Dahlberg #2- Little synthetic added

[Ryan Kral]

Here's another diver I tied up,using "Congo Hair" for the tail, instead of bunny strip. Still has the marabou, and obviously the spun deer hair. This patch of olive deer hair I have is very crummy, the hairs are too short to get the profile I wanted, to small a head. My sink tips will still get it down. This one is again about 6-7" in length. Just ordered some better deer hair patches, this was a cheap patch from Bass pro. Ryan

[Jonn Graham]

Very nice. Question..............are you spinning or stacking the deer hair? How many separate clumps do you use? thanks.

 

jonn

[Ryan Kral]

Hey Jonn, I am spinning the deer hair. Although, with this pattern, since you cut all the hair on the underside of the hook shank, I suppose you could just stack it on the top of the shank, then trim it? To be honest, I havent really tried stacking hair, like if I were to tie one of the fancy multi colored bass bugs. Ryan

[Mike G]

Ryan,

 

I love that profile with the synthetic hair. The natural deer hair head is classic. Some day I will try to get the same effect with a foam head to dodge the problem of having the deer hair getting water logged.

[Tom L]

Very nice fly, Ryan. One trick that I use to make the deer hair head less buoyant and sinks easier is to trim the head flat vertical. Another trick is to add eyes on the head and coat the eyes and a portion of the head with CCG or Loon's Clear Head Cement.

[Rob G]

Mike,

I tried those pre-formed foam Dahlberg diver heads and I didn't like the action nearly as well as the classic spun deer hair. The foam head wouldn't sink no matter how hard I stripped it. Often a spun deer hair diver head will shake and proceed deeper on the strip and then when delayed, will float back to the top which drives many fish to hit it. I'll stick with Larry's classic.

[Mike G]

Mike,

I tried those pre-formed foam Dahlberg diver heads and I didn't like the action nearly as well as the classic spun deer hair. The foam head wouldn't sink no matter how hard I stripped it. Often a spun deer hair diver head will shake and proceed deeper on the strip and then when delayed, will float back to the top which drives many fish to hit it. I'll stick with Larry's classic.

 

Actually this Ugly Duck based on Kent Edmonds' Stealth Bomber does the trick with foam. I used his original template for cutting the foam. I refrained from hackling to avoid buoyancy and just used 4 saddle hackles for a tail. #4 Mustad 3366.

 

It's three flies in one--slider on a slow retrieve, popper on a hard twitch, diver that wobbles to the surface after a strip. The foam is very buoyant, much more than deer hair; so you do not need a lot. The head cannot be as big as one made of deer hair. I found that out when I doubled the thickness for a larger fly. It would not sink/dive. I did add legs to a variation which worked OK. Silicon is not buoyant. Second fly from the top.

 

Now I need to try the same Stealth head design with synthetic hair for the wings. I believe the hair will have more action than bucktail and it will not create a buoyancy problem like bucktail might. There is the question of looks. Like Gapen's Muddler years earlier, Larry's Diver was no beauty contest winner. Some thought it was too ugly to use until they saw how many fish were being caught on it.

[Rob G]

Mike,

These were what I tried with poor success.

 

[Mike G]

Rob,

What does Rainys say? To me a head shaped like that should dive. As I mentioned, the problem could be buoyancy since a foam head the same size as a deer hair head is going to be a lot more buoyant on average. If I had you problem, I would try using a smaller head for the fly or slicing some foam off the bottom of the stock head. A #26 Exacto blade works well for that job.

Ryan,

Here's a link to the Stealth Bomber. http://www.flyfishga.com/stealth.htm

Here's the old page with the old template. http://www.flyfishga.com/stealth_old_tie.htm