Fly Tying Materials - All the stuff we use for our flies, feathers, fur, hair, synthetics - Keywords - The words we use - Words, tags, taxonomy - Fly fishing tag cloud - Global FlyFisher

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Fly Tying Materials
All the stuff we use for our flies, feathers, fur, hair, synthetics

Buying soft hackle

Shopping: The soft hackle is supposed to be - as the name implies - soft. Soft hackle can come from many birds. Chickens, gamebirds like partridge, grouse and quail, pheasant and even crows and jackdaws.
Learn how to select the right here

Buying Dry Fly Hackle

Shopping: Learn what to look for when buying feathers for dry fly hackle. How to choose the right saddles or necks and get the most and the best feathers for your purpose.
Get some buying tips here.
Find "Buying Deer Hair" here

Buying Deer Hair
Click to see "Buying Bucktail"

Buying Bucktail
"What to look for when byuing..." is found here

What to look for when byuing...
"Peeete's Pheather'n'Phlash" is found here

Peeete's Pheather'
n'Phlash
"New tube materials" is found here

New tube materials
Directly to "Fleye Foils"

Fleye Foils
Read more on "A very versatile material"

A very versatile material
Click to see "Steaming your materials"

Steaming your materials
Skip to "Dyeing and Bleaching "

Dyeing and Bleaching

Jump to "Washing your materials"

Washing your materials
See "Trout beads" by clicking here

Trout beads
Jump to "GYMF"

GYMF

About "Fly Tying Materials - All the stuff we use for our flies, feathers, fur, hair, synthetics" from Blog Creek – GFF's weblog
· On sale! - Some things make no sense, but we do them anyway - like driving 3 hours out and 3 hours home to go shopping.
· A different tube system - And I mean really, really different. Really!
· Classic Clouser - Tied my first Clouser Minnows ever a few minutes ago. What a fly!

  
 Go to Light Curing Resins
Light Curing Resins
If you're still messing around with two-component epoxy, it's about time to lift your head from the vice and discover the new Light Curing Resins, LCR's.
  
 Go to Upgrading the Gold Ribbed Hare’s Ear
Upgrading the Gold Ribbed Hare’s Ear
It might seem futile to try to improve one of the world's most proven patterns, but there's room for improvement. Trevor Morgan gives some classics an overhaul.
  
 Go to Martin's Mundane <br />Fly Project
Martin's Mundane
Fly Project
This is the Mundane Fly Manifesto: Few and cheap materials, easy to find in the shops. Simple tying methods. Mundane flies. The whole idea is to make it simple and efficient to tie flies that work. 
  
 Go to Tying with CDC
Tying with CDC
Dutch Hans Weilenmann tells the history of the use of CDC feathers in fly tying, covers the different types of feathers and their use and lists both CDC tying tips and a bunch of CDC patterns.
  
 Go to Barrel Full of Bucktails
Barrel Full of Bucktails
Some of these flies are among the most well known of any genre of fishing flies others are a little on the obscure side. Some are simple and some are a bit complicated. I like 'em all. They all have their place on the water, and they all have a story to tell.
  
 Go to The Simplest Fly
The Simplest Fly
"What is this" "A fly!" "What kind of fly" "Well, this is a fly that imitates a beetle" The fly that he showed me then was really huge one, may be about 2 - 2,5 centimeters or almost and inch in diameter. "Wow, why is it so big?" "Because I am an old man, I can not see well"
  
 Go to The Charlie Fly
The Charlie Fly
The Charlie Fly was inspired by the underfur from the originator's Chocolate Lab. Ken Bonde Larsen's dog has unwillingly become the material manufacturer for this great sea trout producer. As it often is with Danish with sea trout flies it's a small, generic pattern.
  
 Go to Make 'Em Swim
Make 'Em Swim
Swedish Michael Frödins newest DVD about his FITS tube fly system and the new turbo discs, which make the flies vibrate, pulse and move more water than using a traditional cone. The fly comes more alive, but are they more fish catching? At least eye catching.
  
