Hi all,
I've been trying to come up with a good subsurface bass fly for years, hopefully you all can help. My problem is we have so much stumps, brush, and sunken tree limbs here that getting a fly through them without hanging up is a chore to say the least. I think I have tried every sort of weedguard with less than great results. Anyone got a good pattern?

rr

for that type of terrain, i use a weedless deerhair diver for bass and a slow sinking spider for brim-p-

I don't bass fish much any more, but I feel you catch more big bass below the surface than on top. One fly that used to work for me was 3 1/2" or 4" of rabbit strip behind a bit of palmered hackle. Tying them on 2/0 kahle hooks helped somewhat with the snags. Try either a white or black strip with two or three wraps of red hackle palmered up front. The strip will foul in the hook bend less if you tie it at the bend, and sometimes I tie in a small loop of heavy mono to help. Soak the fly really good before using it when you first pull it out of the box; rabbit doesn't play nicely when it's dry. I've never been fond of flies with weedguards, and I seldom use them.

Dusty's UDF is the best snagless deer hair bug I have fished for nasty stuff for topwater bass.
I'll be fishing UDFs soon on a sinking line.
Good luck!
George

If I ever accidentally make any money off the Upside Down Frog, I'm going to have to give George half.

I've played with this pattern a bit as a subsurface streamer and it works pretty well. If you are fishing in shallowish water, using a regular UDF works well on a sink tip line. If you want to fish deeper water, tying up a version with less densely packed deer hair near the head of the streamer does well too.

If you're interested in tying this simple little pattern, the tutorial/instructions are here: http://texasfishingforum.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/topics/8769350

Deer hair weedguards certainly aren't proof against timber as much as they are "soft" vegetation, but they can still be effective if you're paying attention to where the wood is versus where your streamer is. Trying to yank it through woody areas is only going to result in major frustration and lost streamers.

Good luck!

another fly that I have found useful in the timber that runs subsurface is the seaducer. I use a streamer hook, usually #4 and really pack the palmered hackles on the hookshank. tied this way, the seaducer is almost zero nuetral in the water; it sinks very slowly and on floating line it will return to the surface, thus it is easier than most subsurface flies to control going thru stick ups, timber, etc, whoever named it, did a good job; white, black/white, red/white are my favorite colors. chartreuse is always a good spring color-p-

Thanks for all the suggestions. I am definitely going to try the UDF and maybe a combination of the seaducer and rabbit strips, hummm.. I love rabbit.

I do have a question on the UDF though. Why the lead wire wraps? Something to do with the action?

Thanks again

rr

That's OK Dusty - the UDFs you sent me to try were ample pay - they work!
Besides, I owe more than I can repay to all the folks in the fly fishing community who have helped me over the years....
I like my old time tested Teeny 200-300s for getting flies where I want them - I hate sink tip fly lines...

They're not totally necessary, but I'm a belt and suspenders kind of guy. I think they help get the floating version to sit tail-low in the water. The "V" of deer hair above the hook and the skirt material below the hook work with the lead wraps to help it ride hook point up as well.

It probably doesn't hurt the action either.

I've tied a couple with rabbit instead of the skirt material and that's a pretty potent combination as well. You might want to give that a try too.

Here's a version I tied a while back for this very purpose. I used a little estaz and some EP dubbing brush up front to push some water, kept some stacked deer hair and the lead wraps to keep the hook upright (the deer hair also works as a weedgaurd)and then used bucktail and a little flash for the tail. This one I actually tied for Redfish.

D.

That's a good looking, simple streamer. I do think it could maybe use some skirt material, though. haha

Have you fished with it?

TR your sponsored by a skirt manufacturer aren't you .
I chunked it at the pond just for some R&D on it's action, it performed like I wanted but I haven't made it to the coast to try on a Red yet.
I was in CC part of the weekend and had my fly artillery in the toolbox but with winds pushing 30mph I bowed out for pizza and beer.
D.

Not currently, but if you know of one...

George has experimented with putting rattles in them too. Since I haven't finished my wake-up Dr. Pepper, I can't remember what his results were.