Flies for All Fish

 Joe Cornwall has been fly fishing and tying flies and jigs for well over 30 years. He authored the book Fly fishing Warm Water Rivers ( www.flyfishohio.com )

A smallmouth bass fanatic at heart, Joe is happy to fish for anything with fins. In this monthly column Joe will share the patterns he’s found to work best in our local waters and for our local game fish. 

 


   Volume 7,  Issue 2                                                               February   2006

The Sparrow
Fly and Text by Joe Cornwall
Photography and Video Production by Jim Stuard

“You’re an original, baby, like we’ve never seen before…” Sheryl Crow could have easily been singing about Boston’s own proselytizing piscator Jack Gartside, a creative raconteur with a fascination for all things finny. Gartside is a prolific creator of productive patterns. Nearly four decades ago he created a simple, but highly effective pattern using just a bit of dubbing and the feathers of a ring neck pheasant. That is the pattern we will tie this month. It’s called "The Sparrow."

The Sparrow is a cross between a soft hackle wet fly, a nymph, a flymph and a streamer. It is suggestive of many aquatic creatures. “What I originally had in mind, I think, was perhaps a soft hackle version of the Muddler Minnow” says Gartside. And though this pattern was created to fool the finicky trout of the Madison River, I’ve found it to be a killer smallmouth bass fly. Great Lakes steelhead guides swear by this pattern in olive. It’s almost unbeatable as a carp fly, too! Tie it in sizes 4 to 12 and, when you’re not sure which fly to use, use this one.
 

 

 

 

 

Click on picture for larger view

 

MATERIALS

Hook – Mustad Signature Series CS53 (size 6 shown)
Thread – Brown 6/0 (140 denier)
Tail – Ringneck pheasant “marabou” rump feather.  Select one with a nicely squared tip.
Body – Dubbed mixture of red fox squirrel body fur and rusty orange Antron.
Hackle – One wrap of well marked ringneck pheasant cape feather
Head – One or two ringneck pheasant filoplume feathers.  Filoplume feathers are found under and attached to lower cape and rump feathers.  They are short, delicate and fuzzy.

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TYING STEPS -  click on pictures for larger views

1. Mount the hook in the vise and start your thread just behind the eye. Here I’m using a size 6 Mustad CS53.  You can use any 3xl nymph hook.  Experiment with bead heads and/or weighting with lead wire under the dubbed body for deeper presentations. 

2. Wrap the thread back to a point about four times the size of the hook’s eye.  This is the space where you’ll wrap in the filoplumes.  This is also the spot where you’ll start tying in the tail.

 

3. Select a rump feather from a cock ringneck pheasant skin.  Ringneck skins are very inexpensive and provide materials for hundreds of flies.  Get one if you don’t already have one!  Select a feather with a  nicely squared tip and pluck it from the pelt. Make sure to remove the filoplume and put it aside for use as the fly’s head.

4. Measure the tail so it extends beyond the bend of the hook by a distance equal to the length of the flat shank of the hook or a little less.  Trim the material to length and tie in, forming a smooth underbody.  Return the thread to the rear of the fly. 

5. Dub a carrot shaped body.  The body should have a good, spiky look to it with lots of long, buggy fibers.  This is a fly that works best with lot’s of inherent motion, so do dub the body too tightly!

 

6. Select a well-marked feather from the cape of the pheasant with barbules that are as long as the body of the fly plus one half of the tail.  I like the feathers right below the brown and white “church window” feathers. These plumes often have a metallic green coloration that makes the finished fly particularly buggy.  Tie the feather in by the tip, stroke the barbules to the side, and make one turn.  You don’t want this fly heavily hackled!  Less is more! 

7. Strip the thick butt from the end of the filoplume and trim the stem.  Tie in the filoplume by the butt and make three or four wraps, stroking the barbules back between wraps.  Lock the filoplumes in with three tight wraps and cut the remaining tips off.  Form a neat thread head and finish with a whip finish

8. The completed fly is very soft, with lot’s of inherent motion.  I prefer to use a double whip finish rather than risk getting head cement into these soft feathers.  Fish the fly on a sinking or floating line with an active retrieve or a dead drift – you can’t fish the Sparrow wrong!  It’s a great imitation of a soft shell crayfish, a Johnny darter, or a blunt nose minnow.  Try this fly when the Hexagenia are hatching and hold on!

 

Till next time, tight lines and soft water…

The Buckeye United Fly Fishers, Inc is a non-profit corporation organized under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code, incorporated in the State of Ohio for the preservation, conservation and wise use of our fishing waters and game fish; and to assist in the protection and improvement of our natural resources