The Caddis Fly: Oregon Fly Fishing Blog

In this video Tony Torrence brings back an old favorite, in a new jig style format. You can’t go wrong with fly patterns which contain peacock herl. Fish this pattern under a dry fly or dedicated nymph rigs. The Zug Bug has caught fish in rivers and lakes for years.

Jigged Zug Bug

Thread: Veevus 10/0, Black
Hook: TMC C400BL or Daiichi 4647, Sizes 10-16 Size 12 in Video
Bead: Gold Slotted Tungsten Bead, Size 5/32 in Video
Weight: Lead Wire 0.020 4-5 wraps for size 12
Tail: Peacock Sword
Rib: Veevus Small Gold Oval Tinsel
Body: Peacock Herl
Wingcase: Woodduck Flank
Hackle: Hen Back or Brown Hen Hackle

As the gift giving holidays approach, it can be intimidating to think of something to get that special angler in your life. What can you get the fisherman who already has everything!?

Check out our gift guide video here:

For great advice on how to organize your tying materials, visit Flymen’s awesome blog post here .

Here is my blue/black 12 Minute Intruder.

This is going to be a quick post for a relatively quick winter steelhead tube Intruder. I tie this fly in about 12 minutes and it catches steelhead.

Tube: 40/40 ProSportfisher tube
butt: Chartreuse Ice dub
Rear Post: Kingfisher Blue Schlappen tied in by tip
Body: Fl Blue Lagartun Carded Flat Braid
Shoulder Post Prop: Prosportfisher Marble Fox Blue
Motion: Black Ostrich tied in all around
Flash: Lateral Scale (two strands each side)
Wing: Blue Dyed Grizzly Saddle
Collar hackle: Black Schlappen
Dumbell Eyes: Hareline Double Pupil Dumbell Eyes

This is a very effective steelhead tube fly that may be tied basically as shown with the option of making it more or less fancy and in different color phases. This is a blue/black color but I have fished this fly with success in Red/black and a pink hue also.

Ice Dub in waxed loop.

Ice Dub at Butt station of my 40-40 tube. I have cut the hook guide short for this fly.

KIngfisher Blue Schlappen.

Butt Station is now compete.

Lagartun Carded Flat Braid.

Pro Sportfisher Marble Fox.

This is a pinch of Fox fur with guard hairs. I have cut it to be about its full length and extend to the butt station of the fly.

I have placed the fox into the waxed dubbing loop and spread it out before spinning it.

I have spun the fox tail fur and it is ready to fold.

I am folding the spun loop by creasing it back and continually stroking it while wrapping it around the tube.

I have wound the folded fur around the tube like a hackle and this will prop the ostrich on the shoulder station.

I have tied in black ostrich fibers all around the shoulder station. I could have spun the ostrich in a loop but decided simply to apply it in dispersed clumps around the tube.

I have trimmed the ostrich butts from the tube.

Time for the Lateral Scale.

Two strands of Flash on each side of the fly.

I am selecting two Grizzly saddle hackles for the fly.

Grizzly hackles applied to fly. Frankly, these are a little longer than I would prefer in hindsight.

Schlappen to finish off the collar of the fly.

Dumbell eyes will cause the fly to swim true. I will next trim the tube and melt the end.

Front view of the 12 minute Intruder.

Rear view of 12 minute Intruder.

I hope you find this a little useful as you approach your fly bench in the next few weeks.

Jay Nicholas – December 2016

The Jigged Pheasant Tail Nymph is one of our most effect “hopper dropper” nymphs. It’s hook rides up and reduces snags and lost flies. You can tie this fly in a variety of sizes, we like it best from #12-16. It has it all in terms of fish attraction, cdc, flash, pheasant, peacock and a tungsten bead. This fly is highly effective wherever you fish it.

Jigged CDC Pheasant Tail Nymph

Thread: Veevus 10/0, Rusty Brown
Hook: TMC C400BL or Daichi 4647 sizes 10-16
Bead: Copper Slotted Tungsten Bead
Weight: Lead Wire
Tail: Pheasant Tail
Rib: Copper Brassie Ultra Wire
Abdomen: Pheasant Tail
Wingcase: Large Pearl Mylar Tinsel
Hackle: Rusty Brown CDC
Thorax: Peacock Herl

Here are some matted rabbit strips straight out of the package.

Various  rabbit and Finn Raccoon Zonker strips make for great flies, but there are some properties of the material that can be confusing and intimidating.

The first thing that might disappoint you is the extent to which the strips might be matted and kinked as you remove them from the package. This is normal – after all, the strips have been wadded together and stuffed into a small bag and have probably taken on lots of odd shapes. It is impossible to tie a nice looking fly before I take these strips, hold them in kitchen tongs, and hold them over a tea kettle. The steam will allow the strips to loose the kinks acquired in the plastic package and you will now be able to stoke and straighten them out and tie a very nice orderly fly.

The same rabbit strips – after steaming over a tea kettle.

