A quick minnow tutorial

[BilletHead]

               Was texting @Ham back and forth this morning about this Blue Cat I caught on the fly last spring. We were discussing the fly I caught it on. 

                  Decided to do a quick step by step. Pictures suck so bear with me here. B10s#2 hook into the vice. Take a clump of fox tail and hold by the tips. Pull out most of the underfur and retain it. Tie it on the hook,

   You can wrap some lead or not in front of the tail. Sometimes I do and sometimes I don't. Do both if you want it to sink and just use floating line do it and if not using a sink tip will get it down. A bit of flash on the sides of the tail and cover your lead with tying thread. 

       Create a dubbing loop. Remember the retained underfur from the tail? Well mix this with some flash of your choice. This can be done with your hands, but I made a mixer. Has a little hole in top and a place cut out of the side covered with cloth. Shoot some air from compressor in  top for a bit and it mixes real nice.

    Create a dubbing brush by working dubbing between fingers to align tips and insert into dubbing loop. Spin it up.

           Wrap this forward to a place where you will create the head and catch off. Head is dubbing again such as sensos lazer dub. I again work some with fingers and then divide in half and catch the center with tying thread. Do a clump on top and bottom. Pull each clump tight up on top and bottom to create a thin profile fly. Work tying thread to front and whip finish,

    Its ugly I know but now brush it all out and trim to desired shape. Super glue on eyes and if you have it drop UV glue on each eye. Drag some of the glue onto edges of eyes into the dubbed head and light it up to cure the glue.  Brush more and trim more if you want. It's done,

    Here are a few. Picture did not resize well,

     When wet they streamline up sone but on the pause stripping fluff back out.

   I really like these and can be bigger or smaller by adjusting hook sizes and material length. To date bass, walleye, crappie, white bass, hybrids, channel and blue cat, drum, gar, bluegill and green sunfish. All I remember at the moment. Anything that will eat a minnow will eat this thing.

[Nick Adams]

Nice tutorial and good looking fly!! So the UV glue makes the head color?

[BilletHead]

5 minutes ago, Nick Adams said:

Nice tutorial and good looking fly!! So the UV glue makes the head color?

             Thanks Nick,

   No the head dubbing determines the color. Usually do dark on top and white below. Also for anyone that might like to do these fox tails can be ordered dyed all kinds of colors. If you look hard enough on the internet fox tails natural colors and white can be bought pretty cheap. One fox tail can do hundreds of these flys. The died tails can get pricy. Those places you can get half and quarter tails. 

[Ham]

I've never worked with dubbing. I'm kinda intimidated by the concept. I guess you apply a dubbing wax to the thread?

 

[BilletHead]

6 minutes ago, Ham said:

I've never worked with dubbing. I'm kinda intimidated by the concept. I guess you apply a dubbing wax to the thread?

 

                  I don't ham very often. Using the dubbing loop you can keep some tension and just slip a wad of the dubbing in there and slide it up and down to spread it out or slip in little bits at a time. if using a single thread to do nymph bodies or dry fly bodies yes wax helps it stick. 

[BilletHead]

      I'll try to do just a loop tomorrow and add to this with better pictures of all the steps for that part.

[Ham]

i'd guess there is a You Tube video that I could learn from. 

[fishinwrench]

Looks like a killer. 👍 

[BilletHead]

51 minutes ago, Ham said:

i'd guess there is a You Tube video that I could learn from. 

               Yes, many and much better explaining than I would be.  

[BilletHead]

44 minutes ago, fishinwrench said:

Looks like a killer. 👍 

            Thanks Glen,

  I can hear you know though. Does not push much water . It may not but it catches!