Sometimes it is just fun to tie such kind of a monster fly. This pike streamer with a length of 27 cm is articulated to give the fly the maximum of flexibility.There is just one hook in the middle of the fly.
It’s a combination of natural hair and feathers together with synthetics, which creates a big shape and the effect of mass without being to heavy when wet. It’s still possible to cast it with a 8 weight + rod and a pike taper line or a shooting head.
The asp is a fun fish for the fly rod. I got some friends, who are really go nuts, when the weather gets warmer and the asp starts to splash through the surface while hunting for baitfish.
The best fly colour for asp is white, so a white 3-D baitfish imitation works well for them. You need to put some weight into the fly, because often you fish in fast water for asp and you don’t want the baitfish pattern to flip over the surface instead of swinging some centimeters below it.
Arctic fox moves fantastic in the water, but you got often the problem, that the hair tangles around the hook while casting. You can avoid this by puting some uv resin on the fox near the hook to make it stiff. That’s an easy way to create a tangle-free fox fly.
Material:
Wind some lead around the hook shank and secure it with super glue.
Tie in some arctic fox and some strands of electra scale on each side. Secure the fox with uv resin next to the hook and cure it with the uv torch.
Make a loop with your tying thread and put some ice dub in the gap. Twist the loop with your dubbing twister and brush the dubbing with your velcro brush to create a fluffy dubbing strand.
Wind the twisted dubbing around the hook shank and brush it again.
Tie in some laser dub on the top and on the bottom like shown on the picture.
Put some eyes on each side of the fly by using super glue and paint some gills on each side with a permanent marker.
On the first picture, you can see how nice all the materials look, when wet.
tight lines
Holger Lachmann
My Blu-Ray of „Gaula – River of Silver & Gold“ by Daniel Göz and Anton Hamacher just arrived this morning. I put it directly into the player… ;-).
It’s one of the best flyfishing movies, that I’ve ever seen. It’s no fish porn, that fact should be clear. It’s more! It’s about the water, the nature and the great atlantic salmon.
Some scenes of the movie makes you breathless, together with the sound, they are epic! Big words, I know, but that are my fresh feelings some minutes after the end of the movie. The quality of the pictures and the camera rides are amazing.
Highly recommendable!
You can watch the trailer ( and buy the DVD or Blu-Ray, if you like it) here:
Enjoy!
Legendary pike fly fisherman and pike fly tyer Simon Graham starts a really cool challenge in 2012.
Rules
Players pick 4 flies for the season 12 flies to choose from (Found in the left sidebar)
6 tubes
6 hooked
6 substitute flies (3 x tubes & 3 x hooked) 5 flies will be tied for each specific fly design, and will be used through out the season. Once each fly becomes unusable to fish with, it will be replaced with a new one until all five are finished. Flies will be regularily photographed to show their condition throughout the Fantasy league challenge.
Points tally
Points will be tallied up at the end of each week and added to the league table in the sidebar so players can see where they are standing 1 point will be given for each fish caught
2 extra points will be awarded for a fish over 75cm (2,46 ft)
4 extra points will be awarded for a fish over 85cm (2,78 ft)
6 extra points will be awarded for a fish over 1 meter (3,28 ft)
I will alternate between using tube flies one days and hooked flies the next and each fly will be changed after each fish caught which will even out the playing field so to say!
Substitutions
1. Substitutions will be submitted as and when I feel the need to change the playing field. for example certain flies will perform better during different times of the year.
2. 3 x substitutions will take place throughout the course of
the season.
3. Each player gets to choose one tube and one hooked fly they would like to change. The flies that get the most vote for that specific substitution period get used!
Play offs!
1. On the 30th September all the points will be tallied up and the top 10 players will go into the October play offs which will end on the 31st October.
2. All the flies will be brought back into play for each of the ten players.
3. Players can then choose to either keep the ones they have or change to other models during the play offs.
All entrants need to be submitted by the latest 15th May. Send your entry name to uivelon_kierros@yahoo.co.uk with (2012 Fantasy pike fly challenge) as a header
Please visit Simons challenge website: http://fantasypikeflychallenge.blogspot.de/
Here’s the step by step tutorial for a mayfly nymph pattern, to imitate the BWO for example. This pattern is durable and looks quite like the natural, when drifting through the river. Don’t use too much material when tying these kind of nymphs. You should always keep the slim original in your mind.
This pattern is another example, how usefull uv-resin could be, when tying even small flies for trout and graylig. For this fly I used Clear Cure Goo Hydro, which is highly fluid like water. It’s perfect for smaller patterns and is soacked up by dubbing and feathers, what makes the flies really durable.
Materials:
Put the hook into the vise and wind the flat lead on the hook shank. Do a second layer of lead on the front part like shown on the foto.
Tie in three pheasant tail fibres to imitate the tail of the mayfly.
Tie in a small piece od stretch flex and wind it aroung the hook shank.