This photo shows the same Rabbit strips first pictured after being steamed and straightened out – much nicer!

Finn Raccoon Zonker strips straight out of the package.

Here is the same Finn Raccoon Zonker strip (cut in half) after steaming over a tea Kettle.

The two photos above show Finn Raccoon Zonker strips before and after steaming – illustrating the value of steaming the strips over the tea kettle before tying.

Another natural feature of rabbit and Finn Raccoon Zonker strips is the fact that the hair length can vary considerable from package to package – just as the leather on some hides is thicker than it is on others. So don’t be surprised if you find variation in hair length and hide thickness in different packets of rabbit and Finn Raccoon.

Remember also the fact that the hair on each animal is not the same length or texture on the entire hide. This means that for both Zonker strips  you are likely to find variation in hair length along the strip.

Cross cut rabbit tends to have shorter hair on both ends of the strip and longer hair in the middle of the strip.

Zonker cut rabbit strips tend to have shorter hair at the shoulder end of the hide and longer hair at the rump end of the hide. Zonker cut Finn Raccoon may have similar length hair along the entire strip but you might find a gradient in the hair length along the strip, plus a gradient in the amount of guard hairs along the strip.

I usually purchase entire rabbit hides rather than individual packets of strips for two reasons. First, they are usually not as crinkled and mis-shaped from being stuffed into little bags. And second, I know that I will have strips from the entire rabbit hide and I can select hair from various portions of the hide according to the desired properties for the flies I am going to tie.

4 strips selected from the center of a complete stripped rabbit hide.

The photo above shows 4 strips I took from the middle of a stripped hide. Note how straight they are – with no steaming. In this photo the shoulder of the hide is at the right and the rump of the hide is at the left.

The upper rabbit strip was cut from the left end (rump) and the lower strip was cut from the right end (shoulder) of the rabbit strips.

The photo above shows a short piece cut from one of the strips photographed above. Although this rabbit has hair that is very similar in length at the rump and shoulder ends of the strip, the texture is clearly different, and many strips have hair that is noticably shorter at the shoulder end of the zonker strip.

Depending on the properties of the individual strip, I may not use more than half of each strip for my steelhead flies, because I tend to prefer strips with very full, fluffy hair and this is most commonly found at the rump end of the strip.

I hope you have found a few morsels of useful information here, and will not despair when you find rumpled rabbit strips or hair that varies is length along each strip.

Jay Nicholas, December 2016

Comparing the Schlappen feathers in two packages of 5″ – 7″ feathers.

I have been using Schlappen feathers on a regular basis lately while tying up my boxes of winter steelhead flies. Fact is, I have been very surprised and pleased with the overall quality and diversity of the feathers I have obtained lately, and I guess it would be fair to say that my recent experience is but one more in a long string of situations where I continue to learn even after having more than fifty years experience as a fly tyer under my belt.

It was my routine practice to avoid purchasing Schlappen feathers, preferring instead to use hand selected saddle feathers for use as collars and beards on my salmon and steelhead flies. I was fond of being able to pluck feathers from a full saddle patch, from the shortest feathers at the top of the patch to the longest webbiest feathers at the base of the saddle patch.

In case you are not already familiar with these feathers, I would describe Schlappen as the softest, dullest feathers found near the base of the rooster’s tail and these lay between the saddle feathers on the rooster’s back and the long tail feathers.

I formerly considered Schlappen to be junk feathers, far less desirable than saddle hackles.

Lately, however, I have completely reconsidered that opinion and done a full reversal of my decades-long disdain for these feathers. I have tied flies with randomly selected packages of Hareline Schlappen during the process of tying a wide variety of winter steelhead flies, including Intruders, and have been overwhelmingly pleased with the results.

Sure, there are waste feathers in each package and the proportion of junk feathers will vary between packages and also depend on the variety of flies that you intend to tie with any specific package.

I just did an analysis of a random pack of black Schlappen and here my opinionated assessment. One package of Schlappen had had 84 feathers in it. i discarded 25 feathers, set aside 20 feathers that had good tips and 29 feathers that met my standards for high quality wet fly collars from tip to webby base. Priced at under seven bucks for the package, I’m pleased to get that many good feathers for my steelhead and salmon flies. Most of the feathers that I discarded as so-called “junk” could actually have been used for smaller flies beards, tails, and various smaller wet flies.

29 super select Schlappen feathers prepared for use as collars on winter steelhead flies.

The 29 super select Schlappen feathers are pictured above, after I stripped off the stem where it became too thick to wind on a tube or hook.

How representative were the results of this Schlappen package? I have found an occasional package with lower percentage of feathers that met my standards and a few packages that had an even higher proportion of super feathers.

Stem thickness of Schlappen feathers – tends to be slender, more so I think than you will find on most strung saddle feathers. Slender stems make it easier to wind the collars and reduce bulk on my flies, so I have been very favorably impressed with these slender stems.

