http://www.wonderhowto.com/how-to/video/...fishing-169713/

Well I am gonna try to tie some of these flies up. They look good to me. All I have is some hen hackle, but it should be okay. One of these days I will get some Hungarian Partridge. On another forum I visit somebody offered to send me a vise he had sitting around, that he wasn't using. I cannot wait to get it. It should make my fly tying a whole lot easier, and more fun too. He said it was a Griffin. I was going to get an older vise, but just about anything is better than what I have. Then as he was digging around some stuff he had, he found this vise, and is gonna send it to me. I am just beside myself. I had planned to get a vise for my birthday...but this will be an early present...hehehe. These flies will be for a swap, I hope I can do a decent job on them.

i think you will like a griffin vise, mine has very good holding power, i almost bought a anvil, but am glad i didn't, i like griffins jaw design .

Mike you just don't know how thrilled I am to get this vise. The hooks don't stay in this vise very well, and it is a pain to use. At least I can tye, so I cannot gripe too much. When this guy offered to give me the Griffin, I could not say NO...I mean I was just so happy. People have been so generous lately. I am very lucky to meet such wonderful people, online if nothing else! Heck I was happy to get an upgrade of this vise, much less to get such a good one...he said he wasn't even sure if he had ever used it. So it should be in very good shape! I have never used another vise, so this should be very exciting!

As you begin tying, there are four natural materials that you'll find many uses for -- Hungarian partridge, pheasant tail, peacock herl, and marabou. You can make lots of different flies with various combinations of those materials.

Nice looking fly. I'll have to practice with some soft hackle flies.

wonderhowto.com looks interesting. I'll have to find some spare time to waste there.

I presented myself with a Griffin vise about a month ago. Love it. No more hook slippage.

Griffin makes about 6-8 vises... which ones you guys talkin about? i have had a 2a for years and love it, thinking of getting a 3arp for same jaws + rotary function...

The wonderhowto site has several good flies to tye.

I have no idea which Griffin vise, all I know is it is one...and I don't care which one, it is surely better than what I presently have. When I get it, I will tell you which it is.

Griffin Odyssey Spider. It's inexpensive but it does everything I need it to do very well.

Rick

I will have to look that one up. Thanks for the reply.

No, I don't think that is the one the guy is sending me.

I got a good deal on ebay for GOS. It is a fine vise, even if one reviewer thought it looked ugly. One thing I did to make better was glue a piece of rubbber on the bottom of the c-clamp. I use the clamp down-side-up so I can still pull my keyboard out from under my desk.

same here with 3 arp, i have no reason to believe a better vise can be had for less money

Kelly: I am glad that you are going to participate in a fly swap. It is a very good way to nail down a pattern and a lot of fun too. I also thank you for posting a link to Rob's site. I first shared a tying table at a Houston Fly Fair about a decade ago with Rob and he spent the morning tying Trout Crack and the afternoon tying Red A$$ flies. He ia a master at tying soft hackles and his Red A$$ kicks butt.

Be careful learning to tie soft hackle flies as they are very addictive. (G)If you are going to tie soft hackle flies, then you need to get a catalog from Blue Ribbon Flies in West Yellowstone. They have the best selection of tying materials that I have ever found in this country. They also have some Fly Tyers Specials in the spring where the dog may have mangled a few feathers as it was retreving the bird and you can save a bunch on them. Craig and Jackie Matthews are some of the best folks you will ever meet. I like the way that some of the flies that are sold in their shop may only be tied on one hook size like a 17...none of the Royal Coachman in sizes 4-24 [censored].

Big Dale

Thanks for the Blue Ribbon Flies heads up. Looks like a good site. I requested a catalog.

You will enjoy reading it. It is not too much for p[ictures, but I don't know of any other catalog where I think one of the highlights is Craig's article the year in review which starts with a paragraph about his elk hunt and then starts on a by the month review of his fishing in this wonderful corner of paradise.
I have been a happy customer of theirs for many years.

Great selection of soft hackle materials.


Big Dale

Thanks for the info, and a heads up on that site. I just found that fly by surfing, and I loved the wonderhowto site...it has several good fly videos. I also tied a couple of diawl-bach flies...I gave one to my son, and kept one for me. My son will get his stitches out today, then we can start practicing a little on his fly casting.

I will see if I can find instructions on his Trout Crack, and Red A$$ instructions. I plan to do the Red A$$ for a Novemeber swap, but I need decent soft hackle before I make it. I have a JV hen in barred cream that I plan to get for my soft hackle needs right now.

Trout Crack is a pattern by John Wilson of Arkansas. It should be on his web site. He guides for monster trout on the White River. Google might be your friend on this one, but my google is only speaking in Spanish this morning. Go figure. I don't know who came up with the Red A$$ pattern, but itis dirt simple. The abdoman is red thread with am thoraz of oeacock and a turn or two of partridge.

