Pike Flies

Some of you probably thought I went up into thin air, never to hear from me again, but guess what? I’ m still here! Now I could start to explain what happened the last couple of months but, most likely, you wouldn’t believe me anyway. And besides,
this isn’t Facebook! So I’ll stick to the things that matter (for all you pike fly fishermen anyway). I’ve had NO fishing and tying for several months (sad but true), but…
I’M BACK NOW!!!

And I have an upcoming trip to Ireland in less than two weeks, so that’s reason enough to pick up my blog again!

Besides, my vise started to send out some weird ultrasonic waves,

so unable to resist, here’s some new stuff…

This next fly is somewhat different than the previous one. First, this one still has a collar of marabou which I don’t use anymore. Some will say that it flares out while retrieving, well that’s bullshit (pardon my language), because it will only flare out when you have another material underneath that makes that happen (like bucktail for example), otherwise it will remain flat and sticky, which in this case isn’t a problem because it gives it a bloody effect. If you want something to flair out, use raccoon like I did with the first four flies.

But that’s not the reason why I posted it. The weak point with the previous flies are the eyes, sooner or later they get bitten off. I know, some types of glue are better than others, and I’m pretty satisfied with the “Loctite Flex Gel” I’m using, but it will still happen. If they don’t bite off the eyes, it will be the part of the head wherever the glue went.

So with this next fly, I put on some epoxy on the tip of the head and smeared it over the eyes. This way they will never come off. I already tested this one and it has little or no effect on the action of the fly, so I’ll certainly adjust a couple more.

This next one is a combination of two flies. I used the basics of a “ Firetiger Hangtime” by Brad Bohen for the tail and than made a collar of raccoon and my usual head of Slinky Fiber (in a brass wire dubbing brush).

And a couple of tandems as well…

I’m not quite satisfied with the colour of the head on the last one, but I‘m sure the pike won’t mind.

And now I’ll get to work again, I still got a lot of things to do the next couple of days…

Pike Flies, the Baltic way

If you start searching on the internet for pike flies, sooner or later you’ll end up somewhere in the Baltic. Which is understandable, because there are a lot of great fly fishermen over there, and they’re not so narrow minded as a lot of other fly fishermen in the rest of Europe.

And there is this one pattern that you’ll find with a lot of those guys.

I think it all started with a pattern Niklaus Bauer tied, called ‘the Hoover’ (but don’t shoot me if I’m wrong). Anyway, you see (more or less) the same pattern coming back by (just to name two big shots) Ulf Hagström and Simon Graham. And they catch a lot of pike on that fly, so I figured, if it works over there, why wouldn’t it work over here. So I’ve been experimenting a bit, and finally came up with this pattern, which I like a lot.

All these flies are about 15 cm long, tied on a Gamakatsu Worm 36, size 5/0, and they’re all tied the same way (just different colours).

- I started with some flash material (full length of the tail).

- then some Yak Hair.

- chenille

- Yak Hair (but shorter than the previous)

- chenille

- bucktail

- flash material (but shorter than the previous)

- chenille

- bucktail

- marabou (2x)

- some of Rich Johnson’s Realistic Flyz Eyez

- Epoxy for the head

The reason I use chenille and bucktail, is simply to have more volume with a lot less material, and to give the marabou a nice pulsating action while retrieving. Usually I don’t like marabou for pike flies, sure it looks great when dry, but once it gets wet, it just sticks together and doesn’t give a lot of action. But with some bucktail underneath, that’s a whole other story.

 

Materials used:

- flash:  cosmic pink Vampire Flash FX

- yak hair: white

- chenille: pink

- bucktail: white and pink

- marabou: pearl and pink

 

- flash:  light green Polar Flash

- yak hair: white and chartreuse

- chenille: chartreuse

- bucktail: white and chartreuse

- marabou: pearl and chartreuse

 

- flash:  light green and light yellow Polar Flash

- yak hair: yellow and chartreuse

- chenille: chartreuse

- bucktail: yellow and chartreuse

- marabou: yellow and chartreuse

 

 - flash:  copper/green Polar Flash and dark green Flashabou (from TOF)

- yak hair: red and black

- chenille: red

- bucktail: red and grey

- marabou: Bordeaux and anthracite 

Kustom easy baitfish

I’m still playing with the stuff Rich sent me, and I wanted to make an easy to tie baitfish pattern, with as less material as possible, with a nice profile, a very lively action, very lightweight to cast, and it had to be very durable. To put it in other words, a fly that everybody can tie and make every pike angler happy.

So I tried out all kinds of things, with very disappointing results at first (although one or two prototypes have some prospects).

But in the end, I came up with this pattern, which I have great faith in (I’ve already tested the action, in a water where I wasn’t aloud to, but that’s something we’d better keep to ourselves, unless some idiot puts it on the internet of course). Anyway, I made a tutorial so you could try them out yourselves (click on any image to enlarge).

This fly is about 14 cm long, tied on a Gamakatsu F 314, size 2/0.

