When it’s getting dark on the river, the caddis often become very active. It’s really fun to fish a big caddis fly surfing over the surface. Sometimes the trouts go mad and take the fly very aggressively.

I don`t want to check all the time, if the fly is floating well. The fly should float like a piece of cork all night long. That`s why I like to use materials like CDC and foam for those kind of flies. If you want to treat the fly with fly floatant, you should use a highly fluid floatant like Water Shed. Very important, Water Shed must be completely dried before fishing.

Materials:

• Hook: Maruto C47BL # 12
• Extended Body: Foam
• Wing: CDC and Moose Hock
• Top: Pheasant
• Body and Legs: CDC
• Antennae: Moos Hock

 

Put a needle in your vise and tie a layer of thread. Very important: Use NOT a waxed thread. If you do, you may get problems pushing the finished body from the needle.

 

Put a 3 mm wide strip of foam on the needle.

 

Create some nice segements with your thread. If you got problems creating the body, just google „extended foam body“. There you find some nice videos.

 

Finish the body behind the last segment with a whip finish.

 

Pull the extended body from the needle and tie it in.

 

With a permanent marker you can give the body a nice colour.

 

As a wing, tie in three CDC feathers. They should be longer than the body.

 

Over the CDC wing, you should tie in some moos hock hair in the same length like the CDC. It push the CDC down, so the wing is always flat over the body and it increases the floatability. Then tie in some fibres from a pheasant tail. Split the thread, put in some CDC and twist the the thread by rotating the bobbin. I like to work with the Petitjean Magic Tool when preparing the CDC.

 

 

If necessary, repeat spinning the CDC and wind it around a second time.

 

Fot the antennae I used two hair of moose hock.

 

Pull the pheasant fibres foreward and catch it with the thread.

 

Spinn some CDC as dubbing around the thread and create a little head, then fold the pheasant fibres back, cut it and whip finish the fly.

 

To secure the thread and the pheasant use a bit of varnish or really thin uv-resin, which makes the fly very durable.

 

Finished fly from underneath, or „the fish view“. ;-)

tight lines

Holger Lachmann