jonathan creason

I've caught them on many different types of flies, but I'd say a good 75% of the fish I've caught have been on some sort of crawfish imitation. Granted, I've only been fly fishing for smallies for a little over a year now, but an olive crawfish, dropped behind large rocks in the river has been very consistent.

I rarely leave the house without sunglasses, I just can't stand to squint. I got by for a long time with Peppers glasses, which are budget friendly but have plastic lenses. I stumbled on a good sale on Costa's a year ago on one of the outdoor, over-stock websites and have been wearing them ever since. There is a big difference in clarity between the lenses, and duribility with glass is much better.

I still have the Peppers, but pretty much just use them when I'm mountain biking now.

Great article. Thanks for the link.

Those are some great examples, hopefully I can get to where I'm half that good eventually. Hadn't thought about leather dye, that's a good tip. I appreciate it.

As a newbie I will say that I welcome criticism and critiques. I have tying classes near me, but don't have the time or money now to sit down with someone and learn firsthand so the feedback I get from places like this are my best opportunities to learn.

I can see why many folks use that response, though. Often times the written word doesn't come across like intended, and often times people have skin that is far too thin to handle anyone critiques. I'm sure after a while it gets easier to just say that than deal with an e-meltdown.

Thanks again everyone for the advice. I decided to give a mouse pattern a shot today, and packed with an old pen. I was able to get the hair much more firmly packed with this than I was able to do with my fingers. This is the result.

I HAVE A QUESTION. I think there is a difference between tanning and just dry preserving an animal skin. Am I correct? What I personally do is dry preserving with borax and salt. I thought to actually tan the hide (the skin) and make it soft and pliable, there were some chemicals involved, soaking the hide in brains or charcoal (like natives did) or other chemicals. Some of the pelts I have "dried" myself, you could break if you folded it in half. They are hard and stiff like card board, but the skins I have purchased (like zonkers) the hide is soft and pliable. My point here is, if the result you want is simply hair to clip from the hide (the skin) to tie with is one thing, but if you want soft flexible rabbit strips or zonkers (for streamer tails) where you need the hide attached to the hair, plus you intend to expose it to water repeatedly, I think there is more to it then just drying out the pelt with borax. AM I WRONG? I have never worried about making the hide flexible so I don't know. All my cross cut and zonker strips are made from already processed rabbit pelts I purchased and cut into strips myself. They were soft and flexible when I got then. I'm talking about the skin, not the friken hair on the skin.

Drying the skin is the same process as making rawhide. Tanning does require adding something to soften the skin (brain or eggs work) and physically breaking down the outer dermis layers.

Tanning a hide isn't difficult, but requires a bit of work. If you're only wanting dubbing material making rawhide will be sufficient though. Paleoplanet is a good place to check out for pointers.

Thanks guys, I appreciate the advice. The first one is loosely packed, mainly because it's a weighted streamer. The head is just to push water. The other 2 I tried to pack tighter, but obviously I need to work on that. I don't have a hair packer, so I've just been using my fingers. Probably need to look into rigging something up.

I love the look of a spun head, so I thought I'd save up a little cash and buy some to play with. Only had enough for 1 color, so the cool patterned heads are out for now but I'd like to give that a try sometime. These are my first 3 attempts, with none being any particular pattern, just hoping for something sculpinish. I appreciate any pointers or critiques.

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Thanks everybody! Crackaig, those nymphs look great, going to check out your site.

For the fishies, it probably doesn't . Just trying to get a cleaner finished look mainly.

I've tried a couple of flies with a bead inside of the thorax instead of behind the eye, but I'm having trouble getting them completely covered. So far I've only tried it with peacock herl and dubbing, but each time the material keeps sliding off the bead leaving parts of it exposed. I tried to figure 8 around the bead and put some sort of base down, which worked somewhat better, but still inconsistent. Anyone have pointers on doing this to get full coverage?

I also have a spare (Thompson A), if you and utyer don't work something out.

Last one for today, I swear.

Gotcha, I appreciate the pointer.

Thanks for the help, everyone. Still working on them, and hope to be able to test them out on some bucketmouths soon. The video helped me with several issues. Here's my most recent attempt.

Thanks everyone. Especially for that video, it explains some of the issues I was having.

And this one is take 5 or so.

This is my first trying at tying the famous Clouser minnow. I tried to remember to keep it sparse, but it looks like I might need to shorten things up a little. This one is tied on a size 8 3XL Mustad.

Much appreciated, guys. Need to go pick up some lead wire and give a little heavier version a shot. So far my dual vise-grip to exacto knife tying vise is working ok, but I can definitely see its shortcomings. Maybe I can upgrade in a few years.

Got a hankering to try my hand at tying, so I dropped in a local shop and bought a few tools and enough material to tie wooly buggers until I was sick of them. This is the result of my first evening working on them. I think this particular one is #5 ever. I appreciate any critiques you all can offer.

Thanks, everyone. I'm not quite ready to pull the trigger on anything, just trying to do my homework on all the possible options in my price range. This info is helpful though.

Thanks singletrack (MTBer?). At this point I'm just looking for something to tinker with in the little free time I have, so I'm not really wanting to invest a ton just yet. I appreciate the advise, it sounds like it'll be a decent way to dip my toes in and see if this is something I want to continue persuing.

Anyone have strong opinions on this kit, one way or another, for a rank beginner? It's been several years since I fly fished heavily and would like to get back in the game and include a little tying in the mix, but my budget is pretty tight. I'll mostly be fishing for bass and panfish, with the ocassional trip to the mountains for trout and smallies.