Tying – Page 2

Extortion Complete

May 24, 2011 by n.taylor 2 Comments

Not long ago my friend Gracie told everyone of my plans to get my hands of some of the Free Range Dubbing that Keith Barton over at Singlebarbed had given out to a select few internet friends. Feeling left out and slighted I took it upon myself to make Gracie a big dinner of my homemade mac ‘n cheese. The thing Gracie hasn’t figured out is that after a nice meal of this caliber he always waddles over to the couch to take a quick nap to deal with the glucose coma that this meal induces. As he slept tranquil on the couch I grabbed the dubbing from beneath his computer desk and peeled myself off samples.

Pretty awesome stuff as it turns out. I took the free dubbing and decided to fill up on some carp flies for the summer. I got myself busy with the rust, yellow mustard, and black claret flavors and am looking to position myself to try out any new flavors that may arise.

Free Range Dubbing

Glamour Madeira

May 5, 2011 by n.taylor 11 Comments

Glamour Madeira is a somewhat obscure tying material that has been tough for me to track down. Originally I found this being used by Pat Dorsey on his “Top Secret Midge” as the wingcase but I have also seen it used on RS2’s and various other midges. Glamour Madeira is actually the name of the line of embroidery threads that have the soft sparkle we as tiers have come to love in the material. It comes in various colors ranging from the white that has been used for wingcases to black, blue, copper, and every color in between. I really couldn’t find any information on it on the internet because to my knowledge Pat Dorsey might be the first person to use it for tying…

Glamour Madeira

This week I finally found a spool of this stuff thanks to Greg Garcia at Charlie’s and started playing around with it. What an awesome material with tons of potential uses. So far I have only used it on Top Secret Midges, Rojo Midges, and RS2’s but I am now looking for other ways to use the stuff because I love the way it looks. Even though they are just trout and they usually eat marshmallows and corn there is still something incredibly fun in tying flies you just think look good. If you’re interested in trying some out I know Blue Quill Anglers sells it in small packs for about $1.00 but if you live in Denver you can email me and I’ll let you know where I found the larger spools. On a side note, Greg Garcia is the nicest person in the world and always helps me try to improve my tying skills when I see him in the shop. As a special thank you I butchered his famous Rojo Midge and subsituted his Oral B floss material for Glamour Madeira on a Rojo Midge.

Glamour Madeira on a Rojo Midge

Fly Tying

December 14, 2010 by n.taylor 4 Comments

Tyler, Cody, and Scott

With my fishing season over and knowing that I have a few months of wicked ski traffic to deal with here in Colorado a couple of friends and I got together to reminisce of warmer days, hash out some fishing plans for the spring, and tie flies. I worked on a truck load of midges because I’m not very good at much else while others among us (ahem, Scott Spooner) tied copper johns until even I was nauseated. I guess I just don’t have the patience for that many steps, thread and ribbing seem to suit me very well. I also have Midge Man as an inspiration to keep me thinking of new patterns and copy ~~some of~~ most of his stuff.

Tyler was trying out some more of Herman DeGala’s patterns and inventing the next greatest baetis imitation (don’t worry pheasant tail, you’re still my favorite). While Cody is more in line with me, he likes really easy stuff like worms and so we got along well as we sat feeding the other guys beers waiting for them to use the bathroom so we could take a few of their stash home with us.

Some of My Production

At the end of the evening I can happily say that I now have grip loads of new flies that I don’t have room for and that I probably will never use but hey, they look cool and with all the different colors it might make a nice mantle piece someday.