Spinning Out. Gordon Low explains deer hair and dahlbergs.

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Spinning Out Gordon Low explains deer hair and dahlbergs. 18 Get a group of fly anglers together and naturally flies will come up at some stage in the conversation.

1 Spinning Out Gordon Low explains deer hair and dahlbergs. 18 Get a group of fly anglers together and naturally flies will come up at some stage in the conversation. Add a keen tyer or two to the mix and you can almost guarantee that one of them will have some recent creation tucked in their pocket to show off (I have to admit I ve been guilty of this on occasion). Most of the time the fly will be passed around the group and compliments or criticism offered. Make the fly out of deer hair though and a strange transformation takes place. Magically, grown men start acting like kids at a petting zoo, speaking in hushed tones while each takes their turn stroking and admiring the little wonder before them. The fascination for deer hair flies, Dahlberg Divers in particular, is obvious. The reason, however, seems to be a little more obscure. It s undeniable that these flies are proven fish-takers. Some put it down to their more natural buoyancy (compared to higher floating foam flies) or the insect-like crunch when a fish bites down. I wouldn t be surprised either if the sonic signature of these flies is closer to a natural prey item underwater than some synthetic patterns. Maybe it s a mix of all these things, combined with the confidence imparted when fishing these flies. Another reason could be the satisfaction of fooling a fish with such a carefully created artificial. There is no denying the amount of time and practice that goes into perfecting the techniques required to consistently tie these flies well (not to mention a slightly obsessive nature). Those that have mastered the subtleties are often viewed by their peers as a bit eccentric, or even practitioners of fly tying s dark arts. Deer hair as a tying material is used in a great variety of patterns worldwide, for both fresh and salt water. The humble Muddler Minnow is a simple deer hair fly designed to sit in the surface film and is dynamite on bass, tarpon (oxeye herring) and a myriad of other species, including trout for which it was originally tied. Another simple hair fly is the Sculpin (one of its various forms anyway) which is tied to look like its namesake and be fished subsurface to entice trout and largemouth bass again another fly that transfers well to our Aussie bass. Deer hair can be spun or stacked to create anything from tiny, intricate baitfish patterns to frogs complete with kicking legs. You can also produce bulky 3-dimensional heads on deceiver style patterns for a variety of fish. Bill Catherwood, attributed with being the first to use deer hair to produce bulky heads on saltwater flies, produced patterns such as the Hair-head Herring and Pogy, specifically designed to target XOS stripers. Closer to home, deer hair has been used in a variety of subsurface patterns, mainly to produce bulk and greater underwater vibrations or noise. Neil Shepard s deer hair mullet, tied for barra, are a great example of this style. Jon Makim s Water Dragon is a recent addition; a slightly weighted variation on a slider designed to swim tantalisingly just under the surface. It s proving to be irresistible for our bass and saratoga. For anglers other than those trout-centric types, the most famous deer hair fly would undoubtedly be the Dahlberg Diver. Originally designed by Larry Dahlberg for US species such as snook, tarpon and redfish, the Dahlberg has since become the quintessential surface fly. Particularly in Australia where it has become a favourite for bass, barramundi, saratoga, murray cod and a myriad of other species that spend at least some of their time taking prey off the surface. When tied properly, with the hair packed, tied and trimmed to the right shape, they ride high in the water and can be popped and blooped, stripped under the water or teased slowly along the surface. Because of their versatility, Dahlberg Divers are often the first deer hair fly that people attempt to tie.

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Tying with deer hair Although there is a bit of practice involved in grasping the techniques of tying with deer hair, it s hardly wildly difficult as many seem to believe.

will have you tying entirely fishable deer hair flies in no time. I don t think the fish are worried whether the fly has spots on top or not!

The most readily available deer hair (and incidentally the most suited to the job) comes from the American Whitetail deer.

The two main types of hair that concern us here are: 20 Body hair medium in length with a medium to coarse texture. Body hair is suitable for spinning small to medium size bass-style flies.