 

- Put your thread on the hook (I’ve put some varnish on the hook shank first), and leave it at about 1 cm before the hook eye.

 

- At this point, tie in some Polar Flash. Make sure that the amount of fibres facing backwards are a little longer than those facing forward.

 

- Tie the flash material in towards to hook bend in 4 or 5 wraps (this way you will still have the flash effect along the hook shank), and come back with the thread the same way.

 

- Fold back the excess and tie it in the same way.

 

- Put some lacquer on the entire piece of the hook shank where you’ve tied in your material (durability). I also put a hairclip on the tail from this stage on, to make less of a mess.

- Tie in some white chenille (this is Vampire Plush). If you use other chenille, make sure it’s wide enough (this one is 15 mm). This way you are able to make a nice ‘ball’, which will determine the volume (profile) of your fly.

- Make a ‘ball’ and tie it in.

Now I use Rich’s Kustom Fibre for the entire body of the fly. And I only use a very small amount of it. Make sure to taper it on both ends.

 

- Tie in the fibre on the bottom of the hook shank (in this case white) with a couple of loose wraps, again, make sure that the amount of fibres facing backwards are a little longer than those facing forward. Then, take your time to spread the fibre evenly around the bottom of the hook shank, and then tie it in.

 

- Fold back the excess, spread it evenly around the bottom of the hook shank, and tie it in.

- Tie in the Kustom Fibre on top of the hook (in this case yellow) the same way (with a couple of loose wraps, again, make sure that the amount of fibres facing backwards are a little longer than those facing forward. Then, take your time to spread the fibre evenly around the top of the hook shank, and then tie it in).

- And again, fold back the excess, spread it evenly around the top of the hook shank, and tie it in.

 

- Make a bit of a head, whip finish a lacquer the head.

 

- Glue on some eyes (these are some of Rich’s Realistic Flyz Eyez) partially on the head and partially on the fibre. The reason I do it like this, is because when you epoxy the head (which is the next step), the fibres between the eyes will be inside the epoxy and maintain the volume (and of course make the fly more durable).

After you epoxy the head, this fly is finished. But the nice part of this fibre

(all synthetic fibres in fact), is that you can colour them with a regular permanent marker, and make whatever you want to make of them.

 

You can leave this one white and yellow…

or you can make it a bit more aggressive by adding some red smudges like this

 

white and blue, this blue is Kustom Flash Blend (I think it’s Sea Blue Kustom Fibre with UV Violet Kustom Flyz Angel Hair)…

some dark blue permanent marker on the back, and some orange dots…

or make a kind of mackerel pattern

 

white and Lime

with green permanent marker on the back, and some orange dots…

dark olive (this is done with a Prismacolor marker) and black, with some orange dots, to make a perch pattern

I’ve also made some others without dying them. I can’t make that much combinations yet, but I will surely order me some more colours, because this stuff is really great!

 

Kustom Yellow and Purple Blend

 

And Kustom Flash Blend (purple/black)

Practical stuff

Last week Bruce (Deschamps, from www.freshwatersjournal.com) asked me for some tips to create more volume on a (big) fly.

 

He asked me this after seeing a fly with a racoon zonker tail, which gives a lot of volume on its own of course.

 

Much more than these rabbit zonkers for instance.

But one may ask himself, do I really need all that volume? If it’s for big flies, I prefer a lot of movement over volume.

 

Like this one for example. This fly is 29 cm long, and I did build a bulky head to move more water, but the tail is rather thin. This tail however gives a lot of movement, and will catch more fish than a big profile fly of the same length. If it’s profile and volume you want, I wouldn’t tie them longer than 20 cm (all this is my opinion of course, so don’t shoot me for it).

But zonker strips absorb a lot of water and casting them can be like casting an entire bunny.

So if you do want to create volume with other materials (and this is probably what Bruce was asking), this might help.

 

First there’s your choice of material. This Slinky Blend will give a lot more volume with less material…

 

than this wig hair. But the wig hair will give more movement. How do you solve this? Just tie it in backwards. There is a great tutorial from Simon Graham on that matter on http://pikeflyfishingarticles.blogspot.com under wighair streamers.

Otherwise a “hollow tie” is the best way to do it. Just tie in something in front of your tail material:

 

Like chenille (this is Vampire Plush),

 

If I use saddle hackles for a tail, I like tying in some flash first.

 

Or tie in some bucktail (tight),

 

or the combination of both.

 

Or deer hair.

 

And the best way to do it is by tying in your bucktail backwards,

 

Then build up some thread in front of the bucktail. If you start tying other stuff over it now, you can create a lot of volume with very (very!) little material. There is a great tutorial on this by Mikael "Bluedun" Gröndahl on www.elmerfishing.com/en/bindbeskrivningar/gaddflugor/big-profile-pike-fly.html.

So you can change a lot (and use less), just by tying in something differently.

Another example: these Chinese cock hackles.

 

Four feathers tied onto a hook.

 

And the same four feathers tied onto a hook differently.

Just try things out, look into your books and magazines, search the internet, and ask around. I think the sky is the limit in fly-tying…