Bodkin / Patterns

Brown Drake

Dry Fly · Trout · Intermediate · 2 versions

Classic Recipe

  • Hook Standard dry fly, 2x long, 10-12
  • Thread Brown 6/0

Materials

  • Tail Moose body hair (forked)
  • Body Yellowish-brown dubbing (robust)
  • Rib Brown thread (4 inches)
  • Wing Elk hair or deer hair (upright)
  • Hackle Grizzly dyed brown hackle (2 feathers)

How to tie it

  1. Mount the 2x long hook, tie in a forked moose hair tail, a full shank length.
  2. Tie in the brown thread rib, then dub a robust yellowish-brown body to the 60% mark.
  3. Spiral the rib forward in 4-5 turns for segmentation.
  4. Stack and tie in an upright elk or deer hair wing.
  5. Wrap two brown-dyed grizzly hackles, dense enough to float the big body. Whip finish.

Substitutions

  • Body instead of Yellowish-brown dubbing: Tan/brown blended dubbing — Close to the yellowish-brown; Fox squirrel dubbing — Natural tan, buggy
  • Tail instead of Moose body hair: Brown bucktail — Similar stiffness; Micro Fibbets (brown) — Clean forked tail
  • Hackle instead of Grizzly dyed olive: Grizzly and brown mixed — Available substitute for dyed grizzly; Cree hackle — Multi-colored, close match

Other versions

1 more in the app: Joe Penich.

Tying videos

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