3 Tying with deer hair Although there is a bit of practice involved in grasping the techniques of tying with deer hair, it s hardly wildly difficult as many seem to believe. If you aren t worried about getting the multicoloured rings, spots or tiger stripes often seen in demonstration deer hair flies, then a few tricks and a bit of knowledge regarding choice of materials will have you tying entirely fishable deer hair flies in no time. I don t think the fish are worried whether the fly has spots on top or not! Choosing the right hair The first important step for tying great deer hair flies is selecting the right hair for the job. The most readily available deer hair (and incidentally the most suited to the job) comes from the American Whitetail deer. Hair from different parts of the hide varies in length and coarseness and hence, suitability for different types of flies also varies. The two main types of hair that concern us here are: 20 Body hair medium in length with a medium to coarse texture. Body hair is suitable for spinning small to medium size bass-style flies. It is generally the most regularly available type of hair and is often found as premo strips. Rump and Belly hair this is the longest and coarsest hair found on the deer and is highly suited to spinning large flies and for tying mouse patterns. The naturally white belly hair is also good for dying and has the most consistent colour. The other part of the deer we regularly use is the tail. Bucktail is used in a great variety of flies and probably doesn t need any introduction. As far as discerning what is a small, medium or large fly, from personal experience I tend to regard small as trout-size, up to about a size #8. Medium is from #6 through #1 and covers most of my bass flies. Anything over that is obviously large. Peter Morse When choosing deer hair, there are a few criteria to look out for. Firstly, check that the hair is long enough and coarse enough for the flies you have in mind. Coarse hair is generally more buoyant and spins better. Now look for consistency and quality; make sure than the majority of hairs aren t broken off or damaged, that they are consistent in length and there is no matting.

OPPOSITE TOP, 2ND FROM TOP: Contrasting colours provide visual points of attack for fish and can be tied in a range of colours. OPPOSITE 2ND FROM BOTTOM: Essential tools for tying deerhair patterns.

4 OPPOSITE TOP, 2ND FROM TOP: Contrasting colours provide visual points of attack for fish and can be tied in a range of colours. OPPOSITE 2ND FROM BOTTOM: Essential tools for tying deerhair patterns. OPPOSITE BOTTOM: All manner of species like deerhair flies - including sooty grunter. BELOW: If Larry Dahlberg was an Aussie he'd have tied his fly with saratoga in mind. 21 Peter Morse Some hides may be excessively bleached before dying and this generally results in the hair being very dry and brittle. A neat trick that my good friend and tying mentor Chris Pritchard showed me was to actually smell the piece of hair. Apart from freaking out the staff and other customers in the store (and thus giving you some space to peacefully make your selection) you can tell if the hair is in good condition if it still smells natural rather than dry and chemical. Try it! You ll see what I mean.

