Bodkin / Patterns

Alder

Wet Fly · Trout · Beginner · 3 versions

Classic Recipe

  • Hook Standard wet, 10-14
  • Thread Black 8/0

Materials

  • Body Peacock herl (full)
  • Wing Brown speckled hen or turkey (tent)
  • Hackle Black hen (sparse)

How to tie it

  1. Mount the hook and start black thread behind the eye, laying a base back to the bend.
  2. Tie in 3-4 peacock herls by their tips at the bend, twist them into a rope with the tying thread for durability, and wrap forward to form a plump body, stopping one eye-length short of the eye.
  3. Strip a matched slip from a brown speckled hen or turkey wing and tie it low over the body as a tent wing, curving down over the back and reaching to the bend.
  4. Select a black hen hackle and take just 2 sparse turns as a soft collar, then sweep the fibers down and rearward.
  5. Form a neat head, whip finish, and add a drop of head cement.

Other versions

2 more in the app: Classic Recipe (2), Gregg Dressing (1940).

Tying videos

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