The Willy sidewinder

In Lieu of the fact that it was the Royal wedding yesterday, I thought it would be great to mark the occassion with a commemorative fly. So as its been sidewinder bobblehead week I decided what better than to combine it with a Durex condom and called it the "Willy sidewinder".....after William off course! I was thinking of sending it over as a wedding gift but as I'm fighting off the disappointment of not being invited,I've opted to fish with it instead. Laugh all you want. but its going to bag me a number of fish this spring.

Essentials

1x Vision Mycket bra √
1 x box 6 flies √
1 x My Ghillie rod holder (More on that later) √
1 x sharp knife √
1 x small pliers √
1 x small wire cutters √
1 x scissors √
1 x hook sharpener √
1 x tape measure √
1 x boga-grip √
2 x forceps √
1 x bottle juice √
1 x camera phone √
1 x super glue √
2 x spare 60lb mono leaders/wire traces √
1 x packet LOOP pike wire √
1 x Vision pike fly swivels √
1 x Vision pike wire √

I hate carrying too much shit with me, so this is what I roll with while out on the water.
Total weight 1,1kg. Gone fishing…..nuff said!!

Dear John!

Dear John!!!

Sidewinder bobblehead tutorial

Its been a while since I posted a tutorial on here as I just haven't had the time over the last 6 months to be quite honest . There's a lot that goes on behind the scenes to get something out like this. Anyway play around with this fly its rather easy to tie and can be modified to suite your needs.

Open publication - Free publishing - More fly-fishing

Fly Evolution

So this was the 1st prototype I tied. I have had this in the water and it did fish well but I wasn't happy with the end product. Firstly I trimmed the head to short & I also started too late with adding the white icelandic sheep hair tail. I added streight ended clumps instead of tapering them and didn't pull them back and superglue each section.

Peacock herl are a great addition to any fly.

I was happy with the length of the underside of the head with this model but trimmed to much of the forehead and so it affected the over all displacement of water around the fly so it ended up dipping a lot more than zigzagging.

I also still added flat ended clumps to each step on this fly and again it looked amateurish once I'd trimmed it.

Only when I started tapering the the clumps I was tying on did the fly start to take shape as the materials blended together nicely. I also realised that I needed to add slightly thicker clumps to the sides than on the top and bottom tie off points.

The rounder the head I was able to trim the more the fly started to zigzag in the water. With the other two I used Icelandic sheephair for a tail but with this one I used just white and grizzly microbarb saddles and they work amazing.


Anyway the extra added bonus is that the trimmed head is going to be pike mouth freindly. Its light,retains very little water after the first false cast, and it moves like its got a stick shoved up its ass. I finished the tutorial this evening and will stick it up tomorrow if anyone is intereted in tying one or two up.

The Sidewinder bobblehead pike fly

Something that’s eaten away at me for ages is wastage with regards to synthetics. How many times do you end up with small amounts left from a clump of synthetics finding that it’s just not enough to tie another fly with. I’ve drawn inspiration from a number of fly tiers (Neal Osborn – Fly Art Studio, Stefaan – The lonesome piker & Matheus Gaper - facebook friend) & amalgamated certain characteristic & traits from their own flies, and come up with a novel way of using these left over’s and in the process producing a fly which I call “The Sidewinder bobble head” that has the qualities of a wobbled jerk lure.

Being able to fish ever day isn’t always about catching fish, in fact my morning sessions are generally spent testing flies, and over the last 3 weeks while waiting for the season to take off, I’ve been playing around with a number of variations of this fly until I was happy with not only its construction but how it moved both on & under the surface of the water.

There are two main attributes needed for the Sidewinder bobble head to work. The trimmed head (Mirror Image, Slink fibre, Funky fibre and Frizz fibre) needs to be as large & as round as possible and the tail section (Big fly fibre, Icelandic sheep hair, Party wig hair, Microbarb saddle hackles) shouldn’t be too long as it hinders the side to side swimming action it produces.

I’ve fished them with both floating and intermediate lines and although they work well as a surface lure and push a lot of water, they really come into their own fished with an intermediate line and short sharp continuous strips allowing for a decent pause between the next set of strips. You can tie these in any colour you want but to be honest it’s the undulating erratic zigzag movement this fly has that will attract pike and not the colour scheme.

I’m busy working on a tutorial for the “Sidewinder bobble head” which I hope to have finished on Thursday.

This version I used Orange Mirror Image for the head and combined it with black Icelandic sheep hair and white microbarb saddles for the tail.

out 'n about!

Being able to fish 3 weeks earlier than last year does have its downfalls. Pike are still in deeper water so I've been really stoked with the Jacks I've caught so far this season, especially as I've only been able to wade due to most of the ice still covering much of the island. Wading at this time of the year though is brutal as water temps drain your energy levels rather quickly. Even with 3 pairs of longjohns on, thermal vests, fleeces and jackets I can only bare being half submerged for around an hour before my body starts shutting down. Fishing in these temps is slow. I've been using a floating line with a much shorter leader of around 3 ft and mainly bendback flies and my rattle n hums which by the time have been retrieved are bouncing on the bottom. Still I managed to have a chat with this fella yesterday morning so things are looking up.

BPF Issue 7 out! "Bad ass Musky collection"

Open publication - Free publishing - More finland

I put the finishing touches to the latest Baltic pike flies Issue 7 Ezine this week "The Bad ass Musky collection". Hope you're all having a great Easter!

