55 on the fly

Folks, I've been tying lots of hoppers for the shop trying to finish up my fly tying orders. The trout fishing has been a bit off with double the rain for this month and high water levels at times. So, I've had some time to work on a new hopper design. This fly is designed with the foam in an upright position vs. a flat positioning on top of the hook shank. Seems like a good floater and it can be tied with or without the hair wing. I'll be fishing this proto-type out west next month...... What do you think?

At the end of the Montana fishing season last year Wally, our head guide at Parks Fly Shop and I sat down at our fly tying stations and came up with this new hopper pattern for 2010. The key new feature on the proto-type pictured is the wrapped foam underbody abdomen. Pink was our hot color last season and we wanted the ability to customize the abdomen colors on our hoppers. This is basically Wally's GFA hopper with a wrapped underbody. It's a bit tricky to tie as we don't want any more than one set of thread wraps in the abdomen area. I'm tying hundreds of these hoppers for the shop in different sizes and various colors. I can't wait for hopper season in Yellowstone, it's a blast fishing these big flies when your used to fishing tiny trico's here in NY.... Go tie some! Materials: Hook: MFCo. 7026 2xl nymph 8-10 Thread: Red 6/0 Uni Legs: MFC yellow speckled legs med. for 8’s and small for 10’s Underbody: pink craft foam Overbody: tan craft foa

Fellow fly tiers: I thought I'd share a few thoughts and photos on my new fly tying vise. It's called a "Jvice". The vise is made by Jay Smit a one-man-band sort of speak and he is a master craftsman. My vise with C-clamp was $205 plus shipping. This is the best vise I have seen for the money. The vise has very solid hook holding capability and excellent function and quality. One of my goals this year was to upgrade my fly tying equipment and I've done that with this vise, my thanks Jay! Check them out here: http://www.jvice.com/ Here is where the magic happens... I love tying flies and designing new fly patterns. In the vise is a Parks Fly Shop "Soda Fountain Biot Emerger" in size #18 that I tie for them. I featured it in a previous post. Go tie some!