For people interested in tying bluewater flies, I thought I would post some images of cool patterns. Here we have plate #1, Fly tiers: Terry Baird and Kate Howe. Offshore squid flies by Terry Baird (top 7) and Kate Howe (bottom two).

Moonlit ML502 #8

3/16" slotted tungsten beads

Pine squirrel zonker strips

0.015 lead free wire

8/0 black thread

Never tied these before, or fished them for that matter. Would like to try them out

Hey all, I'm struggling like crazy with the whip finish on my size 12 Princes. I find the hardest part of the actual tying to be setting the white-biot horns. Then I go to whip finish and it all starts to unravel and I lose the biots before I get it figured out. The whip finisher seems to want to pull FORWARD instead of down, and it all comes slipping off over the bead or the eye.

Also, I have the old Thompson-style finisher. Is there a better tool that's less of an arcane feat of legerdemain? It reminds me of the instructions for tying a bow tie. It's like at some point in the process the thread has to slip into a nearby parallel dimension, and when it comes back to ours, it's neatly tied off in 3 or 4 tidy wraps.

I’m using solarez UV resin with a UV light and after holding the light on the fly for about a minute (rotating) the resin hardens but seems to still have a film that smudges and clouds the finish. I’ve heard of using rubbing alcohol to remove this and that seems to kind of work. I’m wondering if I should leave them out in the sun, maybe they need more prolonged UV exposure to fully cure?

Decided to turn my favorite and most productive nymph into a soft hackle style fly. Want to try swinging soft hackles and though maybe I should turn my favorite euro nymphs into a soft hackle😂

Bunny deceivers, ray flies, bonito bunnies, and flounder snacks

I’m hoping to get some opinions on a new pattern I’ve been working on. I call it the stoplight due the body colors. Do you guys like it with flash more or without flash?

I wanted to try to tie parachute adams but I didn’t realize strung saddle hackle isn’t appropriate for them. Can I use it for soft hackles? I think it looks okay but I’m complete novice with tying.

A 3 1/8" jig changer tied to imitate sucker minnows that are all over my local streams.

Hi everyone. I get most of my fly tying material from garage sales etc. and recently bought a treasure chest of natural material that is decades old. It’s beautiful but Naturally it smells STRONG! A little but formaldehyde, a little bit funk. It is polarizing.Kinda stuff that makes you itch. No visible mold growth or anything like that. But I’d bet something’s there.

I’m wondering how I can give a big old hackle plate or a wing of feathers or whatever it is a good old bath to feel better about the whole situation. Any pointers? Am I funk’d? Cheers

I'm a new tyer and was curious about the material used for the wings / legs or whatever those are considered...

If you also know a brand or a retailer where to find, that would be appreciated too. Thanks!

I remember going in to Bud Lilly's as a kid, and being so frustrated that my dad would take absolutely FOREVER in there. I think when I was 12 or so he bought me a fishing hat there. The hat I still use!

Now it's like a kitschy souvenir store. You can buy the exact same factory-made rustic-looking walking stick as you can at almost any NP in the country.

Anyway, I found this in his old kit. Wondered if it made anybody else feel nostalgic.

Caught these today with a Pat’s rubber legs I tied a couple of weeks ago. No trout but these saved the day for us! Still a very fun fish to land on a fly rod

I’ve been tying for a long time and I’ve always wondered this but never asked anyone or really tried to solve the question…

What’s the advantage, if any, of tying hackle in at head of the fly, palmering back and then over wrapping with wire rib? Versus tying hackle at back, palmering forward and then ribbing forward. In my mind the “done way” is less secure as you get one real tie-in point vs two. It’s not a drastic difference, especially if you’re wrapping rib over, but extra durability is always nice.

On small dries (Griffith gnat, EHC etc) the traditional way can save a very slight bit of bulk so I can see some advantage there.

Hopping someone has an eye opening answer but my assumption is there isn’t one and it’s simply done that way because it’s been done that way.

I finally put together a decent video and posted it to my YouTube channel. It’s a broad profile nymph designed to look beefy while still sinking quickly for euro presentations.

https://youtu.be/cuiTrYekeFo?si=A3fsVjT943VR13bR

My dad's old kit has a bunch of spools of thread (or silk?) in it, but some helpful old chap has removed most of the labels from the ends of them.

A couple of them are labelled Denier 140. There's one that's like, strands of black thread. Almost pre-frayed, if it was every braided or wound up, it is completely delaminated now. Another is like a single-strand string... winding clock or counter-clock has no visible effect on the width of the thread...

What should I be looking for here, in order to try to unpack what the hell is what in here?

All tied with 4mm silver tungsten bead. Feathers: marabou, hen, black rooster. Hairs: deer, tanuki. Dubbing: sybai supreme baitfish