How to Tie a Wooly Bugger Streamer Fly Video

By: Guest More than a year ago

Very instructional, well thought-out, and well produced. Excellent

Reply to this Comment

By: Guest More than a year ago

Very good, I think I can tie my own now. thanks

Reply to this Comment

How to Tie a Wooly Bugger Streamer Fly

Okay, before I get started, maybe you will notice that I have got this little advisor for me; this small camera that allows you to see what I see when I am tyeing and as a fly tier, it is pretty important that you do understand the materials to go in on this side of the hook and that is going to wrap in and go away from you. So you are not going to be actually tie things on the backside of the hook. It allows you to see exactly where you should be seeing as you are tyeing the fly. I'll begin with a fly called a Woolly Bugger. It actually is a streamer which means that it is meant to sink, it goes underneath the water. It can be used actually with a stripping motion which means that the fly can be moved through the water quickly. It could actually be used as a dead drift as well, but most of the times, it is fished with some action. It is a very popular fly, in both small and large water; it can be used in lakes as effectively as it can be in streams and rivers. It is a good fly to imitate not only a leech which is actually what was first developed as a leech pattern but also as a large dark moving object which is very enticing to the fish. It is a very simple patter to tie and in fact, it is one of the simplest ones that I will be showing and it is actually because of that reason you can tie a lot of them up and have a variety of colors. I am going to tie it in black. First thing I am going to show you that is I have this black thread, I am using a 6O thread, a little bit more heavy thread; strong enough so if I have to torque down on something as I can snap of. I'll begin by actually wrapping the thread on to the hook and I am going to wrap this over the thread again and I am laying that thread parallel to the hook and wrapping all the way back. I am going to weigh this fly too because I want to skit down nice and fast. I am using Marabou feathers on this fly which means that it is going to be a little bit buoyant when it first hits the water. So having some lead on the inside will help to make it sink quickly and you want this to definitely sink. This should not be a fly that floats. Okay, it is important than anything else I am going to put the lead on the fly even just before I think about any of the other materials to do that. Take a piece of lead out here, snap that off. I like to lay my lead along the shank and keep it in one spot and wrap across like this. Again, there are other ways of doing that. You can actually wrap this in other ways but this way is actually very secure. So there is no slipping where your lead is slipping around underneath the material, spinning. Now, my thread is back behind so I am able to start at the back of the fly when I want to. Actually, now I am going to move this ahead because I think if I allow this fly to drench up bottom of the ocean floor, I have to put a little of lead on that, but I am not going to put that much on. So I am going to actually just move this forward a little bit, I realized my lead won't make it to the center. I want this lead to sit pretty much in the center of the hook, not towards the back. So I am going to actually start this a little bit -- I am going to start at the very back. I can put more on or I can take some off at this point when I have it to be mostly towards the center of the hook. It's lashed down so we are not going to have any problems with the slipping around underneath that lead. Lead is very soft, you can easily move it and form it the way you want. You want to get that fly down quick now. Keep in mind there are some areas mainly one of the big areas just as Yellowstone Park never allow to use lead and then other rivers in this country that are pushing more towards the idea of having the lead inside of flies. Be careful of that before you fish this fly because it is something that you should be mindful of if you are in a protected area. It is not the best idea to use this lead anyway in any place; you can avoid it, but it is the best material we have got to get it down and usually, it is pretty well contained within the material. Okay, now I am back to the back again. I start out by taking two pieces of Marabou feathers as they are fluffy. There you can see, they have a lot of movement to them and they are big and they are very cumbersome and make for a big gaudy fly. One of the mistakes that people often do when they tie this fly is not tie enough of this. So I am going to use two pieces of this and tie them back to back, wouldn't have to do it that way, but I am going to do that. Before I have tied them in though, I am going to actually take a piece of this material here which is called crystal flash and it is actually a very spark material. I have always had a few little pieces of crystal flash into the tail on my woolly buggers to get a little bit more of a flash, a little bit more of sparkle, a little bit more of an enticing application. So when you have that in there, the fish is going to may be pick up a little bit on this. So I am just going to put a few fibers in there, not too many, just a couple, may be four or five. So I will now take those two pieces of marabou and I will sandwich this in. So, it is there and it is not super, super obvious, but it is enough to kind of give you a little bit of a sense of some flash; little sparkle in that water. So, I am kind of coming