Better Buggers

Better Buggers by Jason Akl
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For all of you fly tyers out there that are constantly looking for new and better ways to make your old trustworthy wooly buggers even better. Here is a little something to make you smile. Over the last few years that I have been tying, many different products have come to the forefront to make the life of fly tyers easier and their respected flies look better. Some of these products that I am mentioning are leech mohair yarns, dubbing teasers and synthetic chenille’s. As good as these products are, nothing can compare to what seems to be the new fad in the fly tying community: fur hackles. Adding a fur hackle to your favorite bugger pattern can do many things, it will add extra body giving a bigger profile to a wet fly, it will increase the flies action in the water and definitely fur hackles increase the flies durability.

Take a look at the two flies shown below:

1. Regular Brown Wooly Bugger

2. Fur Hackle Olive Wooly Bugger

You can see the difference easily between the two flies, one looks full and stout and the other slim and long, even though they were both tied on the same size hooks. Don’t get me wrong; I am not saying that there is no place for the regular brown bugger pattern, but when hunting lunker trout you have to sometimes size things up a bit to their fancy. I personally switch to these dense fur hackle types of patterns in early spring and late fall. The big lake runners come out of the lakes and enter the streams these two times a year and it is a perfect chance to present these fish with a nice sized meal they will find hard to resist.

Looking at the technique of adding fur hackles is another advantage to tyers, many flies can be tied in a short amount of time once a tier gets the hang of using hair clips and forming dubbing loops. The fur used to make the fur hackle can come from many different places. For beginners I suggest using a small portion from a zonker strip. This will help beginners to see how much is needed to be placed into the hair clip and how to properly align the tips so that the hackle will come out even. Once you become more experienced in using the hair clip and spinning fur hackles from zonker strips you can start using different patches of fur to make your hackles. I like to use patches of dyed rabbit fur, simply combing the fur until the tips are even, then placing it into the clip. When looking at cost of production, fur hackles are very cheap as compared to using cactus chenille’s and synthetic dubbings. Enough fur is included in an average pack of zonker strips to tie anywhere from 25 to 30 flies.

Materials Used in the Conehead Fur Hackle Wooly Bugger
Hook: Mustad Size 4
Thread: Olive Uni-thread Size 6/0
Body: Olive Rabbit Fur
Tail: Olive Marabou
Head: Chrome Conehead Bead

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