Some Blue blended mirror image baitfish patterns. Took small clumps of sea blue & steelhead silver mirror image and blended them together for these two. Added a small sprig of olive raccoon for under its chin.
These two are more steelhead silver with a splash of sea blue for a lateral line. Then added a small sprig of Cherry red raccoon fur for its chin area.
Ivan Keeney catches a 47-inch, 29.7 pound pike at Smith Lake from his canoe. Read the full story HERE . Although I'm chuffed for the fella for catching such a fine specimen,I have to say that I'm a tad disappointed that this big old girl didn't go back. She must have been totally exhausted having to fight for over an hour for her life. Its all be and well targeting pike on the fly,as long as you have the right equipment. a 5wt - 6wt rod doesn't cut it i my eyes. Still this is fishing and I'm not going to take Ivan's moment away from him and a fish of a lifetime.
I used Bug-Bond with this fly instead of CCG. The difference with Bug-bond is that there isn't any tack after using your UV torch to set the resin so there is no need to use Sally Hansons hard as nails to get rid of the tack which CCG ends up with. Sure it doesn't take that much longer but with Bug bond there is no need to buy another product to finish the fly off with.
I've added several long peacock hurl feathers to the top of the fly not only for a lateral line but mainly to give a little more movement to this fly overall when under the water.
I started with a sprig of bucktail towards the back of the hook then added half a pencil thick clump of white wig hair material. The added some light blue flashaboy.
Then added a couple more small sprigs of black bucktail to the top of the hook and a sprig of blue bucktail underneath. Added 5 white microbarb saddles, whip finished and stuck a couple of eyes on.
Well I'm back from the Finish fly fair which was interesting to say the least. Saturday could only be described as manic.No sooner had I set up camp and my bench was swamped, and by the looks & sounds of it, the interest in Pike on the fly over here is definitely growing. I could genuinely feel a real hunger to learn new tying techniques and flies. 
Those that do regularly fly fish for pike here though have a limited knowledge of how to tie an array of different flies.This I put down to most of them following the same forums and reading the same few articles that have been written about pike on the fly over here. Most flies I've seen whether in Helsinki or in Tampere all generally looked the same. Slinky fiber tied onto a tube then the front of the fly epoxied. I know this by the way most use a tandem hook system which they construct themselves from long shanked hooks. By the sounds of it they all work but having just one style fly in your box is very limiting. 
So being able to show them different tying techniques to create different baitfish patterns was how I spent most of Saturday & Sunday. I know they'll be an influx of pictures in the pike fly sections of the forums here in the next week or so. 
Anyway I explained to a lot of people how to tie this fly over the weekend and Eumer actually sold all of the Mirror Image and packets of raccoon zonkers they had available on their racks. A big shout goes out to all those that mentioned PikeFFArticles and It was great to meet up with some familier faces from the Helsinki show again.
I'm not a massive fan of baitfish patterns but still need them in my box for the summer. These are some more herring variations tied with mirror image and a splash or yellow raccoon for the chin area.
Orange is a productive colour for me here on the island. This one has been tied with Deadly Dazzle and a small sprig of orange arctic fox for under its chin.
Many of you over the other side of the pond won't have heard of Niklaus Bauer. Part of the Vision fly fishing team this guy is Mr Pike in Sweden. Last year I posted a series of videos on here called Fly vs Jerk .......Just type that into the Youtube search engine and there is hours of lunch time viewing for you.....Only in Swedish but interesting stuff.
Here are some more baitfish pattern variations for the summer. These are tied Mikael Gröndahl Bluedunn stylie!
This one I started with the mandatory black & a splash of red bucktail at the front.Then covered with strands of pearl tinsel. Then I used black Icelandic sheep hair and tied that on top of the hook for the lateral lines, then white Icelandic sheep hair for its belly. Total length 150mm. 
This one is much the same except tied in Black & red for low light condition fishing. I haven't build the head up with these two like Mikael does with his. Call it laziness but with a large fat head it disperses the water a little better and creates a little more movement for the materials.
Some more Herring baitfish hybrid patterns 150 mm long, tied with Mirror image for the summer. I mixed Steelhead silver with Olive and Misty black and added a splash of Plum arctic fox just to cover the hook.
Some time back I featured a video specifically for tying your own pike wire ......Well now there's no need to bother, seeings Vision fly fishing now stock these on their webpage.You get 10 pike fly swivels in a packet for Є6.50. Now I'd never used them until a few weeks back purely because I couldn't be arsed making my own but at 65 cents a pop I'll be trying them out on one of my rigs this season.
A couple more sliders hot off the vice. As you can see Ben "Up North maine fly casting" your popper heads you sent were put to good use.
With this one I took a pink magic marker and coloured over the popper head. Stuck a couple of eyes on then bugbonded. 
This is a mix of pink bucktail and pink goat hair with a splash of pink FFF Flash and baby pink tinsel flash. The collar is UV Black polar chenille.
This one I stated with colouring the head with an orange marker pen,sticking on a couple of eyes and bugbonding it. Then added some black bucktail and some black goat hair. Then added 10 or so olive ostrich hurl feathers, followed by some Chartreuse bucktail and a Olive UV polar chenille collar. Jani & I tested these on Sunday and they look fantastic in the water.
I wasn't sure whether I was going to attend the Finish fly fair (Perhomesut 2010) this year, but have been asked by several people to get my arse down there so for any of you fins that read this blog and are also going, then stop by the Eumer stand and come say hello. Actually its going to be great hooking up with some old mates and hopefully meeting new as well.
But also in seven funky colours that were carefully selected to match almost any color of natural or synthetic fly tying material.
Silver Baitfish – Blue Baitfish – Tan Baitfish – Golden Chartreuse – Dark Grey – Coppertone – Pinky Purple
A full set of 3D eyes is included with the Fish-Skull™ heads in the bag which eliminates the additional cost of buying eyes but as they have sunken eye sockets one has the option to use any other make, style or color of fish eye if you choose to do so.
What I would like to see is a foam version of these heads as I think they would make fantastic alternative for a slider head. Maybe its something the company could look into producing as well. I’m really looking forward to getting hold of some of the large skulls to try out this spring here on Replot and will let you know how they perform.
Click any of the links or images to visit the Flymen fishing company website or get hold of Martin Bawden direct. He’s a hell of a nice chap and great to deal with.
So we put all the names in a hat and Lena picked one out late last night and it was Dave.Nice one fella.....Send us your address mate and I'll post these four flies onto you ASAP. Thanks to all that entered, maybe better luck next time!
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