up around the top, I can kind work them around, you can see if I can stick out the flair. Okay, there we go. I want to tie this on pretty long off the back of the hook. I can tie short if I want to, but these files are usually pretty good for pulling up the bigger fish and small fish will take them, of course, but specifically tied to entice larger fish. I am tyeing this on a Size 6 hook. It is not a huge hook and often these are tied on as large as even 1 or a Size 2 hook. I am going to tie this, I am going to lash that down pretty good. Okay, just sit back there, cut off the excess because these are not dainty flies, these are big monstrous flies. They can actually be used for Bass and Northern Pike as well. They are often used for Salmon and Steelhead because they are big and they are extremely wiggly in the water, very enticing to the fish. Okay, next thing I am going to do, I am going to tie in a hackle which is going to be used for palmering, which is palmer hackle. I have selected this very, very long saddle hackle and this was pretty webby, you can use a softer material. You don't have to use a soft hackle for this, but again, it is going to impart more movement if you do. To palmer this, I want to tie a tip end first, okay. So, I am going to open these up a little bit, spread them apart a little bit and this allows me then to have smaller going to larger as I tie this in. So smaller fibers moving towards larger fibers towards the head. I'll cut that off and move a couple of more these so I can actually have a nice solid base to tie this into a steam, a thicker steam. Hence, it's going to tie it in, doesn't really matter much in this one if I have any specific direction; I am just going to tie it in there. Okay, so it is on. Now, the body on this fly is made with Chenille. Chenille is a black yarn, it is used to make various types of fabric and it gives you a nice buggy look in body. I am going to tie in back here. All this is just being tied at the back of the hook, so it is quite simple. Wrap that down, get this up to the head. Now, I often use a natural material when I tie this, you can actually use black dubbing, a good one to use is a black rabbit fur. I am going to actually dub it on very thick and heavy and then you brush it out, pick out the dubbing and make it really fluffy and messy. I do that quite often. This gives a little bit more of a sense of movement, but the fly is typically tied with Chenille. You can actually use an olive color Chenille if you want to for the body. You can tie this fly in pretty much any color you want to. I have seen them tied in pink, yellow, orange, brown, olive and any other colors, white I have seen quite a few times too and they are all quite effective. But I like the black because it does actually imitate more realistically a leech which I like to actually think of as being a little bit more of a natural food source for the trout and some big yellow thing. I am going to lash down. I am going to loose it when I take it off, take that off of there. This is a big enough hackle. I don't even have to use the hackle pliers on this one. You can see it's just a big monstrous thing on the wrap. Palmer style because I am wrapping this up through the body of the fly. I want to make sure I have space in between each turn. I have got space; I am not going to have them all right next to each other. There I am with the head. This is a streamer so I am going to put a relatively large head on this fly. I am going to take a little bit thicker right in the front. What's nice about this webby hackle, it gives me a nice sense of movement up there at the head. I am going to tie that off, we have got a really thick hackle stem and I am going to make sure I have lashed them two or more times to safely lash that down. The reason why we have a little bit heavier thread because otherwise, it's going to snap that thread off. Be careful to cut the thread when you are in there. Now, I grab it and I pull it all back. I have got that stem there. Just to feel that stem, I am going to grab it one more time. I'll clip that one more time with a sharp little piece of material to kind of have to have one and there we go. Get rid of all this junk. It sticks out in wrong directions, hold this back and I am going to form now a nice bullet shaped head. It takes a fair amount of thread to do this. It feels like you are going a little bore with this but it's okay to do that. Okay, one more time around and down, I like to kind of work those fibers back and it bounce once and some last couple of turns and I will get it back again. Okay, we have finished. Pull this out. There we go. Make sure to get that free, a little attention in back and up, and we got it. Again, I am going to work that a little bit with my fingernail just to make sure that I have got everything looking the way I wanted before and I am done. I am going to put a lot of heads on this one because I like a big shiny head and it is a pretty hefty fly. So I am going to make sure that we are going to have this pretty nice and secure with head. Streamers typically have big shinny heads on them so don't be afraid of put a lot of cement on that. The first bunch will soak in and then the next one will give a nice shinny head. Some people even dip their streamer heads into the cement afterward. You can do that if you want to; you don't have to. Make sure I am cleaning that up nice and open so when I am in fishing mode and I am quickly grabbing a fly, I don't have to worry about cleaning that eye out. Clip it off. Take a look at that fly from different angles here. Okay and there it is, the Woolly Bugger.

