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Following Rich's Steps - Romance & Eyelash Flies


Tom L

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Rich Mc was very generouse to have given me some samples of Romance and Eyelash yarns. I have found that the Romance yarns are good substitutes of hackles & marabous and the Eyelash yarns are good for adding extra flashes to a fly. The Eyelash yarns textures are very similar to Hareline's Polar Chenille, but they are a little bit stiffer - not as fine as the Polar Chenille.

 

Following Rich's steps, I'd toyed around with these materials and came up with a few flies.

 

Clouser Style Flies

In this 1st series, I used Romance yarns as the belly of the Clouser (palmered), rabbit strips as the top or back. And for added flashes, I used a few turns of Eyelash yarns or a few turns of Polar Chenilles.

 

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Muddler style Flies

 

This is the second installment in the Romance and Eyelash yarn series. I used Romance yarns as the tails (furled) and bodies (palmered) - these are the same techniques that Rich used on his Ma's Leech. For some flashes, I, again, opted for Eyelash yarns or Polar chenilles (just a few turns). I'd found that adding a hackle collar gave a smooth transition from the body to the head of the fly, and it also provided an option for adding a hot spot as seen in the 1st fly which is an all white fly with a red collar. The head of the flies are made of craft furs (dupping loop, figured 8, and trimmed). I've been tying a lot of craft fur flies and found that the craft fur stumps that I trimmed off just go to waste and now I've found a good use for them. The craft fur head makes the fly looks and swims like a traditinal Muddler, but less bouyant. Fly with eyes just looks more life-like and instead of glue-on eyes-- I wanted something more permanent-- and chain-eyes were a good option for this fly. So here they are:

 

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Head: Craft Fur (dubbing loop, figured 8, trimmed)

Eyes: Chain eyes

Collar: hackles

Flash: Eyelash yarn (optional)

Body: Romance yarn

Tail: Romance yarn

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Guest rich mc

in the first photo of the white with red collar. using some yellow romance yarn as a body would be a pike magnet . bet your dying to get them wet in the river rich mc

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Tom, those look sweet and that classic red and white would be a smallie magnet as well.

 

And Rich

thanks again for being so kind and sending us some samples so that we Central Illinois Bassbuggers will be able to play with at one of our upcoming tying sessions.

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Like!

 

Thanks to rich for the materials and to Tom for sharing his creation.

 

I will share a thought. I see a Sexy Craw Clouser in there. Since I have some orange Romance and some olive Bunny, I can build it. Should I add sili legs?

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Thanks everyone for the kind words. I think these new materials discovered by Rich have a lot of potential, especially the Romance yarn. I first saw them was while fishing with Rich on lake shabbona a few months back. Rich was fishing his newly created Ma's Leech and the way that fly moved in the water was very life-like. I'm definately anxious to give these new flies a test drive.

 

If you have these yarns at hand and had created some flies, please post and share your creations. I do have a few more ideas on how to use them. I'll post them in a near future.

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Guest rich mc

another use is for some smaller flies. trim off the eyelash part and use it full length for the tail then use the rest as a hi tie method or place in a dubbing loop. rich mc

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These are 2 additional ideas that I could think of.

 

Looped-Wing Leech:

I cut the yarn (cut only the core) into short pieces; then tied one end of a piece to the shank and looped the other end back and tied to the shank. Dupped the shank with Awesome Possume. And took another cut piece, tied one end to the hook shank and looped the other end back and tied to the hook shank again. Then dupped the shank again. And repeated 4-5 times until the entire hook shank was covered. The second photo, I turned the fly upside down to better show the technique.

 

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Stacked-Wing Minnow:

This minnow is virtually a modern twist of the old favorites Micky Finn and Black Nose Dace by using Romance yarn as the wing. To accomplished the stacked wing, I again cut the yarns (cut only the core) into short pieces; then I used a lighter flame to fuse one of the yarn core pieces (the ends that would hang freely) to prevent them from frailing out. Tied the unflame end of the yarn pieces to the hook shank and stacked them up on top of each other.

 

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  • 1 month later...

Rich gave me a sheet of the silicone that he mentioned in the last bulletin a while back. I just started playing with it a few days ago. These are the flies that I came up with: a crawfish and a paddle tail.

 

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