Phun on the Phringe with Pete...

This week top fly tyer Pete Gray (USA) who usually ties in the UV Phree Zone, as he likes to call it has decided to tie using UV cured acrylics... for "Phun"

Pete is a great and much admired fly tyer, who leads the way... he's not a follower... many who see his ties on Stripersonline are constantly WOWed by his technique and dare I say it, his genius...

His comments on Stripersonline were short and to the point...

"Used with the "tip kit" its application is much more precise and the cured results are much more tack free than the sort'a almost tack free other stuff..."

"Bug-Bond hit a home run... CCG hit a Ground Rule Double..."

...and in an email to me “David, If given the choice between Bug-Bond and CCG, I'd absolutely go with your magic voodoo acrylic WITH the "tip kit"...Over the MOON!” Pete Gray

You're "Over the MOON!" well that makes two of us Pete... and thank you for allowing me to reproduce your comments and images.

The Ducking Fedley!

“Dealing with emails that come into the office is never a chore as they are mostly fishing or Bug-Bond related and like most, I enjoy a good fishy tale. One such anecdote with supporting photos was sent to me by Chris Sandford. Chris has very kindly allowed me to reproduce part of his email along with the photos so that I may share it with you (Chris, it is much appreciated. Thank you).

The unexpurgated version will be found in his soon to be published article in the Autumn issue of Waterlog magazine (http://www.waterlogmagazine.com/ do have a look at their website and consider subscribing to this quality journal).

Chris told me that although they didn’t win the one fly event, they didn’t do too badly and more to the point the Bug-Bond flies lasted the whole day… and by the look of the photo, Chris’s fly looks as if it could be fished again the following day and probably many more.

The excerpt from Chris’s email follows…”

“A week before the ‘One Fly’ competition Bob (A Passion for Angling) James called me and asked if I’d like to be part of the ‘Dream Team’ with him and Chris Tarrant....and would I mind tying the flies!

I knew that many parts of the Test were still quite coloured so I decided that I would give the team a choice between bright and heavy and fairly traditional and heavy! But I would do my best to make all the flies indestructible. It’s amazing how much damage can be done to one fly in just one day’s fishing so I gave them all a severe ‘Bug Bonding’!

On the day I presented Bob with the choice of the flies. “Your three ‘indestructibles’” I said. He looked at them carefully and asked ‘Which one are you going to use?’ I pointed to a small, tungsten headed, flash back bug on a size 14 hook. ‘Me too’ he said ‘What’s it called?’ ‘No idea’ I replied, ‘I only thought of it yesterday!’ Bob’s guide inspected it closely and muttered ‘Looks ****ing deadly to me!’ So that, we decided, was its name. The ****ing Deadly’!

One of the funniest moments related by Bob later in the day, was when the camera team covering the event filmed him landing three fine Trout on my fly. When asked by the director what the fly was called Bob had a lapse of memory and looked to his guide for help. Without missing a beat he said ‘Oh yes…that one…it’s ‘The Ducking Fedley’!

Cheers… Chris”

Size doesn't matter... but it helps!

You sometimes get that feeling in your water that the day is going to be good... not often as we would like BUT I just had to leave work early today.

1600 hrs and I was away from the desk and by 1700 hrs almost at the lake... My hollow tie was deployed in several marks but all failed to attract... BUT I knew I was in the wrong place! As the sun started to dip I decided to go to a mark where I'd lost a reasonable pike previously and decided to play hardball... I knew that I'd scored in this mark with dark flies... black or olive and decided to use one of my pal, Simon Graham's ties. Simon has become a great pal over the ether and we occasionally phone each other to chew the fat... I look forward to tying along side him at the BFFI in October!

I have digressed the tube fly... very wet at the moment is an olive raccoon tail, gold flash and brown raccoon head with a gold conehead... I armed it with a Sakuma Manta 2/0...

I cast into a mark where I'd had a loss earlier this year casting beyond the lilies and bringing the fly back on both sides of the V... Nothing was doing. However there is another slot in the lilies 6ft away but a difficult cast... more a back cast between the shrubbery and cast to the open water but then cast it onto the corner of the small lily pads... hopping it over the top of them and then dropping it into the water. Second cast and as it just dropped into the water a bait fish went vertical and with a boil of the water I was in...

Boy did this fish run for open water... a strong fish that I was keen to subdue quickly and get back in quickly... My newly built rod, a self build Harrison Lohric 9' 9# was perfection itself and at no point did I feel out of control...

So between my pal Simon Graham and my friends Steve Harrison and Mike Helliwell at Harrison Advanced Rods I banked a personal best at 16lb...

The photos are from the phone again... and thanks to the lad who took the photos!

72 inch Tarpon... its a kinda magic!

I've been so busy with Bug-Bond recently and a well earned holiday has been and gone... I arrived back a week ago... some exciting stuff in the pipeline... But here is the holiday report!!

I spent an age tying a variety of saltwater flies destined for the UK shores and pattern wise I was generally happy with them BUT it is quite difficult to score in the UK waters in comparison to other waters around the globe... especially if you are new to SWFFing (pike being my thang).