 Go to Tube Styles
Tube Styles
If you think that a tube for a tube fly is a cylindrical piece of plastic, then you are in for a surprise. This article will present more tube styles than most fly tyers ever imagined, and probably teach even seasoned tubers a thing or two.
  
 Go to Hen Hackle
Hen Hackle
Awhile back, I received a shipment of hen necks and saddles from Whiting Farms. The saddles struck me with their intense colors and solid web, then necks with their stem length and shortish barbs. These feathers were perfect for the wet flies I was working on.
  
 Go to CDC Mayfly
CDC Mayfly
A small mayfly, which may be (mis)taken for a dun during the sometimes the concentreted hatches on late August and Septemper evenings. It uses a hollow extended body, parachute hackle and wings of cdc stems to float high.
  
 Go to Creative Fly Tying
Creative Fly Tying
While there are only 12 chapters in the book, each chapter is a gold mine of fly tying information. Each chapter takes us along for a ride on the development of the pattern, the genesis often being some frustrating fishing trips which make for some enjoyable reading.
  
 Go to A New Generation
A New Generation
The book opens with a biography of Scott as it pertains to his involvement in the fly fishing industry. To this desk jockey - his life seems pretty darn cool. I mean - who doesn't dream of working in a fly shop, 100% immersed in fly fishing on a daily basis?
  
 Go to Material shopping
Material shopping
Another podcast featuring GFF partner Martin Joergensen, this time pondering about the absurd prices of some fly tying materials - particularly synthetics, which can often be found on doll's heads, in craft stores and other places at a lot less than in your local flyshop.
  
 Go to Angel Body
Angel Body
Shiny tubing materials are widely used as body material on streamers. So is ordinary tinsel. Here is a new way of making glittering, but more volumnious, pulsating and living bodies for your streamers using Angel Hair or a similar material.
  
 Go to New Hooks
New Hooks
Partridge has come out with a new line of trout hooks called "Flashpoint". Most fly tyers are hook junkies, and Bob Petti is no exception, so he jumped at the chance to review these new hooks.
  
 Go to Spey Fly book
Spey Fly book
I have admired Bob's tying for quite some time - as I always considered him one of those rare tyers whose flies are museum quality beautiful, yet they have the sleekness and symmetry of a well tied fishing fly
  
 Go to Imitative Fly Tying
Imitative Fly Tying
Ian Moutter is back with a followup to "Tying Flies the Paraloop Way". Consider this an applied fly tying book, as you not only learn how to tie the flies, but also how they were designed, why they were designed, and how they may be fished.
  
 Go to Stalcup's Mayflies
Stalcup's Mayflies
Shane's book is devoted to imitations imitations of each major stage of mayfly development - nymph, emerger, adult, and spinner - top to bottom as he says. For each section, he offers up several patterns, each with a introductory essay, step-by-step tying instructions, and a list of variations.
  
 Go to Baby Buggers
Baby Buggers
Wooly buggers are one of the all time most effective fish catching flies. However, if you think you need heavy tackle and lots of lead to get them to work - think again. Peter Frailey tells about his "Baby Buggers", and how well they cast and fish.
  
 Go to The Locofoam Story
The Locofoam Story
Harrison Steeve's story about a brand new foam material for terrestrials and many other flies. "You guys are crazy to spend so much time messing around with that loco foam." Needless to say the name stuck. Read the whole story here.
  
 Go to Wash-n-Dry Dubbing
Wash-n-Dry Dubbing
Make your dry fly dubbing in bulk quantities while washing your clothes! It's that easy! Harvest the fibers that come from you tumble dryer and prepare it for fly tying. Read the whole story by Steve Schweitzer here.
  