Fly Fishing Series

Learn the rewarding art of fly tying while creating some of the most effective patterns around.

http://www.titleset.com/platinum-fishing-series-p-22.html

Title_set Distribution

Informational, educational, and documentary titles on DVD

http://www.titleset.com/

Featured Links:

All About Tie Styles

All men have the potential to look classy when wearing a tie. Unfortunately, the wrong tie can also make you look unimportant, immature, or even sleazy. If you???re a business professional, your tie makes a statement about you before the first handsh

http://www.articlesbase.com/fashion-articles/all-about-tie-styles-656890.html/9461024403

Okay, before I get started, maybe you will notice that I have got this little advisor for me; this small camera that allows you to see what I see when I am tyeing and as a fly tier, it is pretty important that you do understand the materials to go in on this side of the hook and that is going to wrap in and go away from you. So you are not going to be actually tie things on the backside of the hook. It allows you to see exactly where you should be seeing as you are tyeing the fly.

I'll begin with a fly called a Woolly Bugger. It actually is a streamer which means that it is meant to sink, it goes underneath the water. It can be used actually with a stripping motion which means that the fly can be moved through the water quickly. It could actually be used as a dead drift as well, but most of the times, it is fished with some action. It is a very popular fly, in both small and large water; it can be used in lakes as effectively as it can be in streams and rivers. It is a good fly to imitate not only a leech which is actually what was first developed as a leech pattern but also as a large dark moving object which is very enticing to the fish.

It is a very simple patter to tie and in fact, it is one of the simplest ones that I will be showing and it is actually because of that reason you can tie a lot of them up and have a variety of colors. I am going to tie it in black. First thing I am going to show you that is I have this black thread, I am using a 6O thread, a little bit more heavy thread; strong enough so if I have to torque down on something as I can snap of.

I'll begin by actually wrapping the thread on to the hook and I am going to wrap this over the thread again and I am laying that thread parallel to the hook and wrapping all the way back. I am going to weigh this fly too because I want to skit down nice and fast. I am using Marabou feathers on this fly which means that it is going to be a little bit buoyant when it first hits the water. So having some lead on the inside will help to make it sink quickly and you want this to definitely sink. This should not be a fly that floats.

Okay, it is important than anything else I am going to put the lead on the fly even just before I think about any of the other materials to do that. Take a piece of lead out here, snap that off. I like to lay my lead along the shank and keep it in one spot and wrap across like this. Again, there are other ways of doing that. You can actually wrap this in other ways but this way is actually very secure. So there is no slipping where your lead is slipping around underneath the material, spinning. Now, my thread is back behind so I am able to start at the back of the fly when I want to. Actually, now I am going to move this ahead because I think if I allow this fly to drench up bottom of the ocean floor, I have to put a little of lead on that, but I am not going to put that much on. So I am going to actually just move this forward a little bit, I realized my lead won't make it to the center.

I want this lead to sit pretty much in the center of the hook, not towards the back. So I am going to actually start this a little bit -- I am going to start at the very back. I can put more on or I can take some off at this point when I have it to be mostly towards the center of the hook. It's lashed down so we are not going to have any problems with the slipping around underneath that lead. Lead is very soft, you can easily move it and form it the way you want. You want to get that fly down quick now. Keep in mind there are some areas mainly one of the big areas just as Yellowstone Park never allow to use lead and then other rivers in this country that are pushing more towards the idea of having the lead inside of flies. Be careful of that before you fish this fly because it is something that you should be mindful of if you are in a protected area. It is not the best idea to use this lead anyway in any place; you can avoid it, but it is the best material we have got to get it down and usually, it is pretty well contained within the material.

Okay, now I am back to the back again. I start out by taking two pieces of Marabou feathers as they are fluffy. There you can see, they have a lot of movement to them and they are big and they are very cumbersome and make for a big gaudy fly. One of the mistakes that people often do when they tie this fly is not tie enough of this. So I am going to use two pieces of this and tie them back to back, wouldn't have to do it that way, but I am going to do that. Before I have tied them in though, I am going to actually take a piece of this material here which is called crystal flash and it is actually a very spark material. I have always had a few little pieces of crystal flash into the tail on my woolly buggers to get a little bit more of a flash, a little bit more of sparkle, a little bit more of an enticing application. So when you have that in there, the fish is going to may be pick up a little bit on this. So I am just going to put a few fibers in there, not too many, just a couple, may be four or five.

So I will now take those two pieces of marabou and I will sandwich this in. So, it is there and it is not super, super obvious, but it is enough to kind of give you a little bit of a sense of some flash; little sparkle in that water. So, I am kind of coming up around the top, I can kind work them around, you can see if I can stick out the flair. Okay, there we go. I want to tie this on pretty long off the back of the hook. I can tie short if I want to, but these files are usually pretty good for pulling up the bigger fish and small fish will take them, of course, but specifically tied to entice larger fish.