Cut a piece out of a pheasant tail feather and tie it in for the wing case.
Take a partridge feather and cut a little piece out of the tip. Then tie the partridge feather in with the tip first.
Dub the thorax, then fold the partridge to the front and catch it with your thread next to the hook eye.
Put a little drop of Clear Cure Goo Hydro on the stem of the partridge feather to join the dubbing with the feather. Cure the CCG Hydro with the uv torch. The hackle stem and the dubbing are joined together now. Nothing will ever slip and the legs will stay as shown on the photo.
Fold the pheasant to the front and catch it with your tying thread. Put a little drop of Clear Cure Goo Hydro on the wing case and cure it with the uv torch.
The wing case is now very durable after curing the CCG Hydro. If you want a shiny wing case, that’s what I prefer, put a second drop of CCG Hydro on the wing case and cure it. Now, the mayfly nymph is ready for fishing.
tight lines
Holger Lachmann
It’s the end of April and the trout and grayling season will start soon.
Here’s another very good emerger pattern, which imitates some different may fly species, depending on the colour and size. It’s tied on the new Daiichi 1167 Klinkhamer hook, designed by the famous dutch fly tyer Hans van Klinken.
The Daiichi 1167 got a stronger wire compared to the Tiemco 212Y for example, which makes sure, that the abdomen hangs deep in the surface. That’s really important and that’s the reason, why this pattern got no tail or a trailing shuck, to make sure, that the abdomen is hanging deep in the surface.
The quill body is covered with a thin coating UV Resin.
Materials:
Put the hook into the vise, do a layer of thread and tie in a stripped peacock quill. Wind the quill around the hook shank and catch it with the tying thread.
Put a little drop of Tack Free UV Resin on the stripped peacock quill and spread it on the abdomen. Cure it with your UV torch.
Tie in two CDC feathers for the wing case. Then tie in the tip of another white CDC feather as a crippled wing.
Dub the body and tie in some partridge fibres to imitate the legs. Fold each CDC feather to the hook eye and catch it with the tying thread. The CDC wing should be exactly in the middle of the feathers.
Cut the CDC feathers for the wing case and do some turns with your whip finisher to create a little head. Varnish the head, if you like. That’s it, ready for fishing. ;-)
tight lines
Holger Lachmann
This pattern is so famous….no more words about it, let’s start tying! ;-)
Materials:
Do a layer of thread on the hook shank and tie in the grizzly marabou as a tail.
Tie in two strands of pearl crystal flash on each side of the marabou and fix the mono for the ribbing.
Spin some dubbing around the thread and dub the body. Don’t dub the body to tight, because we want to brush it later.
Tie in a smaler grizzly hackle and wind the hackle from the front to the back around the dubbing body. Rib the dubbing body and the hackle turns with the mono from the back to the front and catch the mono with your tying thread. Give the body a nice brush with your velcro-brush.
Take a dun grizzly saltwater hackle and prepare it like shown on the picture. Tie it in and wind it around the hook to create the front hackle.
Take some bead chain eyes and tie them in. After some turns around the eyes, put a drop of super glue between the eyes to secure them, then keep winding the thread around the eyes. That’s how you create a strong bead chain head. If you fix the eyes with loose turns of thread, they will slip around the hook shank. That’s it, the Grey Magnus.
tight lines
Holger Lachmann
I added some pictures of different Magnus to the gallery. The Magnus is a very popular pattern for seatrout in the Baltic Sea, especially the Polar-Magnus in the winter time.
A ‚must have‘ in every fly box of a coastal fishermen. I’m sure it will work for other fish species, too.
Polar Magnus
Olive Magnus
Brown Magnus
I tie and fish with Fish Skulls since fall 2011 now. When I first saw them, I wasn’t really sure if I like them or not. They looked very massiv and heavy. I thought they were to heavy for my kind of fishing. I was wrong.
The Fish Skulls are not made out of tungsten or brass like other metal heads on the market, they are made out of aluminum.The weight of the aluminum is big enough to give the fly a nice jigging effect and bring ít down to the fish, but light enough for easy casting.
You can buy them in different sizes. For my fishing, the small Fish Skulls work great with wide gap hooks like Gamakatsu F 314 # 6 or #4.
The biggest weight of the Fish Skulls is on the lower part, which works like a keel, so the fly always swims straight. That’s the reason, why it’s really easy to tie up side down patterns, just switch the head.
Every package contains 10 Fish Skulls and the eyes, which you just fix with a small spot of super glue on each side. I like to „pimp“ the Fish Skulls with other eyes, like fluo eyes.
It’s easy to tie with the Fish Skulls. Just tie your fly and leave a little space next to the hook eye. Apply a drop of super glue and slip the Fish Skull of the hook eye on the fly. You can create a little „thread dam“ between the Fish Skull and the hook eye, but I think you don’t have to, because the super glue will secure the Fish Skull really tight. Sometimes I like to give the fly a hot spot by using fluo thread for the „thread dam“.
