Trout/perch Zonker

Yes, it’s been a week since I posted something, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t do anything. Since my main goal is trout at the moment, but the weather just stays horrible, with heavy winds, rain and hail storms, I stayed inside and tied myself a lot of trout streamers.

 

I certainly won’t post all of them, but I do want to share these ones. This kind of streamer is getting very popular over here in Belgium.

It’s a pattern by Pedro Guridi, a very nice Chilean guy who lives in Belgium. He’s not only a very good fly-fisherman, but also a fantastic fly-tier.

He made a tutorial of his ‘zonker’, which you can check out here.

He made some other tutorials as well (nothing for pike though), which you can find on the website of his club http://thenymphmaniacs.com/

And with perch in mind, I already tied me some slightly bigger ones in different colour combinations as well.

 

 

If this weather doesn’t change soon, I’ll do like Erin Block so elegantly said it in her last comment “Fist to the sky… and fish!”.

Making popper/slider heads

The flies on my last post were made with these ready made poppers from Wapsi

(but loads of other brands have something similar).

 

It is a simple way to work, they have a nice shape, they are very durable (I don’t know what they’re made off, but they’re very hard, so a layer of epoxy is not necessary), and if you want, they come with hooks to match.

So, you warm your hook with a lighter (that’s how I do it), push the popper in place, fill the groove with epoxy or some UV stuff,

 

make a hole for your rubber legs (more on that matter later), paint the popper, and you’re ready to tie the rest.

But like all ready made products, they have their limitations (size, buoyancy), not to mention the fact that most fly-tiers like to make everything themselves (including me). So here we go…

 

I start with this piece of foam.
I bought this one in a fly shop (but loads of industrial foams work equally good) and cut out a square section, which I cut very roughly into shape.

And now comes an interesting trick I learned from the Grey Piker

(thanks again Philippe!).

 

I glue the foam onto a piece for my dremmel tool (this is a whetstone I only use for this purpose).

You can see that I’ve cut the foam only very roughly, which is no problem at all.

 

Just hold the foam against a piece of sandpaper and start your dremmel tool. I use two kinds of sandpaper, a ‘100’ for the rough shape and a ‘240’ to finish.

 

And the result is a nicely shaped popper (or slider) head.

 

Then I cut a groove with a scalpel.

 

If it’s a popper I want, I scour a cup with another dremmel tool. 

 

Next, I put some varnish or super glue on a hook, and put some rough thread on (this is sewing cotton).

 

Then I glue on the popper head (I reversed it here, because I wanted a slider instead, but it’s the same principle).

When dry, I fill the groove with epoxy or some UV stuff, and I’m ready to paint.

 

Now, you can actually paint the heads, or use markers, but the most interesting way I think is with a paintbrush set… 

but I don’t have that. So I use this aerosol.

One tip maybe: do it outside, you can’t believe what kind of a mess this stuff can make (not to mention the smell).

 

But, you have a nice,

quick result.

Since this foam is rather fragile (certainly when you take pike teeth into account),
it’s necessary to coat it with a layer of epoxy.

And at this point I like to add some glitter as well.

 

For the slider (red/white) I added some red and silver glitter to the epoxy. This works well when you want the same colour and amount of glitter equally around the head.

 

But with the popper (chartreuse/green), I wanted some green glitter on top of the head and gold on the bottom. So I just put some varnish on the place I want the glitter and scatter some on it. Once the varnish is dry, I put on an epoxy coating.

 

I also put on the eyes while the epoxy is still wet.

And once the epoxy is dry, I make the hole for my rubber legs.

 

There are several ways to make that hole, but heating up a bodkin or a needle and push it trough is the easiest and most popular.

 

Although I like to use this tool as well. This is boilie drill (for carp fishermen), which is basically a drill on a handle.

For once, I will not advise you to use a dremmel tool. With the speed of the rotation, the foam will melt, which leads to two possibilities. One, your drill gets stuck in this melted substance (then you can either break your popper head, or break your drill, and since I can be stubborn... I did both). Or two, you're able to push it trough but your drill ends up with a plastic coating (which is a real mess to clean).

And then of course I tie the rest of the fly…

The popper is about 13 cm and the slider about 18 cm long. They are both tied on

a Piketrek Eagle Claw Pike Fly hook, size 5/0.

If you have any questions or suggestions concerning this post (or others),

please don’t hesitate to send me a mail…

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)

The ‘Lonesome Tom’ tutorial

I’ve never had this amount of mails before relating to one specific pattern, so I definitely had to do a tutorial on this one. I hope this will answer most of the questions I’ve received. If you still have questions concerning this or other matters, please don’t hesitate to mail me.

