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Tying Streamside

556 views 12 replies 5 participants last post by  GAT 
G
#1 ·
A friend and I made this video a few years ago. I thought maybe folks here might enjoy it.

 
#3 ·
Well, that is flat out cool! So, who's the old dude with the white beard and hair?:D

Thanks for posting. I tie flies at picnic tables while fishing stillwaters, but never tried tying flies while fishing a river. As noted, there is an advantage to that tact. (BTW, glad you made it over here, my friend)
 
G
#5 ·
Well, that is flat out cool! So, who's the old dude with the white beard and hair?:D

Thanks for posting. I tie flies at picnic tables while fishing stillwaters, but never tried tying flies while fishing a river. As noted, there is an advantage to that tact. (BTW, glad you made it over here, my friend)
I dye my hair that color to make myself look older . . .
 
#4 ·
That's a cool vid. I would have left a bit of thread to rib the emerger (actually, I would probably have used brass wire), but in any event he's (you?) got me thinking about a portable kit when I camp and fish.
 
G
#9 ·
I normally rib that soft hackle fly. My friend is the video guy and everything was done in short choppy segments then edited together. I left out that rib in the process, but good point. Thanks.

I've taken that kit with me to many places. It's really worked out great to be able to customize some patterns based what you find in the river. It's especially helpful if you're fishing water that is new to you. That wasn't the case in this video though. That's the Arkansas River I'm fishing and I've fished that since I was a kid although I no longer live in Colorado.
 
#10 ·
There is certainly an advantage to tying when fishing. A few years ago, Gin and I were fishing East Lake and while she was on the lake, I was tying flies at a picnic table... with the aid of a chipmunk that was very interested in my trail mix.

Callibaetis were hatching and I noticed the emergers where not really a solid grey color but had a light green tint. I found some dubbing that was basically a very light olive, tied some simple patterns and gave them a try. They worked great!

Now, I tie my Callibaetis with dubbing that includes a light olive hue. I wouldn't have figured that one out if I hadn't tied the flies at the lake and tried them just after tying them. Of course, the color recommendation from the chipmunk didn't hurt :)

Great thread!
 
#13 ·
Rocky, our bug guy, and I also made nets as Trapper described. At one time, Rocky would bring an aquarium to the local club flyfishing fair and we'd go to Oak Creek and collect nymphs so he could show them in the aquarium at the fair. It helped to have one guy upstream shuffling their feet on the bottom to dislodge the nymphs so they'd float into the net held downstream.

This technique is how I gathered nymphs for my bug aquarium that I once kept in my garage.

Turns out, Oak Creek is home to a huge variety of aquatic insects and the reason some entomologists moved to Corvallis to teach at OSU. Evidently, the number of bug species available is rare for one little stream. When Hafele and Hughes wrote their first book, they collected bugs from Oak Creek to use for reference in the book.

Unfortunately, once I switched from rivers to stillwaters, I've found it damned difficult to collect bugs off the bottom of the lakes :)
 
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