	THE OLIVE WOLLY BUGGER Courtesy of Max AKA FlashBackMax (LIGHTENING)Tying the Almighty WOOLLY BUGGER!!!!!(THUNDER) If there’s one fly you could bet on that 95% of fly fishers have in their boxes, hands down it would be the ubiquitous woolly bugger. Tied in more forms than there are snowflakes in an Alaskan blizzard, the good old fashion woolly bugger has lost it’s way lately. Crystal this, conehead that, and a what seems to be a general boredom with the classics has brought some to question if what they are fishing actually even is in fact a woolly. Well we’re here to clear all that up. There’s dirty little secret in fly fishing. There are flies that catch fish, and there are flies that catch fisherman. Fly shops and mail order outlets are always looking for the bigger better flashier items that catch your eye. If it looks good to you, it must to the fish, right? Here’s a better example; Lets say you’ve got an old fly rod sitting in one of your rod tubes in the closet. She was a good old rod, but after you bought that new triple flex, doohickey enhanced magnum rod, you don’t use the old girl too much. It’s pulled in thousands of fish for you. You can remember some great times you had fishing with it. But, it’s old. You probably ought to just crack it over your knee and get rid of it, right? WRONG!!!!! The same is true with the original woolly bugger. Just cause it isn’t super tungsten weighted peacock infused crystal omi-bugger doesn’t mean it won’t catch fish. Besides, if you’re like me(ultra-adept at slinging flies into trees, snags, etc) tying flies that take a beer break in-between steps 53 & 53a to complete, aren’t really worth your time in the first place. Original woolly’s are tied in a number of ways. The materials are rarely different, however the steps involved in reaching that final goal can be quite varied. This is my interpretation of the original. Materials List Hook: standard streamer hook, sizes 2-14(try some really small ones…..DEADLY!) Tail: Olive grizzly marabou Flash: 3 strands of krystal flash Rib: Red wire Body: Olive yarn Hackle: Olive grizzly neck hackle Step 1 - Inset the hook into the vise and wrap the shank with thread. Step 2 - Measure the tail and make it the same length, or even a little longer than the shank of the hook. But don’t just tie it in at the back. Leave some tag so you can wrap it forward. This will ensure you have the same sized body all the way up the hook. If you tie the tail right at the back and don’t allow for the extra, there will be an unsightly bulge there when you finish the fly. Step 3 - Tie in the Krystal flash. Easy tie tip: tie in the flash on one side of the tail, then grab the tag end pointing towards the eye of the hook and pull it around onto the other side of the tail and tie it in. This is much stronger than tying two pieces in on either side of the tail. Step 4 - Tie in the wire ribbing. I’m using red because it shows up for you to see, but red is also an excellent attractor color. Fish learn to associate flashes of red as the wildly flaring gills, or bleeding sides of injured or dying minnows. Step 5 - I tie the hackle in back at the bend and wrap it forward. So just peel down the very tip of the hackle feather and tie it in. Step 6 - I use regular old yarn you buy at a craft store vs. chenille. Chenille: $1.25 for 3 yards. Craft store yarn: $2.29 for 300 yards. Do the math. The other thing I like about the yarn is that it’s size adjustable, meaning I can get multiple sizes of yarn out of the same overall piece. Here’s what I mean, the yarn comes in usually three or four ply’s twisted together into one rope of yarn. Just unfurl it and use the number of individual strands you feel is right. This fly was a size 8 and I wanted a thinner type body so I used two. If you wanted a thicker body you could use three. For really small sizes I’ll even dub vs. wrap yarn so I can get the exact size body I want. In the same manner as the tail, you need to leave some tag to tie up to the eye so that the body remains the same dimension all the way forward. Step 7 - In nice even turns wrap the yarn up and tie it off, clip the excess. Step 8 - Wrap the hackle feather up to the eye and tie it off, clip the excess. Step 9 - Wrap the wire up through the hackle and tie it off, clip the excess. The wire provides segmentation, but it also holds down the hackle feather incase a fish might get a tooth caught in it and break on piece. While wrapping the wire it might want to fold down some of the hackle fiber. However if you wiggle and move the wire as you’re wrapping it, it helps to avoid that behavior. Also you can brush around the fibers with your fingers as you wrap pulling them out from under it. Step 10 - The tying is done. Wrap a nice head on the fly, whip-finish, and hit it with a drop of cement. Step 11 - This step is optional but I think it makes it look nicer. With your non-dominant hand, put your thumb, index, and middle finger together to form a triangle. Set your hand over the top of the fly. Begin to pull your hand back over the fly letting the eye of the hook come out through the middle of the triangle. Continue to pull back the hackle fibers towards the tail. When the eye and some of the fly is exposed, but no hackle has sprung out from under it, take your other hand and press on the sides, the top, and the bottom of the exposed portion. This will make the hackle fibers lay back nice. Continue to pat the fibers back. This continual pressure will cause all of them to fold over and lay down. That’s it! Give the original a try. Fish won’t know it isn’t one of those “other” buggers! Courtesy of Max AKA FlashBackMax

THE OLIVE WOLLY BUGGER

Courtesy of Max

AKA

FlashBackMax

(LIGHTENING)Tying the Almighty WOOLLY BUGGER!!!!!(THUNDER)

If there’s one fly you could bet on that 95% of fly fishers have in their boxes, hands down it would be the ubiquitous woolly bugger. Tied in more forms than there are snowflakes in an Alaskan blizzard, the good old fashion woolly bugger has lost it’s way lately. Crystal this, conehead that, and a what seems to be a general boredom with the classics has brought some to question if what they are fishing actually even is in fact a woolly.