So a family holiday in the Caribbean was a potential solution and had me tying a hell of a lot more flies... the final death throes saw me getting a few flies from Oz at UKsaltwaterflies and my pal Dougie tied a few flashtail whistlers up for me as well... just to try!!

I did a lot of homework and with the help of a UK based forum member I was able to tap into the local knowledge... he having relatives there.

Over the course of the 10 day holiday I was able to go out on a local boat and hookup some Bonito/small tuna... the local fare tho' had to be the very obliging horse eye jacks that never failed but the bigger jacks were moving offshore even whilst I was there... so by the end of the holiday I was getting battered by smaller fish... I did have a superb follow off a couple of bones but I ran out of water... the area doesn't really have flats.

All the above were taken on a combination of shrimp patterns, poppers, bush pigs and candies that I've posted on forums and facebook over the last few months...

THE highlight of the 10 days was being told of a secret location for tarpon... now my downfall here is that I'd only tied two pukka tarpon flies one a Marquesa Sunrise (a copy of Brian Gent's) and a Black Death... on my 3rd/4th day I found myself with a local who was spinning for jacks, he and I worked together spotting fish for each other. I saw a shadow of about 3 or 4ft and my local angler shouted back to me "tarpon"... I tied on the Black Death and put out a couple of casts to no avail... some 15 or 20 mins elapsed and I saw a group of 3 similar sized fish and cast well in front and let the fly sink a little... I then started to strip and frankly to my disbelief I had 3 big eyes and mouths turn for the fly and I stripped quicker... then next thing that happened had me gob smacked and trembling afterwards, the water erupted and my fly was buried... line went thru the rings at a rapid pace and my inexperience got the better of me... the tarpon jumped... but it wasn't a 4 footer but based on the local estimate given to me it was a fish of about 6 foot and they said that it was in the order of 120lb... in the morning sun at about 0630 I saw the biggest slab of silver I have ever seen in my life... these are tremendous fish... needless to say I was bust off, my impunity treated with disdain by this magnificent fish. This was the biggest fish I have ever been connected to... even for the very short period of time I had with it!

I saw a tarpon of a similar size the following day but fluffed the shot completely... I had numerous follows from other smaller tarpon but no hits... next time I'll major on tying the Black Death and a lot of them!! They wouldn't touch the Sunrise even though they would follow it.

Here are a few snaps from my hols... proving that some of my flies work :D sadly none of the tarpon BUT a memory etched on my mind indelibly for ever... and I'm firmly caught by the bug of wanting to land a tarpon...


As a footnote... the vast majority of fish were released... obviously the Bonito/tuna weren't and there is an expectation by the locals for fish to end up in the pot... they couldn't get to grips with me putting fish back... they'd take what I would term relatively small fish for the pot. I even got adept at losing fish off one particular popper ;) when fishing in front of one family... a further comment on the size of the tarpon - having done a bit of research this evening a 6ft tarpon is guesstimated at somewhere between 100 and 120lb... I'd be quite happy with the lower estimate!

Stonefly - just an awesome tie!

I can't believe that the Dutch Fly Fair was 3 weeks ago... it seems an age away, yet just like yesterday. One of the people I had the pleasure of meeting was Johan Put... a great tyer and full of fun.

Johan had a terrific stand of realistics at the show and he decided that he wanted to become a Bug-Bond believer... this is an excerpt from an email I received from him tonight together with the attached image:

"I bought the Bug-Bond on the Dutch Fly Fair, but have to wait until today before I can test it.

So today was the test day, first made some baitfish to practice and it works great, no more messing around whit epoxy and have a lot of waste which always happen to me.

Then the big test for the wing cases of the stonefly, normally it take me about 30 minutes to create them and them let then dry over night for the best result whit the soft body.

Now it took me about 10 minutes to create and can use it directly.

I put some very tin layers on the nymph tool to built up some nice realistic wing cases.

Now I can show people how I made the wing cases on shows and tying demo’s.

The legs are broom bristles how are thicken up on spots also whit the Bug-Bond.
And the eyes are to.

So the Bug-Bond has proved it self to me, I have some more ideas but to little time.
You be hearing from me again whit some new bug bond flies." Johan Put - Netherlands


All I can say is the fly is awesome... usually I take the link out of the image or click it to the Bug-Bond site... however, for this fly click the link and just see the attention to detail... WOW!

Silverfishfly Steve Silverio mentions Bug-Bond

I met Steve at the Dutch Fly Fair and enjoyed a few beers with this great tyer. He used Bug-Bond during the fair and then kindly mentioned it during his lecture on tying a clouser pattern fly.

Rod repair - it gets better!

Bug-Bond was orientated around fly-tying... that's what I designed it for but I was also very aware that it would have other uses.... back in February, Steve Harrison of Harrison Advanced Rods documented it on his blog that I was developing it into product to replace epoxy on rod rings... I've had a play with various whip finishes on blanks but had to do one in anger today on my 9' 8/9#. I'm not a rod builder and don't have a turner... this was by hand... perhaps a bit too much juice but for an emergency repair for fishing this week it is fine... the big thing is it only took 4 minutes! Oh and sag free in 3.5 seconds when you first apply the UV light...