Semi-Realistic Heaven For Fly Tiers: The flies and lives of Ulf Hagström

If you like realistic flies, take a good look at Ulf Hagström's blog. My philosophy for fishing flies doesn't really go well with the word (semi-)realistic in the same sentence, but I admire Ulf's exceptional fly tying skill. Excellent stuff, very inspirational.

Ice, you can go now.

a jazoni photo. Used with permission.

It's March. To cope with it I'm currently reading The Freshman Flyfisher by Rick Passek. Rick is a fellow blogger from British Columbia, Canada. He asked me to write a review of the book, and I will. There is a good chapter about beginner fly selection in his book. Those always make interesting reading.

I haven't tied flies in two months. Not since I made the perfect mobile fly-tying station that is supposed to make fly tying so easy to start that you actually can use that spare 15 minutes for it. I'll be introducing this ground braking innovation to you at some point. Before that, you go and take a long walk along the banks of Tamanawis. There you will find lots of information about fly-tying-somethings. They will help you organize your fly-tying stuff and speed up the tying process. Or, at least they'll keep you busy doing anything but tying flies. Great stuff.

Flytier's Page: Levern "VERN-O" Burm

Take a look at Levern "VERN-O" Burm's Gallery featured in Flytier's Page by Hans Weilenmann. Great flies and great photographs.

I have the privilege to own some flies tied by Vern. We made a fly swap last Spring when he sent me a few US trout flies and I mailed him back some Finnish trout flies.

VERN-O's flies can be purchased online via JS Fly Fishing.

Sculpin pattern

This is the same pattern as in one of my previous posts although this is in different color. I learned this one from a 13-years-old boy at local fishing club. I like the way the hair wing is done. It is soft and stiff at the same time making it better than the Marabou Muddler for fast current as this fly keeps it shape in all fishable currents.

From Fly-patterns

From Fly-patterns

From Fly-patterns

1/60 sec: At the fishing club

From Life

Dahlberg Diver. Tied by Jay Lee

From Jay Lee

The Dahlber Diver is a pike fly. This one is tied by Jay Lee. Thank you Jay!

I'll be casting a fly for pike in May, but not this one; it looks far too good to be ripped to pieces by pike's sharp teeth.

Take a look how well this monofil supports the zonker tail.

From Jay Lee

And this is how the deer hair should be clipped.

From Jay Lee

Beetle. Tied by Tomas Whitehouse

Fly Tied by Tomas Whitehouse. Image copyright (c) Tomas Whitehouse. Used with permission. From Fly-patterns

Coming Soon: Beautiful Flies

I have received two packages of most wonderful flies.

Jay sent me two beautiful flies that are so good that I have thought giving up fly tying. View Jay’s other flies and bio at Hans Weilenmann's site.

I have also received some flies from Tomas Whitehouse. Tomas currently lives in Finland but is originally from the homeland of Ozzy Osbourne = Birmingham, England. He Rocks!

Here is a teaser for you:

Tied by Tomas Whitehouse - From Fly-patterns

Operation Midnight Sun

Although this hardly is a matter of National Security, it probably is as close to it as I am ever going to get. I was contacted by Agent VERN-O (that’s his Screen-Name), and have conducted some research for him. The thing is that I can break Navajo-Code just as good as next guy (i.e. not at all), but I do can break Finnish-Code. Well, actually that is not the whole plot.

To put all the pieces together you have to know that the following facts:

1. There is an organization called FIPS-Mouché.
2. The abbreviation comes from words “Fédération Internationale de Pêche Sportive Mouché” which translates to “International Federation of Sport Fly Fishing”.
3. 27th FIPS-Mouché World Fly Fishing Championships will take place June 13th - 20th 2007 right here in Finland
4. VERN-O is in a contest to become Fly Fishing Team USA's Official Fly Tyer for 27th FIPS-Mouché World Fly Fishing Championships.

He asked for help and I said yes. I have read a lot of Finnish information about Competition water: River Simojoki and Lake Veitsiluoto and send vital parts of that knowledge to VERN-O. I have also discussed with a competition fly fisher who fished the very same competition waters when our 2006 National Championships were held. And this information has gone to the United States via secured satellite uplink. Naturally I can’t give you the information I have given to VERN-O. For all I know, there just may be a Delta team, watching my actions, ready to take care of things in case I do something stupid.



Here are some samples of VERN-O’s prior work (we, in the Intelligence Community, refer them as “bugs”). As you can see it is serious no-nonsense hi-tech fishing devices we are talking about!





According to my statistics well over 50 % of this site’s readers come from United States so it is only fair that I do this favor to representative of my most loyal audience.

Anyway I thought that I go partially public here, as insurance, but if this is the last post of this blog, you will know that things have not worked out as they should have. If not, there might be few leaks of information coming later. Stay tuned.

Something for me...

Jay has noticed my difficulties tying with deer hair and has a fly for me.

PS. Post number 100.

Edit: The Humpy is also ready now!

Fly Tying: Deer Hair

I have been tying flies for a long time. That doesn’t make me any sort of professional, in fact; I have been fly tying for long enough to know that I would probably make a poor professional fly tier. Yet I have some skills and I can make flies for my own use and some of them even turn out quite good. However I have always felt that working with deer hair is quite hard.

From Fly-patterns

Deer hair is an important material for many flies from small dry flies to big streamers and even salmon dry flies. It seems to me that the skill of fly tier can be judged by how he or she can work with deer hair. This is probably an oversimplification, but it might tell something.