As you already know, I’m a really big fan of zonker stripes, so the first try with Fish Skulls where the combination of zonker stripes and Fish Skulls and it works perfect! I fish them since then in this combination.
I haven’t used the Fish Skulls for seatrout fishing in the Baltic Sea yet, but I think they will work there as good as for my freshwater fishing.
In my opinion, the Fish Skulls are worth to give them a try.
tight lines
Holger Lachmann
Zonker stripes are one of my favorite materials for tying streamers. The Zonker-Fish is a really simple pattern made out of a zonker stripe, which is very durable and, most important, it catches fish.
You can find a lot of color examples in my photo album Streamers.
Materials:
Wind on some lead wire and secure it with super glue.
Tie in a piece of mono for ribbing.
Mix two colors of flash dubbing.
Split the thread and put the dubbing in the gap. Then spin the bobbin to twist the dubbing.
Wind the dubbing around the hook shank and brush it with your velcro brush.
Tie in a zonker stripe at the front and rib it with the mono from the back to the front.
Tie in a strand of krinkle mirror flash on each side and form a little head with flash dubbing.
Use some super glue for fixing the Clear Cure Eyes on each side and fill the space between the eyes on top and bottom with Clear Cure Goo to create a durable head.
tight lines
Holger Lachmann
I’m very happy to be invited again to tie at the spring fair of adh-fishing in Peine on 3. + 4. march 2012.
As always it’ll be a great weekend with great casters and fly tyers like Christopher Rownes, Allan Bloch, Leif Stävmo, Mikael Frödin, Andy Weiß and more.
The best thing there is the atmosphere. You don’t feel like entering a shop, which is getting bigger and bigger btw, you feel like coming to friends!
I really LOVE the casting pool behind the shop, where you can test cast every rod, no matter single hand or spey rod, from Sage, Guideline, Orvis, Vision, Loop, Scierra and Scott.
Yeah, it’ll definitely be a fun weekend!
BE THERE OR BE SQUARE ! ! ! :-)
Here’s a step by step tutorial for a matuka streamer. This type of streamer is very old and you don’t see it to often in the fly boxes of the fishermen today, but the truth is, that the feathers move nicely, especially when you put some weight in the front of the fly, which causes a jigging effect.
Materials:
Wind some lead wire around the shank and secure it with super glue.
Create a little dubbing ball at the end of the hook shank, tie in a saltwater hackle and wind it around. The dubbing ball pushes the fibres to the sides.
Tie in a piece of mono for ribbing. Split the tying thread and put the dubbing mix in the gap. Spin the bobbin to twist the dubbing. Wind the dubbing around the hook shank and brush it with your velcro .
Take two feathers and pull some fibres from one side as shown on the photo. Tie in the feather at the front and secure them by ribbing them with the mono. Catch the ribbing with your thread.
Tie in some strands of krinkle mirror on each side and do a whip finish with your thread. Take two gator eyes and put them on each side. You should use super glue to secure them. The fly is nearly finished. Just take some Diamond Hard Tack Free resin and let it run between the eyes, then cure it with your uv torch. Repeat this till the gap between the eyes is filled. This makes the fly very strong and durable.
tight lines
Holger Lachmann
I’ve installed some photo albums for dry flies, nymphs, streamers, pike flies and seatrout flies incl. the possibility of a slide show. Hope you like it!
Last night I wanted to tie a CDC-Shrimp. I’d just done the first few wraps with the tying thread, when my cell was ringing. My buddy Aik was calling. So, what to do? Stop tying? No way! :-) I clamped the cell between my ear and my shoulder and continued tying with this „special“ posture…. When I finished the telephone conversation, the fly was finished too, including the back with Clear Cure Goo.
To be honest, I was concentrated on the call and was wondering, that the fly looked no too bad either. I should always tie without thinking! :-D
Another all around seatrout fly. This pattern is inspired by the famous fly „Omøborsten“. This fly is mainly tied out of soft Keough grizzly saltwater hackles, which pulsate strongly in the water. I made a little video at the end of the tutorial, where you can get a slightly impression, how the fly mowes in the water.
Materials:
Wind the lead wire around the front part of the hook and secure it with super glue. Then create a little dubbing ball at the end of the fly.
Tie in a really big and soft hackle.
Wind the hackle around the hook shank.
Tie in some pheasant tippets.
Tie in the mono for ribbing. Then split the thread, put the dubbing in the gap and spin the bobbin to twist the thread and the dubbing. Wind the Dubbing around the shank.
Tie in another hackle…
…wind it towards the end of the fly. Secure the hackle by ribbing the it with the mono. Then brush the body, so the dubbing strands are mixed with the hackle fibres.
Tie in another big hackle at the front. This big front hackle pushes the water and creates much turbulance.
Create a nice little hot spot with your fluo thread and varnish it. That’s it!
tight lines
Holger Lachmann
click to play the video[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/36655237[/vimeo]