Posted on by t.z.

Flies with dyed (coloured) hare

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Following up on my "harelabb" post from yesterday. The weather was sort of crap so I sat down and continue the quest for the “perfect” caddis. Never sinking, imitating a dry or pupae (when fished on a sink tip line or pulled hard). Very visible for the angler and of easy to tie. I remembered a fly Marc Petitjean showed me many years ago. You surely have heard about this fly tier, if not – google the man. His methodical approach is simply amazing and can be applied to other materials as well, I think. So here is what he did. He simply spun some CDC fibres in a split thread and wound this, starting at the hook bend towards the eye, onto a dry fly hook. While doing so, he manipulated the fibres backwards and upwards. Then he cut the underside. From the visual this was the perfect caddis imitation, the only snag for me was that the CDC was f….ked after a fish or two. Changing flies is definitely NOT what you want to do in a caddis hatch, which mostly happens in the darker hours of the day. I had played around with the technique with my favourite material, hare fibres form the artic hare foot. These fibres are hydrophobic and have very interesting shine to them, but they are white. These white flies didn’t catch (pun intended) the fishes attention. So I dyed some front feet in dark claret and fished it several times this summer with great success. So I made some more in other, a little brighter colours. These flies are maybe not very “beautiful” from a fly tying artistic point of view, however. Anyway, I like the combination of scruffy and durable. These things are hard to break, very easy to clean after a fish and will still catch when sunk. The structure catches air bubbles like the caddis pupae does under water. So what you need is a strong thread, some hare feet, Veniard dye in dark claret and fluo pink (because its fun) and maybe some wool yarn should you fancy a fly with an extended body. You can also add a front hackle for legs / antennae. I did this with a hare fibres from a hares mask spun in a split thread. .
- #skålestrømmen #browntrout #catchandrelease #flyfishing #skalestrommen #photography #ahrexhooks

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