Well we’re here to clear all that up. There’s dirty little secret in fly fishing. There are flies that catch fish, and there are flies that catch fisherman. Fly shops and mail order outlets are always looking for the bigger better flashier items that catch your eye. If it looks good to you, it must to the fish, right? Here’s a better example; Lets say you’ve got an old fly rod sitting in one of your rod tubes in the closet. She was a good old rod, but after you bought that new triple flex, doohickey enhanced magnum rod, you don’t use the old girl too much. It’s pulled in thousands of fish for you. You can remember some great times you had fishing with it. But, it’s old. You probably ought to just crack it over your knee and get rid of it, right? WRONG!!!!! The same is true with the original woolly bugger. Just cause it isn’t super tungsten weighted peacock infused crystal omi-bugger doesn’t mean it won’t catch fish. Besides, if you’re like me(ultra-adept at slinging flies into trees, snags, etc) tying flies that take a beer break in-between steps 53 & 53a to complete, aren’t really worth your time in the first place.

Original woolly’s are tied in a number of ways. The materials are rarely different, however the steps involved in reaching that final goal can be quite varied. This is my interpretation of the original.

Materials List

Hook: standard streamer hook, sizes 2-14(try some really small ones…..DEADLY!)

Tail: Olive grizzly marabou

Flash: 3 strands of krystal flash

Rib: Red wire

Body: Olive yarn

Hackle: Olive grizzly neck hackle

Step 1 - Inset the hook into the vise and wrap the shank with thread.

Step 2 - Measure the tail and make it the same length, or even a little longer than the shank of the hook. But don’t just tie it in at the back. Leave some tag so you can wrap it forward. This will ensure you have the same sized body all the way up the hook. If you tie the tail right at the back and don’t allow for the extra, there will be an unsightly bulge there when you finish the fly.

Step 3 - Tie in the Krystal flash. Easy tie tip: tie in the flash on one side of the tail, then grab the tag end pointing towards the eye of the hook and pull it around onto the other side of the tail and tie it in. This is much stronger than tying two pieces in on either side of the tail.

Step 4 - Tie in the wire ribbing. I’m using red because it shows up for you to see, but red is also an excellent attractor color. Fish learn to associate flashes of red as the wildly flaring gills, or bleeding sides of injured or dying minnows.

Step 5 - I tie the hackle in back at the bend and wrap it forward. So just peel down the very tip of the hackle feather and tie it in.

Step 6 - I use regular old yarn you buy at a craft store vs. chenille. Chenille: $1.25 for 3 yards. Craft store yarn: $2.29 for 300 yards. Do the math. The other thing I like about the yarn is that it’s size adjustable, meaning I can get multiple sizes of yarn out of the same overall piece. Here’s what I mean, the yarn comes in usually three or four ply’s twisted together into one rope of yarn. Just unfurl it and use the number of individual strands you feel is right. This fly was a size 8 and I wanted a thinner type body so I used two. If you wanted a thicker body you could use three. For really small sizes I’ll even dub vs. wrap yarn so I can get the exact size body I want. In the same manner as the tail, you need to leave some tag to tie up to the eye so that the body remains the same dimension all the way forward.

Step 7 - In nice even turns wrap the yarn up and tie it off, clip the excess.

Step 8 - Wrap the hackle feather up to the eye and tie it off, clip the excess.

Step 9 - Wrap the wire up through the hackle and tie it off, clip the excess. The wire provides segmentation, but it also holds down the hackle feather incase a fish might get a tooth caught in it and break on piece. While wrapping the wire it might want to fold down some of the hackle fiber. However if you wiggle and move the wire as you’re wrapping it, it helps to avoid that behavior. Also you can brush around the fibers with your fingers as you wrap pulling them out from under it.

Step 10 - The tying is done. Wrap a nice head on the fly, whip-finish, and hit it with a drop of cement.

Step 11 - This step is optional but I think it makes it look nicer. With your non-dominant hand, put your thumb, index, and middle finger together to form a triangle. Set your hand over the top of the fly. Begin to pull your hand back over the fly letting the eye of the hook come out through the middle of the triangle. Continue to pull back the hackle fibers towards the tail. When the eye and some of the fly is exposed, but no hackle has sprung out from under it, take your other hand and press on the sides, the top, and the bottom of the exposed portion. This will make the hackle fibers lay back nice. Continue to pat the fibers back. This continual pressure will cause all of them to fold over and lay down.

That’s it! Give the original a try. Fish won’t know it isn’t one of those “other” buggers!