 Go to Brush eyes
Brush eyes
Shrimp patterns are always fun to tie. These salt water imitatoins are easy to do and fish well. Martin Joergensen has once again pursued the art of imitating these salt water arthopods - this time utilizing his family's hair brushes! Read the story and find the patterns here.
  
 Go to Jungle Cock Repair
Jungle Cock Repair
Prime Jungle Cock necks are rare to come by. Learn how 'upgrade' fishing quality JC necks in this article.
  
 Go to Turbo Block
Turbo Block
Siman Ltd. has taken the Turbo dubbing twister a step further with this tool, which enables you to easily make your own dubbing brushes - stiff or soft and from almost any dubbing material.
  
 Go to Better tinsel bodies
Better tinsel bodies
How to tie a nice, even, ribbed tinsel body. Here's one way. The description assumes that you want a silver body. If you want gold, just replace 'silver' with 'gold' below.
  
 Go to Blend your own dubbing
Blend your own dubbing
Almost everyone has the right stuff at their tying bench to make a great batch of dubbing. But not many people know they have everything they need to make an outstanding seal�s fur dubbing substitute. This dubbing is a viable replacement for SLF, angora goat and seal�s fur, and the trick to making it is so simple it will amaze you!
Dyeing material
This small section with advice on dyeing fly tying materials was made after a discussion took place on the European fly fishing mailing lis. The text was put together from input from several people of this list: Graham Ward, John Davies, Pat Orpen and myself.
  
 Go to Ewing Streamer Hackles
Ewing Streamer Hackles
One of the most difficult things for today's streamer tyer to find is suitable hackle for winging Rangeley Style streamers.
  
 Go to Hackle for streamers
Hackle for streamers
One of the things most often asked by neophyte streamer tyers is what types of hackle are best suited for streamer wings. The short answer is.....there is no single source best suited for streamer wings. The long answer...well....I'll ramble on about it for the remainder of this essay!
  
 Go to Hooks for streamers
Hooks for streamers
The hook is the foundation on which a good streamer is built. When streamer anglers meet, quite often it's the subject of heated debate! I've listed a variety of the streamer hooks available on the market today (and some no longer available) in the table in the article.
  
 Go to Mix your own dubbing
Mix your own dubbing
Making your own or improving store bought dubbing. I recommend that all dubbing be passed through a coffee or spice grinder prior to using. The grinder tends to separate and air out the fibres providing a lighter product than would be normally accomplished by just using the blend out of the bag. By David Allerton
  
 Go to Picking hackle
Picking hackle
Some thoughts on hackle ...or living with less than the best By David Allerton
  
 Go to Raising chickens
Raising chickens
From feathers to chickens - and back again. You don't need to raise birds to get feathers, but it's both easy and fun. Here's the story about how I had chickens for eggs, meat and not least feathers
  
 Go to Tying on hard hair wings
Tying on hard hair wings
When I talk about hard hair I both mean hair that's hard - like squirrel and polar bear - and hair that's hard to tie in on the hook. We all know the problem: not only is squirrel wings hard as #"¤%&/ to place properly on top of the shank, but they also sometimes seem to fall off for nothing.
  
 Go to Cleaning fly tying material
Cleaning fly tying material
Cleaning tying material Why bother to clean your materials? Bugs, dirt and chemicals are likely on the material By Wayne Luallen
  
 Go to The anatomy of a feather
The anatomy of a feather
On order to be able to talk about our favourite passtime - fly tying - it's important that we use the same language. I hope to be able to clear the fog a bit in this area. By Wayne Luallen
  
 Go to The nature of feather construction
The nature of feather construction
  
 Go to The nature of feather construction - Intro
The nature of feather construction - Intro

  
 Go to Feather Definitions
Feather Definitions
Definitions - The nature of feather construction.
  
 Go to Stacking material
Stacking material
When stacking materials it is important to consider it as consisting of more than just one process. There are several steps involved: material selection, cleaning and preparing, selecting the right tool and performing the stacking process itself. By Wayne Luallen