Help!

[bidz81]

I have been fly fishing for about 3 years now and have decided to have ago at tying.

I have loads of silks,cottons, fritz, floss etc but really no idea where to start.

I have been tying buzzers, but haven't really had the confidence to use them.

Can anyone advise me where to start. What i should start tying & how?

[megaflies]

look up the fly tying threads and they have some step by step flys you could try. the rest comes with practice.

Good luck, it will be worth the effort the first time you catch on your own tied fly.

[shortea]

try looking on youtube -loads of good instructional videos.Tie the sort of flies you use for your fishing-no point in tying flies you will never use


good luck Nick

[wingman]

Hi Bidz81 welcome to the forum, I would recommend buying any of Peter Gathercoles biooks on learning fly tying, 'Fly tying for beginners' for example as they cover the basic techniques and have easy patterns to start on that cover lots of different tying styles from buzzers, emergers etc to lures, seatrout and salmon flies. Also look on youtube for tiers like Davie mcPhail and just watch how they do things, watching someone for 5 minutes can be just as useful as reading 30 pages of a book and you can always tie along with them to make sure your'e doing it properly. Also there are certain DVD's out there that are very good. You could also post photos of your first attempts on here to get helpful advice from the many excellent tyers on here. We all started somewhere and my first attempts were interesting and resembled all sorts of things that never looked like flies but with practice things started to improve.

[g1zmo]

As has already been said have a look on youtube lots of excellent vids on there

[GuyFromLaw]

Lots of good advice here.

Start with a simple fly, a spider, get used to tying on a thread body, and a partridge hackle, or hen hackle.

Once you feel you are getting your finish nice and tight, move on to adding a tag and rib to your fly, again a few spiders will see you okay.

Then move on to winged wets, which is all the processes you have already learned (as above) with a wing and a hen hackle, and a tail.

Flies as examples ...

Black spider ... simple fly, black thread body and a black hen hackle.

Patridge N Orange .... orange thread body and partridge hackle.

Black Pennel ... black thread body (black floss on anything size 10 and bigger) with golden pheasant tippet tail, silver rib, and black hen hackle.

Greenwells spider ... Olive thread body, a little gold tag, gold wire rib and a greenwells or furnace hackle.

You will find flies like these easy to tie, and whats more .. you will catch trout wherever you go on these flies.

You are quite lucky in this modern day that you can access step by steps on the forums and on youtube, we all had to traipse our way to fly tying clubs once a week to learn.

Good luck and most importantly, enjoy it. There's nothing better than catching your first fish on your own tied fly.

[The Blue Licer]

If you can get hold of a book called 'Fly Tying made Simple' by Skip Morris I think you could get a lot of good answers, on the technical aspects he leaves most other writers standing and yet he manages to explain things in a simple manner. Yes, it is an American book but having been teaching fly tying for over 25 years, Skip Morris is one of the few I would suggest spending your hard earned dosh on. He is, in my opinion, one of the best at being able to put down in writing 'how to'.
There is a chance that Sparton still has a copy, phone 0115 9463572. Skip Morris also has books on dries and nymphs, very good technical books

[la_jolla1]

I agree about Skip Morris's "Fly Tying made simple" - an excellent place to start. Time spent with a good fly tier who enjoys teaching is well worth it. My wife gave me a great set of lessons at the local fly shop (no guild in the US), and that helped a bunch.