I am tyeing this on a Size 6 hook. It is not a huge hook and often these are tied on as large as even 1 or a Size 2 hook. I am going to tie this, I am going to lash that down pretty good. Okay, just sit back there, cut off the excess because these are not dainty flies, these are big monstrous flies. They can actually be used for Bass and Northern Pike as well. They are often used for Salmon and Steelhead because they are big and they are extremely wiggly in the water, very enticing to the fish. Okay, next thing I am going to do, I am going to tie in a hackle which is going to be used for palmering, which is palmer hackle. I have selected this very, very long saddle hackle and this was pretty webby, you can use a softer material. You don't have to use a soft hackle for this, but again, it is going to impart more movement if you do.

To palmer this, I want to tie a tip end first, okay. So, I am going to open these up a little bit, spread them apart a little bit and this allows me then to have smaller going to larger as I tie this in. So smaller fibers moving towards larger fibers towards the head. I'll cut that off and move a couple of more these so I can actually have a nice solid base to tie this into a steam, a thicker steam. Hence, it's going to tie it in, doesn't really matter much in this one if I have any specific direction; I am just going to tie it in there. Okay, so it is on.

Now, the body on this fly is made with Chenille. Chenille is a black yarn, it is used to make various types of fabric and it gives you a nice buggy look in body. I am going to tie in back here. All this is just being tied at the back of the hook, so it is quite simple. Wrap that down, get this up to the head. Now, I often use a natural material when I tie this, you can actually use black dubbing, a good one to use is a black rabbit fur. I am going to actually dub it on very thick and heavy and then you brush it out, pick out the dubbing and make it really fluffy and messy. I do that quite often. This gives a little bit more of a sense of movement, but the fly is typically tied with Chenille.

You can actually use an olive color Chenille if you want to for the body. You can tie this fly in pretty much any color you want to. I have seen them tied in pink, yellow, orange, brown, olive and any other colors, white I have seen quite a few times too and they are all quite effective. But I like the black because it does actually imitate more realistically a leech which I like to actually think of as being a little bit more of a natural food source for the trout and some big yellow thing. I am going to lash down. I am going to loose it when I take it off, take that off of there. This is a big enough hackle. I don't even have to use the hackle pliers on this one. You can see it's just a big monstrous thing on the wrap. Palmer style because I am wrapping this up through the body of the fly.

I want to make sure I have space in between each turn. I have got space; I am not going to have them all right next to each other. There I am with the head. This is a streamer so I am going to put a relatively large head on this fly. I am going to take a little bit thicker right in the front. What's nice about this webby hackle, it gives me a nice sense of movement up there at the head. I am going to tie that off, we have got a really thick hackle stem and I am going to make sure I have lashed them two or more times to safely lash that down.

The reason why we have a little bit heavier thread because otherwise, it's going to snap that thread off. Be careful to cut the thread when you are in there. Now, I grab it and I pull it all back. I have got that stem there. Just to feel that stem, I am going to grab it one more time. I'll clip that one more time with a sharp little piece of material to kind of have to have one and there we go. Get rid of all this junk. It sticks out in wrong directions, hold this back and I am going to form now a nice bullet shaped head. It takes a fair amount of thread to do this. It feels like you are going a little bore with this but it's okay to do that. Okay, one more time around and down, I like to kind of work those fibers back and it bounce once and some last couple of turns and I will get it back again.

Okay, we have finished. Pull this out. There we go. Make sure to get that free, a little attention in back and up, and we got it. Again, I am going to work that a little bit with my fingernail just to make sure that I have got everything looking the way I wanted before and I am done. I am going to put a lot of heads on this one because I like a big shiny head and it is a pretty hefty fly. So I am going to make sure that we are going to have this pretty nice and secure with head. Streamers typically have big shinny heads on them so don't be afraid of put a lot of cement on that. The first bunch will soak in and then the next one will give a nice shinny head. Some people even dip their streamer heads into the cement afterward. You can do that if you want to; you don't have to. Make sure I am cleaning that up nice and open so when I am in fishing mode and I am quickly grabbing a fly, I don't have to worry about cleaning that eye out. Clip it off. Take a look at that fly from different angles here. Okay and there it is, the Woolly Bugger.

Transcription by: Scribe4you Transcription Services