Tail Marabou from the base of a black schlappen feather (Clearwater Hackle) (1 clump, one shank length)
Hackle Black schlappen (Clearwater Hackle) (1 feather, tied in by the tip)
Body Medium black chenille (1 piece)
How to tie it
Debarb an Allen S403 size 8 by closing the vice jaws over the barb, a 3XL shank, so the working length is about that of a size 2 hook.
Build a small thread base behind the eye with black 6/0 and tie in a pair of fluorescent chartreuse bead chain eyes, a few wraps one way and a few the other. The 6/0 lets you really bear down on them.
Twist about eight turns of 0.020 lead wire onto the shank. More than that gets too heavy for most streams. Pinch it off, tuck the ends and snug it up against the eyes, then back it off a fraction to leave a gap.
Take the thread back, catch the lead down and build a small ramp from the bare shank up onto the lead. That gap behind the eyes is where the materials get tied off.
Pull a clump of marabou from the base of a black schlappen feather, the mottled black and white section, measure it to one shank length, tie it in at the rear and trim the excess. Everything on this fly comes off the one feather, which is where the name comes from.
Take the same schlappen feather, pinch it right at the tip, pull the fibres back as you would preparing a soft hackle and tie it in at the very rear with a couple of wraps. You can leave the excess and wrap over it.
Strip the end of a piece of medium black chenille back to the core and tie it in at the rear. Crystal chenille is wasted here. The schlappen covers the body almost completely, so all you want underneath is something dark to suggest the lateral line or a leech.
Half hitch the thread in front of the bead chain eyes and wind the chenille forward, stopping directly behind the eyes. Three or four wraps secure it; trim as close to the eyes as you can.
Put a couple of figure-of-eight wraps back through the eyes.
Palmer the schlappen forward. Take a turn or two at the rear before moving up the shank, and let the fibres fall where they will rather than stroking them all to one side. Stop with about one and a half turns behind the eyes.
Tie the hackle off, keep pinching it up and trim as close to the eyes as possible without going over them.
Hold everything back with your left hand, take a couple of wraps to secure, then a few more figure-of-eights to bed the chenille down between the eyes.
Check the head the whole way round, half hitch, whip finish.
Put one healthy drop of head cement from the bodkin between the eyes and another directly underneath. This fly takes a lot of punishment.