Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Thanks Jeff

I while back I received a mail from fellow blogger Jeff over at Fly Fishing & Tying Obsessed that he wanted to send me some off his poppers and a few other flies. Well the flies arrived just a day before Christmas and they are exquisite. Jeff obviously put a lot of care in making these and the poppers especially looks to good to be fished.  I previously made a post of some poppers that I tied based on Jeff's flies but the real thing put my creations to shame.

All the flies Jeff send me

If you haven't done so already head on over to Jeff's blog and check it out. I know he also sells these flies and believe me it is well worth the money. Hopefully I will be able to test these out within the next few weeks and report back, though I know all of them will catch fish.






Monocacy Bumble Bee

Roadkill

Thanks for your generosity Jeff. As soon as I get my lazy but into gear again I will tie you some tiny trout flies to try.

Friday, December 16, 2011

Fishing 16 December 2011

Today was a public holiday in SA and I managed to sneak off to the streams for some fishing. We had some hard rain in the week and even had some reports of some snow on the mountain early in the week. It is supposed to be high summer and we have had snow!!! The rain made the river flow a little higher than what is normal for this time of year but at least it will let us fish for longer into the summer. The weather today was absolutely perfect and the fish though so to. There was no hatches that I could see and I also didn't see any fish rising, but all 20 odd rainbow's I caught today was caught on a dry fly.

With the high flows I got snapped off 3 times when a fish ran downstream and I could not follow it fast enough. I was fishing with 8X tippet as I forgot my 5x and 6x tippet at home. When I reached to top of my beat I turned around and had some fun catching small mouth bass with streamers on the way downstream.





I also decided to clean my tying desk today. I normally sit down and tie one or two flies and always end up either sticking the flies in whatever piece of foam or box that is close by. Well, apparently I have been tying a lot more than I though as I found a crap load of flies all over the place.




Wednesday, December 7, 2011

A South African fly tying journey with Ed Herbst and friends Volume 2


I previously highlighted a short clip of Ed Herbst first video A South African Fly Tying Journey with Ed Herbst and friends and I am exited to say they Ed has just released “Terrestrials” the second in the series.

Background info

The first in the series with Ed Herbst as narrator, interviewer and fly tyer and Andrew Ingram as camera operator and video editor was extremely well received both here and abroad. It was generally agreed that it significantly raised the bar for DVDs of this genre and this was hardly surprising given their decades of experience in the communication field and Ed’s acknowledged expertise as a fly tyer and fly fishing historian.

The DVD covers five innovative interpretations of insects which are important to trout and other fish, the grasshopper, the ant, the beetle, the inchworm and the crane fly.

Ed contributes two flies, his hopper with its effective leg configuration – a pattern which Tom Sutcliffe describes on his website as the best such pattern (http://www.tomsutcliffe.co.za/fly-tying/111-tying-ed-herbsts-hopper) and his Split-Back Beetle. The latter incorporates a sighter post combining orange egg yarn and krystal flash to provide both a contrasting colour and small sparkles of light on the back of the pattern. Foam beetles, while deadly, are notoriously difficult to see because they float flush with water surface and Ed’s pattern solves this problem.

Renowned Rhodes Guide, Fred Steynberg, demonstrates a foam ant pattern which he has developed over several years and which he says, when correctly presented to a sighted fish, is “never refused”.

Well-known Aliwal North custom rod/net builder, Mario Geldenhuys,(http://www.customflyrods.co.za/) demonstrates an ingenious inchworm pattern. The extended foam body is built on a needle and then transferred to a #18 hook. The comparatively large body floats the tiny hook with great buoyancy and Mario says this quick-and-easy to tie pattern is as effective on yellowfish as it is on trout.

Tony Biggs’ RAB has been catching trout for decades and Philip Meyer’s parachute version is easier to cast into the wind and is exceptionally effective when a breeze is ruffling the water and activating its squirrel tail “legs”. Philip says it is exceptionally effective when crane flies are on the water but also works well as a searching pattern when nothing is hatching and fish are not rising.

My thoughts:

I thoroughly enjoyed the first DVD  and was looking forward to this second in the series. The flies in this volume is well known flies to the South African Fly fisherman but before this DVD there was no real step by step tutorials on how to tie them properly. I know that I have tried to copy them myself with varying degrees of success. This DVD has certainly helped me and with no doubt it will be a great help to both novice and expert fly tiers. These flies were designed by South African Fly tiers for South African conditions but will work equally well wherever in the world you might find yourself. The video footage is expertly shot with clear instructions and the tiers explain the history of the flies as well as why they use the material that they do.

A South African Fly Tying journey with Ed Herbst and friends Volume 2 is well worth adding to your library.

Volume 2 is 60 minutes long and is available from my shop or Stream X

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

UV Chewee Skin Pupa

I tied this fly a while ago using Nymph skin but lately I have been playing with UV Chewee Skin and I think that this material works so much better on this fly.


UV Caddis Green



UV Tan


Below is another soundless step by step movie.

Saturday, December 3, 2011

Quick Dubbing Brush Caddis

A video I made for a quick Dubbing Brush Caddis