Tell me what you think

[Ashby 0]

This is my first attempt in a long time to make some kind of show box fly. I know these two are a little ways away form being there, but tell me what you think, what I need to do to improve, and some tips as well would be welcome. One is a Rusty Rat with a little twist in there. The other is a Green Highlander with a little twist as well. I think a few more times with each and I'll have a nice looking fly. Thanks for your imput guys.

 

Ashby

[flytire 0]

For a "show box" fly the correct materials should be used.

 

Just my opinion.

[Ashby 0]

True! Maybe I need a new book then. I did add the hackle rib for the Highlander, the floss and extra oval tinsel for ribs on the Rusty Rat. I did look at the Green Highlander on the site and it is way different than anything I have ever seen, though I like it a lot more. Thanks Norm.

 

Ashby

[Gregg A 0]

The look pretty cool. Bet they would catch a fish or two.

[Isonychia 0]

In the weird and arcane world of salmon fly tying, the number five is sacred. On many -- if not most -- flies, there should be five turns of tinsel on the tip and/or five turns of tinsel on the rib. Most tiers avoid bulk by tying materials in with five turns of thread, then unwinding three of those turns before starting on the next component.

 

I realize it's more difficult to accomplish with hair wings, but try to trim the wing butts as closely as possible and in a manner that produces a short, blunt, cone-shaped head.

 

And give yourself some room! Both of the flies you've pictured here have a lot of materials packed onto relatively small hooks. Do a Google search for "salmon fly proportions" and try to adhere to those guidelines. Either use larger hooks so your existing materials are more to scale, or use smaller materials.

 

When tying show flies, proportion is everything!

 

Hope this helps...

 

John

[Ashby 0]

Hey John, thanks for the input. That I didn't know about five turns. I will look for the proportions for the salmon flies and do a little more reading up on them. What is a good all around size hook used to tye show salmon flies with? I was going through some of the photos on the site last night and saw some were over 5 inches long That is huge. Thanks again for the advice. Gregg, yeah they may catch a fish lol, but I'm thinking that is about it. Don't think mine are ready for the box of glass yet lol.

 

Ashby

[Isonychia 0]

Most of the "exhibition quality" flies you'll see over in the Salmon and Steelhead section are dressed on size 3/0 to 9/0 hooks.

 

That said, there's nothing at all "wrong" with tying full-dressed flies on size 1/0 or 2/0 hooks. The trick is in choosing a hook size that best displays the materials at hand. If you happen to have a wide variety of materials in a wide variety of sizes, you have the best of all worlds and can tie the flies to suit your tastes.

 

The best way to learn about salmon fly tying is to spend a lot of time on the Salmon and Steelhead forum. Most of the guys who post there are very, very good; very, very knowledgeable; and very, very helpful. I've learned a ton in just a few months.

 

John

[Guest]

Exhibition flies should be tied on as large a hook as your materials allow. Those large hooks you saw in the salmon fly forum are handmade, very expensive and finding materials that will fit on them can be a full time job in itself. I personally believe that you don't need to tie that large to have an impressive display. Four well tied flies on 1/0 or 2/0 salmon hooks will look just as nice as one big fly.

 

John's advice regarding your flies is right on and I would like to add some additional advice. Take your time, think about every step, every thread wrap. Unless you've been tying these things for years and years, speed is death in salmon fly tying, especially at the novice stage.

[skunkaroo 0]

Salmon flies are a lot of fun to tye. Not only do they look cool, but they been catching fish for a very long time. Your flies are very good first attempts at show flies (a damn sight better than mine were), but as John notes there are a set of conventions for tying most salmon fly patterns. Two web sites that I found invaluable in this respect were Ronn Lucas Senior's Tying Atlantic Salmon Flies (a board member I think?), and the Global FlyFisher. The former covers almost everything to do with tying salmon flies and goes into detail on special techniques for everything from minimising head bulk to laying perfectly smooth floss. The latter is more of a swiss army knife when it comes to tying, and a simple search will usually pop up information such as Salmon Fly Anatomy and tricks on Thread Control.

 

Good luck and good tying,

 

Aaron

[Ashby 0]

ok, all in all it looks as though I have a ton of work to do. Thanks for all your input, tips and advise on this. There are a lot of things that I have not taken into consideration while tying these flys. Pretty much everything mentioned by you guys I have not thought about, but I have something to go by now. Aaron, thanks for taking the time to find me the links. I'll take a look at them and see what else I can do. I know it looks as though I'm going to have to get bigger hooks lol.

 

Ashby