Got together with Saltheart and tied my first flies last night. Started with a few bucktails and then made myself a beautiful teaser. Now to smuggle a few hackles into the house ;).

I'm hooked, tying teasers is much easier than I first expected. I've had success on teasers to this point, now to land my first 50 on my first teaser.....

Fishpart,

You'd be amazed what you can tie flys out of! That tinsel off the christmas tree, any hair my dog or cat want to give up, all sorts of stuff is laying around. I guess it's sorta existentialism. One of my most productive flys in freshwater was some sewing thread, believe it or not. A little band of black a band of red, and then a band of black and a tail of hair made out of my dog's hair. As I recall, it wasn't so great with trout but sunfish and yellow perch loved it. I lost it in the hook through the finger incident.

What I took away from that fishing show last night is underwater, fish see only certain things. For example, a sliver side.
When you look at a silverside above water, you see an olive back, the silver strip, nostrils, everything in great detail.
But when we viewed it underwater, all we saw was the silver stripe, a little of the back, the silvery white belly pouch and the eye. From now on, all my flys get eyes. On the baitfish underwater, you could see the eyes on ever single one of them. Bunker, Mullet, Sandeels, silversides, Bayanchovys, every one of them, you could see the eyes.

From now on, my silverside fly is going to be a long strip of olive bucktail, two pieces of tinsel, and a short fat hunk of white bucktail underneath. Two big eyes, and then siliconed back to where the white bucktail stops.

Same thing with the sandeel one but I'll leave the bucktail longer and silicon back to the hook bend.

I haven't seen too much mullet or bay anchovys. The mullet are coming up here now. I saw a few small schools last year. Had no clue what they were until a friend of mine snagged one.

Happy tying!

I got to admit his first one came out very good. Of course watching him try to whip-end one of those big 4OZ jigs was definitely like watching Daman Wayans play "Handiman" on In Living Color! :)

Hi Ed,
The most popular teaser to tie is a sand eel. There are many color combos to choose from. The most important thing to remember is to tie sparse and presentation is everything.

You'll like them even better when they start landing you some fish...

Yes, I have been corrupted...Went out and bought some bobbins some supplies and a whipper. I found an old Jacobs chuck on a taper ,built myself a pedastle base and tied a few teasers this afternoon. My little "helpers" will be back Tuesday so I hope I can finsh up the chainsawing I skipped because of the rain.

BTW I have reports from two sources that the buckeyes are arriving at Gilbert Stuart.