Fly Candy

Salvaged another one of Rowlands old hooks last weekand & tied a simple angel hair baitfish in brown & pearl whitewith a collar of olive UV polar chenille. Well I couldn't see the point of throwing away a hook with a head like this one has.

Maybe not a traditional flash fly but angel hair is much the same and will be perfect for late autumn when the water clouds over due to plant life dying off.

Readers fish porn

My brotha from another motha Alex from F.G.F.F bagged himself a snotrocket with one of my flies last week. Grow big n strong little one cause I'm commin to get yeh in a couple of seasons.

"Uncle Larry's Bluegill"

Tight ass dubbing brush!

Here is the ultimate tight ass dubbing brush. To be fair I've made a couple of these and they actually work pritty good. well worth the effort!

Fly Candy

With these I blended "Tan brown" frizz fibre with "Misty green" deadly dazzle and "Off white" mirror image. The top fly has a black raccoon fur chin while the bottom one has an olive raccoon fur chin. I also added 4 brown microbarb saddles half way into the tie. Both have the medium sized fishskulls added.

Fly Candy

Its great to be back out fishing regularly again. I've had fish to hand which has rejuvenated the soul but only after 2 weeks my waders smell like extremely ripe camembert cheese, even though I gave them the full valet treatment at the end of last season. My boots have seen better day as well. I've often been surprised when reading that some chaps have to replace their waders and boots only after one season. I've used mine twice a day for around 450 days and they still keep me dry and believe when I say I've put them through their paces. Saying that though I'm sorely in need of some new duds. I'm no tackle tart but a mans got to have certain necessities but with the price of equipment these days it looks like I'm going to have make do with the crusty shit that I have at the mo. The most important thing is that I have enough flies to last me for the season and thats all that matters in the long run.

Am looking forward to showing this to a few snotrockets this spring. I took it out for a swim this weekend and it looked like a small pike from above when I was striping it back.

Shark flies

Shark flies.....would love to know why its all red. Am sure there is a reason. looks a pretty easy construction. wonder if some of my own flies would snag a toothy critter?

Fly Candy

Three variations of fishskull baitfish patterns using Olive & white frizz fiber blended with pastel yellow deadly dazzle. To all you guys coming out here to fish with me this season...bar the musky flies, the last three months worth of tied flies seen on this blog are waiting for you to use, including these here. I'm looking forward to May 20th when my first clients arrive on the island. Meeting new faces forging new freindships, experiencing all the trials and tribulations that goes with fishing is why I love being a professional fly fishing guide. Its going to be a good, good season,I can feel it in my bones!

Fly Candy

Soft belly baitfish tied with electric yellow slinky fibre and yellow marabou hairline. Since this photo was taken I've added some black retro funky stripes down their flanks.

Pike on the fly in Spain

How could you not get addicted to pike on the fly when you see this kinda fiahing......not so sure about the music, but hey different strokes for different blokes!

Fly Candy - Musky madness

This monster musky fly only has one objective and thats to attract a monster fish. At 15" inches long its a combination of fur,rubber,flash,bucktail and deer hair.

I started with tying on two thin strips of yellow barred rabbit zonker onto the articulated stinger hook. Then a couple of clumps of black bucktail spun around the hook shaft. Then added 2 black saddles on either side then another clump of bucktail. Then covered that with a yellow/white rubber muppet. Then finished of the tail with a contrasting clump of yellow bucktail


The main body tied onto the front hook has eight black saddles splayed outwards interdispursed with bucktail along the shank. A generous clump of fluoro chartreuse super fine tinsel was added just behind the collar. The head is tightly spun deer hair trimmed diver style

Chartreuse & Black pike fly

Just a nice simple effective fly to tie and fish with.

Fly Candy

More fishskull goodness hot of the vise. These are a combination of deadly dazzle,Frizz fiber, and Mirror image blended together in varying shades of Oranges & whites. I might with one of them this spring to see how the combination of materials swims like. I've been working on a new designed fly using smaller amounts of synthetics and combining them with either wig hair, Icelandic sheep hair and also with goat hair. 1st tests this week were very positive and I might be onto something but until I'm happy with the overall design I'll keep it under wraps.

Fly Candy

Its good to have flies for different fishing areas and these have been given the fishskull treatment for slightly deeper waters. All three have double bunny zonker strips. this one has white/black. Then added a couple of clumps of red bucktail then some pearl tinsel flash then a decent collar of Black UV Polar chenille finished off with a black fishskull head.

A traditional firetiger colour combo

This is my favourite out of the three and have already caught two pike with it this weekend. This one has a pink raccoon collar instead of the uv polar chenille I used on the other two.

Pool 32 issue 3 out!

Pool 32 issue 3 is out and well worth the read. Again filled with awesome photography backed up by some great articles. Click image to visit the ezine.

Fly Candy

Blue is a very productive colour here on the Baltic especially with the plastic treble chuckers and whenever I've used a blue fly I've caught fish with it. Anyway I had a couple of unused packets of Shaded pink and Sea blue slinky fiber which I split into equal sized clumps then blended different shades with some plain white for the belly.


I like this striped one and might actually add stripes to the rest of this set, i'll see!

I might bring these out in the summer or late spring for a test run. Having not fished with this purple/blue colour combo before I'm not sure how they'll fair....fingers crossed they're the nuts and the pike love em!