5 22 Tools for the job Before you go hacking hunks off a premo strip with a pair of tiny scissors and trying to lash them to a hook, you ll need to invest in the right tools for the job. First thing on the list is a decent set of hair scissors. Whether it be a pair of quality serrated scissors or some of the flash new tungsten-tipped jobbies, a good set of long-bladed scissors that grip and cleanly cut the hair are essential. As is a good ceramic tipped bobbin with a reasonable length stem to reach around all the materials as you progress through the job. Also essential is a small comb to weed all the fluff, under-fur and broken hairs out from between the material after you ve snipped off your selected hank. Optional additions are a hair stacker (for getting all your ends even) and a packer for pushing the hair up tight between stages when you tie your fly. Some tyers prefer to pack the hair using thumb and forefinger but it will take a few broken hooks and stab wounds before you develop the knack of knowing just how hard to push. (make sure you place your hook in the vise with the barb covered by the jaws ask me how I know about this one!). Obviously a vise with a solid set of jaws is a must! Hooks Essential to the performance of the finished fly is the style of hook you use. If the fly you are tying is to be fished subsurface, hook choice will depend on the target species, how bony their mouth is and how hard they pull. Select a hook with a long enough shank to produce the right proportions in your fly and make sure there will be enough hook gape once you ve filled it with materials forming the head of the fly. For surface flies you will also need to choose a hook made from fine gauge wire so that the weight doesn t adversely affect the buoyancy of the fly. There are many deer hair specific hook patterns available on the market these days. Try the Gamakatsu B10S or Mustad Signature Deerhair for starters and work from there as you develop your own style. THREAD Here lies (or should that be lays bad pun warning!) the simplest, yet most crucial, foundation ingredient of a well tied deer hair fly.the first big mistake most tyers make is the assumption that tight flies need very tough thread. Though this does hold some truth, the problem that arises from this line of thinking is that the next step is to get some kevlar or GSP thread (after all, thread doesn t come tougher...). Some people even go to the extreme of using Fireline to tie with! The unfortunate result is that the thread tends to cut right through the hair. Don t use Kevlar or GSP thread for tying with deer hair! A much better approach is to use bug thread or even plain old flat waxed nylon and develop a feel for how tight you can cinch everything down without popping the thread. Tying off between stages and using head cement or flex-cement on the thread base as you go will ensure the resilience and longevity of your creation. Tying off between stages also means that if you do pop the thread you don t lose the whole village. Selecting the right thread will also compliment the properties of the deer hair and make it so much easier to master the different tricks you can use to tie attractive flies. Also worth a mention is whether to lay a bed of thread on the shank before starting the deer hair stage of the fly. Personally, I like to utilise the slipperiness of the hook shank to aid in spinning the hair evenly on the shank. Jon Makim on the other hand, prefers to lay a bed of flat waxed nylon before spinning as it stops things slipping around as much. Jon s flies are truly first class and he s the only tyer I know who s happy to produce deer hair flies in commercial quantities so maybe that s his secret. Spinning, Walking, Packing and Stacking These four terms are often used interchangeably but do actually describe distinctly different techniques. Using them all together is the real secret to mastering deer hair flies. The best way to describe them is to imagine starting with a few wraps of thread around the hook shank and have a bunch of cleaned, even hair about the thickness of a pencil in your hand. To spin hair, place the bunch of hair in front of and at 45 degree angle to the hook shank. Take two or three loose wraps around the middle of the hank then release it as you pull tight and continue to wrap around the same spot on the shank. If you ve pulled it off the hair should be flared and evenly dispersed around the hook shank, originating from the same point along it. If you release the hank after the first three loose wraps and continue to advance the thread up the shank as you pull it tight you will walk the hair up the shank as it flairs and spins. This technique is very useful for patterns such as the Hairy Mary, where you want the hair to be sparsely spread along the shank, rather than packed tight. Packing can be done with a specifically designed tool that fits over the eye of the hook and can be forced down the hook shank, or by hand using the thumb and forefinger as described earlier - just heed my warning about the barb! Essentially you want to push the hair back up the shank so that it packs together and gives you room to put more hair on the fly. Stacking is the technique used to build colours on each other and to produce those mesmerising stripes and eyespots on a fly. Once you ve spun the required amount of hair (this will vary depending on the effect you seek), walk the thread back into the middle of the bunch and make sure the thread

6 is tight and the hair doesn t want to spin any more on the shank. Taking a hank of different coloured hair, place it in the preferred position and secure it with a few tight wraps without releasing it. Unlike spinning, the hank is generally held in line with the hook shank rather than at 45 degrees (holding it at 45 degrees will actually give you more of a tiger stripe effect). To create eyespots, the process can be repeated over the same point with a different colour again before advancing the thread to the next stage in front of the last clump of hair. A couple of half-hitches on the shank and a drop of cement will hold everything in place as you repeat the process working towards the hook eye. Once you have the desired amount of hair on the hook (or you ve reached the eye and run out of space) whip finish and add a drop of cement. Usually I put the fly aside to let the cement in the thread base dry and whip finish to set before I go on to trimming the fly. in half (very carefully) to make them easier to use. Do most of your shaping with the razor, then use a pair of fine-point scissors to nip any stray bits. A neat trick to make the hair easier to work with is to briefly steam the fly over a boiling kettle. This will stiffen up the hair and make it easier to trim. It also straightens any bent hairs and is a neat way to straighten out any bent hackles as well. Whether or not you choose to seal or treat your flies is a personal choice. Other than a sparing application of head cement on the collars of Dahlbergs to stiffen them up I tend to avoid using anything on my flies. A coat of Softex or silicon will keep your flies floating longer but unfortunately they take longer to dry out once waterlogged. For detailed sequences of spinning, walking, packing, stacking, trimming and sealing, visit the Fly Patterns page at Trimming and Sealing Before you trim the fly it is essential to have a picture in your mind of how you want the fly to turn out; sounds obvious but it is surprising the number of people that just start shaving and hacking until there is hardly anything left to shape. I also like to have the fly in the vise with the eye pointing straight at me so that I can get a symmetrical shape. A good rotary vise will also allow you to rotate the fly as you work on it without having to take it out of the vise. The best tool for trimming is probably still the old style razor blade. You can normally get these in packs from behind the counter at the supermarket and I normally break them 23

The Dahlberg Diver As mentioned earlier, the Dahlberg Diver has become an iconic fly for Australian fly anglers. Tied in its basic form it makes a great, generic popping bug for a variety of species.

