tight lines
mcfluffchucker
and a rather fetching young lady on the front a bonus , now this stuff is made from the same stuff as a lot of synthetics and it cost me 3.00 UK pounds for this wig and the stuff is around 15 inches long so quite good value for money , this one is black and was the only colour they had but no doubt if id looked around the town center i could have found different colours
watch this space for some flies im going to tie with it tomorrow and remember next time the wife wants you to go shopping head along with her you never know what you'll find
tight lines
mcfluffchucker
(a cave in Scotland)
i have no problem with asking for help if i don't know how to do something hell that's how you learn things helped enough people in my time and don't mind doing that at all . so when it came to thinking about a new idea i needed help , you see id seen a video on you tube with a chap using lead head jigs (no not on the fly) and the chap in question had used a stinger hook for these walleyes and actually did a great job on catching those short biting fish ,.
well I've had that very same problem before with predators you know so i got to thinking about incorporating this into some of my flies , i thought this would work very well with my sub bugs , trouble was i had no faith in the holding power of the stinger hook i just couldn't get it out my head that the connection would break on a decent fish , with that in mind there was only one thing to do , in times of indecision a call to my my redneck brother ken capsey at pike adventures was the the only option as he uses the very same stinger hooks on some of his flies .
after a skype video call with brother ken and a nifty little demo and some choice words from him (glue the crap outta it dude) i watched him do a test on the stinger loop and yup im convinced a fish and gonna break it
so lay down a bed of thread , i just use a normal sewing cotton
using a stiff plastic coated wire tie in one side to the side of the hook shaft , then slip on your stinger hook and whip the other length of wire to the shaft , pinch both pieces of the wire together at the rear of the hook and whip down so the loop sits directly out from the back and not flat , this will mean you hook will sit properly and not to one side
the finished sub bug with a small stinger hook , I've gone for a small circle hook as circles are really the dogs rowlocks when it comes to hook ups and really its the ideal thing to use i think and you'd be able to get away with using smaller sizes of hook and being assured your not going to compromise on the hook up strength
this bug is designed more on ken capseys sub bug head over mine as kens heads seem to get the fly deeper on a floating line whereas mine will just trip under the surface , it all down to the packing of the hair but anyway i went with a smaller packed head and plastic eyes to give it a cool glide-bait action
the finished fly looking great in my book and hopeful it will fish like i think it will. test day coming up and i think ill do a few more just to make sure
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i was tying some flies up the other day and i got this particular fly down to being tied up in 2 Min's yes just two Min's so thought id share this really quick tie fly with you the possibility's are really endless when it comes to colours so knock yourself out and have fun with it , the video takes 8 Min's but that's because im talking through it but you get the idea , feel free to share this as with my other videos on your blogs or website , just let me know where there going
have fun if your out and a massive thanks to ken for the walk through and settling my mind
mcfluffchucker
(a cave in Scotland)
thanks to Bob Cozzo from Ely, Minnesota for a mail asking for a bit more detailed explanation on what i carry in my boat box , well happy to help bob here below is the contents of my box unpacked and on the living room floor (the wife is out)
my boat box is completely different to my bank bag and that again is completely different to what id take if i was traveling ultralight but more on that in another blog post , i tend to choose water specific flies these days that match what the fish are probably used to seeing swimming about , i also include a few flyer flies flies that id maybe not use on a particular water , so depending on season and what the fish are up to my choice of flies can vary greatly in both colour and size , the flies above represent what im hauling just now , again this can change from trip to trip
so whats in the box then
a longer type clip box is a recent addition to the box fits in a corner quite nicely and for my use carry a couple of spools of authanic wire a pair of small sharp scissors for cutting the authanic with , and i also keep a small box of cross lock swivels in here that i use on the end of my traces for quick change of fly , again all easy to access in one place , i also carry a small roll of electrical tape this has many uses from using as a finger guard when stripping line in the wet to covering cuts and using to mark you line to keep you fly at a specific depth in the water , a million uses
when every thing is packed away it all fits quite snugly into the box , the box itself is a daiwa seat bot that course anglers use in the UK , im not sure if you can get them overseas if you then a large plastic cool box will also do the job if you can get one with a hinged lid even better
the inside lid i have lined with a cut to size yoga matt and used a hot melt glue gun to stick it down on these i tend to have the flys im going to be starting out with and flies i want to try in the water also a great place to store used flies to dry , make sure all your flies are dry at the end of the trip if not take them out and dry them separately
i have a rapala clip on unhooking and scissors tool kit that your supposed to clip on your best , i clip it to the side of my box and i always have ultra fast access to a knife and unhooking equipment , and that's that hope it was helpful to you bob 
been a busy week for me topping up predatorbite with flies so ive had little time to play with my own patterns until last night when i decided to whack out a couple of buck tail patterns which came out better than i expected one in black with black flash
and of course one in chartreuse with a nice green flash through it like this pattern quite a lot will be playing with a few more of these patterns
while i was doing the predatorbite order i was churning out the flies and wondered how long it was taking me to do a rainbow trout pattern so i timed myself and i managed to tie a fly in 2 Min's so with that being so easy i decided to make a short video on the tie , the video actually takes 8 Min's or so but im talking through it but you ca tie this no bother in just a few Min's , a quick and easy but great looking fly enjoy
