickens.

American Fishing Wire, multi strand plastic coated. If you want you can even tie a three turn clinch knot, but a uni knot or Homer Rhodes knot is better and easier. I've landed a 54 incher on the 18 pound.

You don't need to wind the thread through the wing. Just bring it in front of the wing as you bring the thread/dubbing to the base of the wing. You also want to make the dam in front of the wing with thread. Dubbing softens over time and your wing will tip forward.

You guys are lucky. The closest thing we have to open water is 11 inches of ice on the lake. It was 11 this morning and will be somewhere between 1 and 7 tomorrow morning. Welcome to spring.

OK, so the correct hair that Al Troth used originally is bleached cow elk. Cow elk flares with very little pressure so don't fret the flare. That can be dealt with after you whip finish. Just grab the wing and butts with your fingers before you cut off the butts of the hair and give it a quick light twists a couple of times. It wil be controlled, besides you want some flare to the wing to give the right silhouette.

Now, about adding weight to the fly with three or four turns of fine wire. I hear this all the time. First with the use of modern genetic hackle that doesn't matter. You are adding so little weight it doesn't matter, but you are right, you sacrifice durability of the fly. I'd rather not have to keep tying on a new fly every few fish.

Looks like good fishing flies. The differences between caribou hair and deer hair is the size of the hair, both diameter and length. Caribou is pretty fine and usually pretty short for the hollow portions, I usually use it on smaller flies like Goddard Caddis because of that. I've heard some discussion on the floating qualities of caribou vs deer hair but with the floatants available today that's quickly becomes a moot point. Using it on bombers that will be waked really eliminates that floating quality argument. I'd say if you start tying large bombers you might want to consider deer hair because it will cover the hook shank quicker.