more rumbles from the cave

And so it begins for another year

you can just tell when folks have had enough of Christmas and new year , without fail around this time of year I start to get the fly orders trickling in first a few then by the first week of February every man and his dog want flies and this year is no exception in fact its really strange most of the orders are for my smaller predator flies maybe this year is the year of scaling down the flies for pike , or maybe people just want something different to try who knows . Be interesting to see how that pans out .

Same thing with hooks , all of a sudden im going nuts on the predator hooks seems like everybody all of a sudden is tying flies must be the bad weather and lochs with wintry lids on stopping people getting out anyway keeps me busy in the cave

being busy in the cave  

 I also got down to making a load of pike bangers , these are based on the famous “bobs bangers” but scaled up a bit , you can fish them a number of ways but there great early season fished of the bottom on sinking lines you can get some pretty savage takes on the way down as well , because they flutter due the the round buoyant head can be irresistible if it passes a fish  

 usually Ill make up a bunch of heads production line style in various colours and various eyes , why so many well to be honest I tend to give a lot of flies away to folks on the bank so I keep a few in reserve and of course the destroyer will need a few in his box ..

 so here they are pike bangers tied on a 6/0 clouser hook nothing much too it but a deadly pattern , and of course works great for seabass as well , ive not tried them for the bass but plenty do with the smaller sizes and do OK , maybe that’s a trip to think about in the summer …..and below well a few different colors ready to go it would be rude not to really

 also this week taken delivery of some rather nice new hook stock (yes it a blatant plug for my websitehttp://www.spanglefish.com/hookeyeandfly/index.asp) first up is the rather tasty lazer baitfish offset hook although this is supposed to be a size 6/0 its clearly more of a 4/0 but the hook is so nice I can live with that and its blinking razor sharp as well , would make a great hook for either smaller predators or sea bass / pollock sandeel patterns  

THE SURGICAL STRIKE

 there’s a lot of hooks out there and over the years ive found some favorites but there not all really marketed at the fly angler indeed the ones that are marketed at the fly angler only come in packs of 10 or so most of time which does actually make them very expensive ,now one of my favorite hooks is the orvis pike and musky hook , ive been trying for years to find another hook like it that I could by in bulk but I refuse to compromise on quality and of course the risk of losing a big fish to a cheap hook just not worth it .

So finally after hundreds of samples and loads of testing I am delighted to say ive found it and the best thing is it comes in sizes up to 8/0 more details here on the site

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here’s a fantastic though provoking item write up from brain price over at Vermont fly guys thanks for letting me use it brian

What's wrong? You were expecting some beautiful colored fly with flowing tendrils of feathers ; just picturing its beauty pulsating in the water weren't ya? Let me explain:
We've done a few demos and the biggest question asked is "How long does a fly like that last" referring specifically to the toothies we chase. That is actually a good question, one that we never had a answer to because we either park the fly for memory lane; or it gets snagged by our buddies. So starting last March at ice out I set out to do a test, I was going to track the number of fish caught on one of our flies and stick with it all year. This is the one, a mini Maelstrom Whistler tied in last years fav color of mine, White/Pink. Tied on a double 2/0 Esox 1 Hook from Hook eye and Fly and finished off with Deercreek UV Diamond Hard. So this is the Gnar your seeing after 13 Northern Pike, 2 Pickerel, 3 Smallies and 2 Largemouth.
That means that this fly saw around 10,500 teeth and ran through a belt sander of mandibles 5 times. It is missing 2 tail feathers, a good bit of hair, marabou is chewed out, the dumbells are scarred with teeth marks, the UV resin has a chew through on one side,blood stained hackles(probably mine), and the hooks are sharp as the day they grew hair. I ain't going to lie, I'm surprised; but we do tie our flies to take this kind of abuse. Lets see if 2013 is its demise. Like I said, that was a good question...BP

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merry christmas to the destroyer  

 finally after weeks of illness and work I finally got a chance yesterday (18^th jan) to catch up with the destroyer and I gave him christmas present ( 2 bottles of whisky) and I was absolutely made up when he gave me a double sided box with some of his flies in , I been raving for months now about how good his flies are so that gift was well appreciated thanks buddy only trouble now is I wont want to use them  

 what no doughnuts  

 the destroyer has a moment when he realises that he had forgotten to bring the doughnuts

 lunch time soup hot rolls and monster fish on the tv life is good , as you can see the destroyer is now free-styling with his flies basally choosing a material he likes and tying it with the methods ive shown him , the pink fly he did was a cracker anyway the day went far to fast and before I knew it that was it finish time kids arriving home from school and stuff so that was it for another week and with the forecast being quite awful for the next 2 weeks looks like next week will again be a tying day  

 I had some fly orders to finish off so there wasn’t much time today for experimentation but we did manage to play with a few colours the results are below , im experimenting with blending ep at the moment as I like the idea of 2 colour blended flies hopefully when my ep arrives this week ill have some new patterns to show next week all being well and I dont stuff it up

 (this fly is around 7 inchs long )

hook – 6/0

thread – phantom thread

belly – electric chartreuse

back – our blend of green and olive ep

flash – uv green blobtail (from castlefeathers on ebay)

eye 8mm black

 (this fly is around 7 inchs long )

hook – 6/0

thread – phantom thread

belly – electric chartreuse

back – olive ep

flash – gold blobtail (from castlefeathers on ebay)

eye 8mm black

the results  

 looks like hes pretty much got it now so im looking forward to seeing some of his own ties

see ya next week

mcfluffchucker

a cave in scotland