So this is a ‘step by step’ on a ‘Lonesome Tom’ pattern (well, two actually, because I use two different methods to make the head). Click on any image to enlarge.

This fly is about 14 cm long, tied on an SS-1930 Inox, size 4/0 (but I know that hooks are very personal, so this is not a must), and you can use any colour combination you want. This is just my version in chartreuse and white.

 

1. Put your thread on the hook (I always varnish the hook shank before I put on the thread).

 

2. Tie in some flash material (this is Polar Flash) like this.

 

3. Fold back the excess and tie it in.

 

4. Tie in a chartreuse rabbit zonker strip. At this point I put on some lacquer but it’s not really necessary.

 

I also put a hairclip on the tail, so it won’t get in the way while tying the rest of the fly.

 

5. Tie in some white chenille (this is Vampire Plush).

6. Wrap the chenille around the hook shank (about 1 cm), cut it, and tie it off.

Now comes the bucktail. There are two reasons why I use bucktail here.

One, It gives a nice transition between the head and the tail, which gives it a more natural profile.

And two, It keeps the tail from wrapping around the hook (it will still happen, but a lot less).

 

7. Tie in some white bucktail and spread it evenly around the bottom of the hook shank.

 

8. Tie in some chartreuse bucktail and spread it evenly around the top of the hook shank.

 

9. Cut off the excess and use Head Cement to secure it (this is very important for the durability of your fly).

10. Then wrap your thread around the hook shank to make this kind of conical shape. This will make the building of the head a lot easier.

This is the amount of polypropylene fibre (or EP Fibre) I use to make the head. As you can see, I will do it in 4 (x4) steps. But that’s because I’m used to do this.

If you’re not used to tie a head like this (or if you don’t have this kind of soft synthetic fibre), I would recommend that you do it in more (than four) steps, with less material. You won’t notice it while tying, but once you cut it into shape, you will have certain gaps (and that doesn’t look very nice).

 

11. a. Tie in the red fibre on the bottom of the hook shank (two tight wraps is enough).

 

b. then the white fibre on one side

 

c. and again on the other side

 

d. and chartreuse on top

at this point, I use a half hitch knot to secure, and then pull the thread trough the middle of the fibre on the bottom of the hook shank (the red in this case) while pulling all the fibre backwards, and wrap the thread around the hook shank a couple of times in front of the fibre.

 

I use another hairclip to keep all the fibre out of the way for the next step (it can get really messy if you don’t).

 

12. Tie in some Barred Crazy Legs (or Flexifloss, or whatever…)

 

13. Repeat step 11 (in this case, white on the bottom, and chartreuse on the sides and top of the hook shank).

 

14. Again, repeat step 11.

 

15. And again. Then tie off, whip Finnish, and lacquer. 

 

This is what you’ll get, and as you can see, this fly is in desperate need of a haircut.

 

15. So after cutting the head into shape (be careful with the Crazy Legs), and gluing some epoxy eyes on, you should have something that looks like these.

Now, if you feel like this is to difficult, or to much work to put into a single fly (which I can perfectly understand), then this might be an alternative.

 

The first 10 steps on this fly are the same as the fly above (except this one is completely white, but you can use any colour you like of course). So let’s continue from this stage on…

 

11. Make a brass wire dubbing brush with the same material as above (in this case, white and red polypropylene fibre, but I’ve mixed in some flash material as well). If you don’t know how to make one of these, I made a tutorial on how to make a brass wire dubbing brush a while ago, which you can find in my blog archive, on Thursday 25 November 2010. 

 

12. Tie in the dubbing brush.

 

13. Wrap it forward (tight) around the hook shank like this, while pulling all the fibre backwards…

 

14. until you reach the hook eye. At that point, cut off the excess. I don’t have any excess here besides the wire itself, because I’m quite used to do this, but I can guarantee you that you will have some excess in the beginning. So make sure to make your dubbing brush long enough. It’s a lot easier to cut off a bit because it’s to long, than to add a second one because it was to short!

Then tie off, whip finish and lacquer.

15. This next step is important. This is very soft material, so by making the dubbing brush and tying it in, lots of the fibre will be attached to the hook shank at both ends of the fibre.

All you have to do is put your scissors into the fibre, along the hook shank like you see on the picture. DO NOT CUT! But just pull your scissors upwards, and continue to do so around the hook shank. You will feel it when it’s no longer necessary, once you put the scissors in and you’re able to pull it upwards without any resistance. 

Then you will have something that looks like this. Which again, is a fly in desperate need of a haircut.

 

16. So after cutting the head into shape and adding some epoxy eyes, you should have a fly that looks like this.

Like I’ve said before, my video footage an the action in the water of this fly was a bit disappointing, so you’ll have to take my word for it, or even better, tie some yourself, and…

tight lines!