From Fly-patterns

At times I have avoided tying deer hair flies, but that is about to stop. I’ll tie more of them and try to improve my skills. I have read many articles which aim to making of deer hair heads and bodies. Some of them give good tips, but the practice is most important thing here.

From Fly-patterns

Here are some common uses of deer hair in fly tying:
- Heads of streamers of dry flies (mainly Muddlers, Sculpins, Poppers, Hoppers)
- Wings of dry flies (X-Caddis, Sparkle Dun, Elk Hair Caddis)
- Body of a dry fly (Goddard Caddis)

Here are my top five tips for deer hair:
1. Use strong enough thread
2. Use ceramic bobbin
3. Experiment with lots of different deer hair types (I have about 10 different patches of deer hair)
4. Different deer hair might require different thread and slightly different tying methods
5. Have patience

Pending...

I am going to ship some flies to Ed and Ian as I mentioned earlier. Finally, this afternoon, when my wife and daughter were taking a nap and my son was watching Nemo, I had time to tie the flies.

EDIT 2006-12-04: Sent.

My first dry flies for the Atlantic-salmon

Last night I was planning to tie some flies for our friends overseas. I have promised to mail some flies for Ed and Ian this week. However I found out that I was tying other flies with my friends at the fishing club.

From Fly-patterns

One on the left is called Potemkin and the other one is Bomber. Both flies are tied on #6 hooks and are intended for the Atlantic-salmon. As I mentioned earlier I have never fished salmon and these are first flies in my soon-to-be-purchased salmon fly box.

Classic flies

Lately I have been tempted by the idea of classic flies. This is somewhat in contrast to my personal view of fly tying. I am very practical and simplistic when it comes to fly patterns.

Below is an example of my streamers. These are Supertinseli patterns. They are easy to tie (about 3-4 minutes per fly), use only artificial materials and they are killers when it comes to effectiveness.

From Fly-patterns

But would it feel better if I would caught a big trout with the Grey Ghost instead? Or how about a classic winged wet fly instead of POPA Caddis?

Hare's Ear Soft Hackle

From Fly-patterns

It is easy to tie and trout, grayling and I like it. One of my best flies in 2005, but I didn't use it much last summer. It is a generic caddis pupa pattern. If you are not sure what fly to use, try this one.

Heavy weight bug?

I found a link to a French step-by-step fly tying instructions. Nice site, although my one credit French course didn’t help much (quel dommage) - but the pictures are excellent. This La poilue pattern seemed like something I need when the rig must get deep. Instead of original #12 hook I used #6. Makes them heavier.

From Fly-patterns

And the kinky variant...

From Fly-patterns

Do we really need to cement the head of a small fly?

One of the gurus at my local fishing club gave me an advice a few years back and I have been following it ever since. While I was cementing the head of my fly, he commented (rather gently) about the usefulness of head cementing. When small flies are of concern, why should we cement the head? The logic says that the fly will last longer. But will it? I mean that you put a good finish there and that's it.

"We say no to head cement!"

From Fly-patterns

I haven't added lacquer to my flies (apart from streamers and big nymphs) since. My flies don't untie themselves any more than they did before. To my experience, there is no need to cement the head of a small fly.

Fly Tying Season

The winter is closing in. Although there will soon be little or no fly fishing activities available, this coming season is best fly tying time for me. I can tie two or three hundred flies per winter. And I need those flies next summer, at least some of them.

When a full fly box looks empty

Some years back I did not tie any flies during the winter. Back then I had other things in mind. Back then I didn’t have the flies I need during summer. I had to tie few flies before each fishing trip and I generally felt that my fly boxes were filled with flies I didn’t need.

The main reason for this was that my fly tying was very random - impulsive at best. Most of the flies in my fly box were my own creations – i.e. patterns that should have never been tied. I didn’t use them too much as I didn’t trust them. I was in constant need of reliable patterns. I had a few, but I tied only one or two flies at time, because I was and still am a lazy person who only ties flies when he has to.

Tour de France

Then I read the Tour de France tying by Martin Joergensen. In this article Martin describes few good speed tying tips (most important is that you should tie good bunch of flies in specific pattern instead of just one or two) and tells how you can watch TV and tie flies at the same time. I am not much of a biking fan and Tour de France was finished that year anyway. Instead I was deep in family life as was my wife and we both needed some time for our selves. For my wife it was time to start over the ballet and some Latino dancing. For me it was time to join the fishing club and start tying the flies I so desperately needed.

My way

So I wrote down what fly patterns I would like to fish next season. And I started tying each Tuesday evening. I tied something like 6 to 18 flies per evening. I think that I missed one or two sessions in that winter and ended up with three fly boxes full of flies. And these were no random flies but a disciplined set. Never have I felt as good as I did next fishing season. Of course I had some patterns I didn’t need but I pretty much had the patterns I did need.

I had done that ever since. I must admit that I don’t have the discipline I had the first winter. I do miss a tying evening bit too often, but I still do well enough.

With good fly selection, you can catch anything...

From Life

Fly Tying Tuesdays

While there are other forms of entertainment, for me Tuesday evenings are mainly for fly tying. This time I tied a few X-Caddis patterns and something for the stocked rainbow trout:

From Fly-patterns

PS. This one works also for native brown trout...

X-Caddis

I love caddis patterns. They are very important in my waters although caddisflies may not be as beautiful as mayflies. One of my favourite emerging mayfly pattern is Sparkle Dun. This pattern in very similar to tie as X-Caddis. I like simple patterns best, so I added few X-Caddis emergers to my selection.

Sparkle Dun

From Fly-patterns

X-Caddis

From Fly-patterns