Bodkin / Patterns

Floating Smelt

Streamer · Trout · Salmon · Intermediate · 1 version

Reference Recipe

  • Hook 4XL-6XL streamer, straight eye, #4-#8
  • Thread White 6/0

Materials

  • Tail/wing White/green material (bucktail or synthetic hair)
  • Flash Pearl flashabou (few strands)
  • Body White uni stretch (spun/packed deer hair, trimmed)
  • Back Green/olive material (deer hair or marker)
  • Eyes Silver/black material (1 pair)

How to tie it

  1. Mount the long-shank hook and start thread at the bend.
  2. Tie in a slim white bucktail underwing with a green overwing and a few strands of pearl flash, keeping the profile long and thin like a smelt.
  3. Spin white deer hair with a green top clump and pack it tight forward to the eye.
  4. Whip finish, then trim the spun hair into a slender, laterally flat smelt body.
  5. Color the back green with a waterproof marker if needed and add stick-on eyes.
  6. Treat the deer-hair body with floatant so it rides in and just under the film.

Tying videos

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