Bodkin / Patterns

Challenged

Dry Fly · Trout · Advanced · 1 version

Reference Recipe

  • Hook Curved-shank scud/emerger hook (Daiichi 1130), 14-16
  • Thread Tan or olive 8/0

Materials

  • Ringneck pheasant tail fibers (3 for the tail, plus a bunch for the body)
  • Copper wire (extra-small (rib))
  • Micro-fine dry-fly dubbing BWO or tan
  • Coastal deer hair (small clump (wing))
  • Dry-fly hackle Dun or grizzly to match the hatch

How to tie it

  1. Secure the curved Daiichi 1130 in the vise and start the thread mid-shank, then wrap back toward the bend a little further than you would for a standard dry fly.
  2. Snip three fibers from a ringneck pheasant tail feather and tie them in at the bend for a short tail.
  3. Tie in a length of extra-small copper wire at the tail base and leave it hanging for the rib.
  4. Wrap the remaining pheasant tail fibers forward as the body up to about the 70% point, then tie off and trim the excess.
  5. Counter-wrap the copper wire forward through the body in an open spiral to rib and reinforce it, then tie off and helicopter away the excess.
  6. Apply a thin, sparse noodle of micro-fine dry-fly dubbing to the thread and dub a short thorax in front of the body.
  7. Cut, clean out the fluff from, and stack the tips of a small clump of coastal deer hair; tie it in over the thorax as an emerger wing with the butts pointing forward.
  8. Trim the deer-hair butts just behind the dubbing and take a couple of thread wraps against the far side of the wing to push the fibers back and clear the hook eye.
  9. Tie in a dry-fly hackle and take just a few light turns through the front of the fly (a touch heavier for freestone streams, lighter for stillwaters), then tie off.
  10. Whip finish behind the eye and add a tiny drop of head cement over the wraps.

Tying videos

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