Overall length of Schlappen feathers – these feathers are in packages labeled as 5 – 7″. When the wholesale dealer gets these feathers from the producer, they are on a sewn string that is roughly four feet long, with the shortest feathers on one end and the longest feathers on the other end. These long strings are then cut into short sections for packaging. As a result, any specific package may be from the short end, the middle, or the long end of the feathers sewn together on string.

The photo at the beginning of this post illustrates two different strings of Schlappen that represent about the two extremes of feather lengths that you will find in any given package of these feathers. The average length of black Schlappen feathers in the one package is about 5″ with some feathers as short as 4″. The average length of the purple Schlappen feathers is closer to 8″ with a few feathers nearly 10″ or so. These two packages represent extremes of the packs that you are likely to find on the pegs at your local fly shop, and you are more likely to find feathers that are in the range of 5″ to 6″ than smaller and larger feathers.

I find that I like to get a few packages of the shorter feathers and a few packages of the longer feathers – that way I have a broader range of feather qualities to use on my flies.

I hope that this post helps answer some of the questions you may have about Schlappen feathers. My enthusiasm for tying with these has blossomed in the last two months and I think that my winter steelhead flies have benefitted greatly from my new perspective.

Questions? Shoot an email the Caddis Fly Shop and I’ll try to answer.

Jay Nicholas, late November, 2016

Hareline materials-only fly tying kit has all first rate products and step-by-step instructions to tie 20 great fly patterns.

Our friends at Hareline Dubbin in Monroe Oregon have recently introduced three new options in fly tying kits that I have had the opportunity to examine recently. Nicely done. Following I’ll note some of my observations on these three kits. They are all in stock and available as gifts or for the beginner who is about to venture into the world of fly tying for the first time.

First, the fly tying instruction booklet is very good, providing clear instructions regarding how to tie 20 of the best trout flies that are fish catchers in most waters around the world. In addition, the skills you will exercise while tying these patterns will provide a foundation for tying flies for salmon & steelhead,  bass, pike musky and bonefish at the least. Sorry, got carried away.

The instructions are good, the materials are first rate too, from threads to dry fly hackle to dubbing and hooks and so forth. All of the materials contained in this kit are the same as I select to tie flies myself, and that is my test for quality. This is not to say that there are not other high quality fly tying kits out there, only to say that I have personally inspected these kits and believe that they represent excellent value and price, with far more and diverse selection of materials than anyone could possibly purchase for a similar investment in normal packaging sizes.

Except for the spooled materials, all of these packaged materials generally represent a smaller quantity than normal packaging that you would find in fly shops. Downsizing on the materials makes perfect sense in fly tying kits because a person would not normally want to get larger quantities of many of these materials until deciding which patterns they want to tie most often.

What is in the Hareline materials-only kit? Briefly, you get two sizes of beads, six sizes of hooks, six spools of veevus thread, copper wire, gold wire, silver gold mylar tinsel, yellow floss, pearl krystal flash, sparkle emerger yarn, parapost wing, Mcfly foam, three colors of chenille, a half Hare’s mask, five colors of dubbing, rubber legs, elk hair, comparadun hair, rabbit strips, crosscut rabbit strips, marabou feathers turkey tail feathers, keough sadddle feathers and grizzly saddle feathers, tailing feathers for dry flies, saddle feathers, ringneck pheasant feathers, partridge soft hackle feathers, a half grizzly cape suitable for tying wings and all sizes of wet fly collar hackles, peacock herl, two colors of bulcktail hair, Loon water based cement, and a Hareline drink coaster, all contained in a useful plastic box.

What flies will the instruction booklet cover? San Juan Worm. Brassie. Bead Head Caddis. Prtridge & Yellow soft hackle. Girdle Bug. Woolly Worm. Woolly Bugger. Hare’s Ear Nymph. Pheasant Tail Nymph. Darian’s Kool Kat Soft Hackle. TP’s Little Nymph Thing.  Buck Tail Streamer. Bead Head Bunny Leech. Comparadun. Elk Hair Caddis. Adams. Light Cahill Parachute. Black Ant. Griffith’s Gnat. Black Gnat Dry Fly.

Hareline also offers two complete kits, the first includes an economy vise and economy tools. This vise and tools are perfectly fine for the beginner who is not sure how dedicated they will be to the adventure of fly tying. This is the Hareline Economy Kit.

The superior full fly tying kit offered by Hareline is the one I am most impressed with and includes a premium vise and premium tools.  The Hareline Premium Fly Tying Kit includes mostly USA tools and this is the best choice for the beginning tyer who is likely to continue tying – because the tools are more durable and in my opinion perform at a higher level than the imported economy tools.

Tools include a vise, a bobbin, scissors bodkin, hackle pliers, hair stacker, and a whip finish tool.

The instruction booklet also shows the proper way to secure a hook in your vise, , dub material on thread, start your thread on a bare hook, thread a bobbin, and as previously noted, tie 20 great trout flies.

Jay Nicholas, November 2016

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