Bear in mind that anything you add can alter the buoyancy of your fly.

bulk and noise for snag-dwelling species like barramundi and murray cod.

7 The Dahlberg Diver As mentioned earlier, the Dahlberg Diver has become an iconic fly for Australian fly anglers. Tied in its basic form it makes a great, generic popping bug for a variety of species. With a little imagination and thought selecting materials you can add a zonker tail, rubber legs or even little arms or wings to create a surface critter to fool the most discerning predators. Bear in mind that anything you add can alter the buoyancy of your fly. Adjustments in the angle you trim the collar can change the amount of bloop, and if you trim the head down or tie it on a heavier gauge hook you can create a great subsurface suspender with plenty of bulk and noise for snag-dwelling species like barramundi and murray cod. Tied with a weed guard, these flies can be thrown right into cover and slowly teased and tickled back out over obstructions, the natural movement of the materials making the fly look like it s alive even when left dead in the water. MaterialS Hook: Thread: Tail: Wing: Collar: Head: Choice depends on end use. In this case #1 Mustad 3404NPSS for durability in saltwater. Bug thread or Gudebrod G thread Bucktail topped with 4-6 strands of pearl Krystal Flash. 4 Bass or Saltwater hackle feathers 1 or 2 webby saddles or schlappen feathers. Deer belly hair in choice of colours 24 Step 1 1. Secure thread with a few wraps above hook point. Take a small hank of tapered bucktail and secure with a few wraps on top of hook shank. Take 5 or 6 strands of Krystal Flash and place middle over tying point. Hold with 2 wraps, fold back and secure with a few more wraps. Add a drop of head cement. Step 2 2. Select four even length hackles and strip off excess webbing. Tie in two either side of hook shank with feathers splayed out. Step Select 1 or 2 webby saddles and snip off stiff part of quill. Secure to hook shank above point, whip and add a drop of head cement. 4. Palmer saddle/s until too small and tie off. Add a drop of head cement. (At this stage I tend to put the fly aside and tie a few more while the cement dries).

Step 5 5. Cut, comb out guard hairs and even a hank of deer hair the thickness of a pencil. Do not trim ends off first hank.

Any unevenness can be filled by packing smaller hanks into gaps. Secure with a couple of tight wraps through spun clump and avoid pinning any hair.

Take a smaller hank of hair of different colour (trimmed at both ends), part spun clump and hold in place while securing with a few tight wraps.

(this time using hanks trimmed at both ends) until desired head is built or you reach the eye of the hook.

Step 8 8. Place the fly back in the vise with the shank as level as you can ascertain and point side up.

8 Step 5 5. Cut, comb out guard hairs and even a hank of deer hair the thickness of a pencil. Do not trim ends off first hank. Hold hank so that desired length of hair over collar will be produced with ends and spin around shank trying to keep as close to collar as possible. Any unevenness can be filled by packing smaller hanks into gaps. Secure with a couple of tight wraps through spun clump and avoid pinning any hair. Step Take a smaller hank of hair of different colour (trimmed at both ends), part spun clump and hold in place while securing with a few tight wraps. Carefully advance thread in front of hair, tie off and add a drop of head cement. 7. Repeat steps 5. and 6. (this time using hanks trimmed at both ends) until desired head is built or you reach the eye of the hook. Avoid crowding the eye as it makes the next steps difficult. Whip finish and add some head cement to the thread wraps. Again, put the fly aside to set. Step 8 8. Place the fly back in the vise with the shank as level as you can ascertain and point side up. Using a razor blade, slice though the hair just above the shank in one step, stopping just before you cut into the collar. 25 Step 9 9. Rotate the fly in the vise and continue using the blade to shape the head of the fly always working from front to back with the blade. Step Final trimming to weed out any stray hairs can be done with scissors and any sealant or cement on the collar added. Before fishing the fly a light squirt of floatant or such like will help keep the fly afloat longer.

Step-By-Step Tying Procedure

Step-By-Step Tying Procedure Magic Skwala I spend quite a bit of time tying flies. I tie everything from the old standby s to innovative patterns I have found from other tiers on the web and in literature, to my own creations. I have