Have fun with this stuff.

Big Dale

Yes, the description you have of Red A$$ is the standard one I think. I found one that used a red bead with it too on the butt side. I think I will try it both ways. I wish I knew which the fish preferred. I will try and find John Wilson's web site. Thank you Dale. You are an endless source of knowledge, and I appreciate you very much.

Trout Crack looks just like a scud to me. Nice fly, but I don't have some of the material for it. I have regular dubbing, and some stuff for shell backs...I have made a scud or two a while back...might do another. I need to tie some more Woolly Buggers, and Bead/Conehead Woolly Buggers.

Kelly: I just revisited your wonderhowto.com web site to see other videos and if you have not done so please watch the video on how to tie the Partridge and Orange fly. Jeff Hines does the teaching of how to tie on this video and if there is a better teacher than Jeff in this country for teaching the techniques of tying a soft hackle fly, I don't know who it would be. For a simple fly with just thread and a feather he teaches so many useful techniques I forgot how many were in this video. While there also check out the video on tying the Gartside Sparrow. My friend Kyle Moppert of Baton Rouge has been tying a version of that fly called The Rusty Sparrow for about 25 years now and it is a great fly to use in any waters for anything that eats crawdads that lives in water.

You will note that Buddy did the video of several patterns while attending the FFF Southern Coiuncil Conclave in Mountain Home in 2007. Anyone that wants to tie flies will learn a bunch by attending this event sometime. It is held in Mountain Home the first weekend of October each year. The Southern Council has the best bunch of fly tyers of any of the councils that I have attended.You can learn more there than at their International Conclave which will be in Loveland, Colorado next year. I usualy attend the Gulf Coast Conclave held in Lake Charles in May and The Southeast Council Conclave at Callaway Gardens in June most years, but the Southern Council is by far the best of the Conclaves in my opinion for fly tyers to attend.

Still there are several that will say that the Conclave was fun, but I can hardly wait till Rendezvous at Toledo Bend the first weekend of November.

I have been watching Jeff Hines tie for about 15 years and I have never seen anyone else that I learned as much from about tying soft hackle flies.

Big Dale

Thanks Dale. I made a few flies just like the Partridge and Orange a few days ago for the Reel Recovery. I used different colored thread, with 2-3 turns of soft hackle. It is a pretty fly, and I hope it does well for them. I also made Bream Killers, and Jitterbees. I cannot remember if I put anything else into the box. I will look on that site to see how they made their Partridge and Orange fly. I don't have Partridge feathers, but am getting more hen feather to do them with. (JV) Anyway I will take a look at all that you said, it is much appreciated. Your knowledge of flies in this area is very helpful. Thanks so much.

Kelly: Don't be afraid to substitute materials. Trout Crack is a scud pattern and John uses something like v-rib for the shellback. I am such a heavy-handed tyer that when Ii use it, it looks great for a few minutes...and then breaks due to the massive thread tension, so instead I use that DMC floss that you find in the craft stores. I seperate the floss and use one strand for the shellback. Hen necks are much easier to use for hackle on soft hackle flies when you are learning. Partridge breaks much more easily, and so does starling. Sometimes I wonder why we have so many kinds of dubbing...I use the underfur of zonker strips for about 95% of my dubbing even tho I have an 18 liter plastic box full of other dubbing. Try mixing the underfur of rabbit in two different colors to make custom colored dibbing. It is simple, but most never think of doing it that way. It is amazing how few have ever seen it done that way. When I tie Long Haired Dave's Sucker Punch, I always tie it that way so that someone watching me tie as at a conclave can see how easy it is to do. That fly also allows me to show Kyle moppert's method of tieing in a pheasant aftershaft feather where it will not break as you are tying it. This is also a very useful technique for tying Gartside's Sparrow. You simply take an aftershaft feather and pop it while holding it in both hands. Throw away the weak part and use the stronger part. A few years ago while I was watching Dana Griffin tying at the Southeast Council Conclave I saw Dana Griffin break three consecutive aftershaft feathers and then I showed it to Dana. You should have watched that light bulb above his head start glowing. I think Dana had been tying for about three decades and had never seen that trick before. Moments like that are a big part of why I find fly tying so cool.

I think I have a partridge that is about half used up around here somewhere. I will try to find it and send it along with some cheap hen necks one day next week. He necks are one tying material where you can get some that are geneticaly grown to be of much higher quality than we can use for out flat water of our tanks in Texas.

Have fun with this stuff.

Big Dale

Thank you for the ideas Dale. I have mixed my dubbing which is a dry fly dubbing with different materials to make a fly. I have not used DMC Floss, and I looked it up, and think it is an embroidery thread. That is a good idea, and I will keep all this in mind for my next flies like that. I do substitute if it is not much difference, at times. You have been so generous, and helpful, I cannot thank you enough.