these eyes are called sea eyes , i got these from rutland fly fishing in the UK but i don't think they do them anymore you can however get them from lake-land fly tying they are exactly the same ones here's the link aluminium sea eyes they are sold in packs of 25 for the ridiculously cheap price of 2.50 UK basically they are like dumbbell eyes like you get on clousers but these are made from aluminium and have a really cool recess that you can stick in your own 3d eyes so of course this brings up a gazillion possibilities for the fly tier , and the other bonus is being aluminium there are very light which in turn reduces the sink rate of your fly over the trad metal dumbbells , these ones being large are also a great option for the pike fly tier
I've used these eyes quite a lot in past and before id have to mix up a little 5 min epoxy then ad a bit to the recess then place the eye on top then add a another little bit of epoxy on top of the positioned eye then wait for it to dry before turning the sea eye over and repeating the process this takes a bloody age to do and you can only do a limited amount of eyes at one time before the epoxy goes hard and you have to mix a new batch up
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as you can see in the picture above the handy dispenser makes it really easy to drop a little bit into the recess of the eye
i then place the small 3d on top and push down with a bodkin as you push down the diamond cure will overflow a bit at the sides but don't worry about this as it will even itself out on the next step
just top up with diamond cure to completely seal the eye in , it will form the shape of the eye just don't overfill the eye for the best results , you can always just add a bit at a time curing as you go till you get the desired effect and thickness
curing takes seconds with the very cool half the price twice the job of other similar looking torches ultrafire uv torch and seconds is really all it takes , the torches come in a an amazing 19.95 UK with batteries fitted compere that to 34.oo UK on other sites well that's quite a saving for the same torch
so having set the eyes you need to prepare the hook i still go with the old build a dam on each side of where the eye is going to sit (you can just see it with my rubbish photography) im also using a clear mono thread from uncle Greg over at piketrek and its only 1.50 UK for 200m another bargain
so what i do know is add a covering of diamond hard over the thread and on the spot where the eyes are going to sit , you only need a small amount on there
sit the eye on and whip round a few times to hold it in place add a small blob of the diamond hard to the dumbbell whipping
then zap it for a few seconds and that's all you need
this has set rock solid and you wont be able to shift it a great solid bond
ive just decided to do the most messy fly in the world just made up of angel hair and nothing else plenty of flash and plenty of movement
some red angel hair tied in under and in front of the eye and fold back and secure cant beat some red in head
there you have it a great looking sparkly fly with a rock solid eye , of course you can pretty much add any kind of eye you like to the dumbbells , and its fast and easy to do give it a try ,
i was on the water early to make the most of things i like to get on water early first light if possible give me a better chance of being on the money when the underwater dinner bell goes off , so i rowed up the loch to my first spot and tried a few patterns around the area for a few hours .
there was nothing much going on using the intermediate line fishing down through the layers so i decided to change over to a floating line and an ugly Betty fly on the surface to see if i could get them agitated to take a surface fly making some noise i fished around the edges on some of my favorite lies where bank access is difficult so threes a bonus right there
with the wind getting up even worse and only a few half hearted nips at the flies i decide to take a break and dig up a late breakfast and think about what i was going to do next as i wasn't coming off the water till i had a fish to the boat , i knew the conditions were getting even harder with a now scorching sun beating down and the wind up to way more than 10mph i seriously needed a rethink on tactics , sometimes a radical change is the way to go on a hard day , the bummer is if this water was in the states id just stick on a gurgler and go largemouth , well it ain't its Scotland so a rethink is the only thing i can do
my thinking was black yup plain old black flies on the bottom ya see the water is still pretty green and rubbish visibility and i figure on such a hot day i figured the fish would be down on the deck , so i rigged up a 5 inch subbug in noir (black to me and you) i also changed to a stripped bass intermediate line as i still wanted to search out the layers with this fly , first cast i let the fly go right down and did a strip pause strip and within a a couple of pulls the rod arched over into a satisfying curve FISH ON BABY the bug does it again
a first look as it shot to the surface very annoyed at getting caught out
the way the bug was sitting in the pike mouth i guessed id pulled the fly right past its mouth anyway the fish couldn't resist the passing snack and it nailed it check out the teeth
just got to love those predators and on a day where conditions were bloody awful i was delighted to be holding a well earned fish 
and there you have the killer bug , this is highly visible in the water and the 7mm animal eyes give it the action of a glidebait in the water , used with the wonderful authentic wire from predatorbite.com give this sub bug maximum movement in the water i mean this thing really does look like a fish in the water
so my box of shinny stuff was confined to the box all day , as i carried on to miss a load of fish to the bug mostly turning at the side of the boat in shallow water that all they wanted black bugs .
so with the wind getting up i decided to head back to the dock and home as there was white caps starting to happen and that's never a good sign . its really quite rare to have a day like this in Scotland at this time of year and from now on i think the weather will go down the pan its already being forecast snow for the end of October , but ill still manage a couple of trips out and hopefully a few more through November if the snow holds off well you cant believe the forecasters
got a busy week ahead lots of tying to do so stay tuned midweek
mcfluffchucker
(a cave in Scotland)
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