Woolly Bugger : Fly Tying Tutorial

BEAD HEAD WOOLY BUGGER Fly Tying Recipe:
Hook: Daiichi 2220 #4
Bead : To fit hook 
Thread: Black 3/0 Monocord
Weight: Lead Wire
Tail: Black Marabou
Rib: Brassie Sized copper wire
Body: Medium Olive Chenille
Hackle: Black Rooster Saddle

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 Everybody. Welcome back to another quick tie here with Tim Hepworth with Fly Fishing Bow River Outfitters, and Thursday Night Live Fly Tying. We want to thank Rocky Mountain Fly Shop for bringing this quick tie to you guys today. We're gonna be tying up the wooly bugger today. The bead head, wooly bugger. All right, let's move on over to the vice. Go ahead and get your bead and your hook put together.

Remember, you need to probably mash down that barb to get this bead on the hook shank. So go ahead and do that, and then get it fixed in your vice good and secure. Before we put any thread on this hook, I'm gonna grab a little bit of this lead wire that's in your kit.

We're not gonna use a whole bunch. More. What I like to use this for is to seed that bead up against the top there. So I'm just gonna grab a piece here, do a few wraps, nothing too crazy. I'll use up this wire just cuz I've got it on there, but that was about a two inch piece. Nothing too wild. We're not trying to cover all the way down. This will build a nice little taper up to the head as well. But more than anything, we like this to shove up into that bead and hold that bead in place. So it's not gonna go anywhere. Once we do some tie. So what I'm using today is I'm using some UTC 140 and this kind of bronzey, dark brown color. Anything dark is gonna work just fine. I'm gonna get my thread started just behind those lead wraps. Okay. I'm gonna put a few thread wraps down, trim out that tag, and then I'm just gonna work a nice thread base okay. Up onto that wire, making sure it doesn't move anywhere and down into the bend. So don't have to perfectly cover everything up.

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It's more about that lead not moving. Then let's head on back to where that Barb used to be. I'm just gonna spin my thread and cord up my thread a little bit. I come forward a little. We don't want to be down into the bend, we just want to be at the edge of the bend. So I'm gonna go about there witht the first material we're gonna stick in.

There is gonna be a piece of maribou. So grab one of the pieces of maribou you got outta your kit if you're tying out the kit. So the traditional way of tying this, I'm gonna pull all of this down until I get to those. You can tell there's a different density and the tip of the maribou, although I like it and I leave it on when I'm gonna be fishing, we're gonna tie this kind as traditional as we can. So I'm gonna come in here, I'm gonna use my scissors not to cut, but to push my thumb against the material and try to tear All of those off. So I do that and what I'm left with is just more the puffy portion of the tips instead of that more fine tip. Okay, so now what we're gonna do is we're gonna size this guy up. We want it to be roughly a full hook shank and length as our tail. So somewhere right about there, measured off the front.

I'm gonna translate that back to there. Switch over my hand. Get a nice thread wrap down and now I'm just gonna work some thread wraps forward, making sure that stays in place. And I'm gonna try to trim this off right about where that lead wrap stops. It's gonna create that nice little taper for me, like a little ramp right up to there.

I'm gonna come in here. Work the rest of the base of that feather into there and then bring this back forward. Okay, now that I'm back on the back of the fly, I'm gonna go ahead and grab this copper wire we have in our kit. Okay. A nice long piece here. This is why we're gonna actually affix our hackle Up the fly here momentarily. So I wanna make sure that's good and secure. I'm doing it on the near side of the fly towards myself. Just gonna have it sitting back and outta the way. Now I'm gonna tie in some Chenille. So you got some of this olive colored Chenille there. Obviously there's so many variations to color you could do on this. You could use cactus Chenille, you could use this Verigated Chenille, whatever it is,  your dealer's choice. We're gonna use some Chenille to wrap up here. So I've just corded out and exposed the cord that is in the middle of the Chenille. Okay? And I'm gonna get that spin my thread towards my hand as we know that causes my wrap to jump rearward. I'm gonna secure that down and I'm gonna take my thread all the way forward up to the bead. I'm gonna do a little half hitch there. I am gonna grab Chenille and Palmer it forward doing touching wraps. 

Okay. Trying to keep as even underbody as possible. Not super crucial, but. Just for the appearance of the pattern. Gonna work that all the way forward, right to the bead. Okay? I'm not gonna worry about leaving too much space there, cuz this Chenillie will compress as I put thread wraps on it.

Secure that Chenille in with your thread. Then we can go ahead and trim that out, okay? Get rid of that. I'm gonna take a few more thread wraps just to make sure that little butt end of the Chenille gets secured and it's not gonna go anywhere.  I really only have one more material to put on. And a lot of times in streamers, we put the hackle on the back and work it forward. We're actually doing it in reverse. Okay. So we're gonna put the hackle in up here at the front and put it back. And then allow our wire to secure to bring it forward. So I've got some saddle hackle. You can have bugger hackle, whatever you want. You kinda appropriate the size, depending, it doesn't really matter. It can be a little bit bigger at the top of the fly. So what I like to do is I come in here, I'm gonna grab the fluffies off the hackle and pull 'em outta the way. I don't wanna work with those. this time we're gonna tie it in by the butt end because we are starting at the front of working back. We want it to taper. So my, the fibers of this hackle are longer at the butt section, so we'll tie it in that way first, as most as always almost We're gonna put the underside of that hackle facing back down the fly. I'm gonna secure that right behind the bead. As always, we wanna make sure that it is not gonna pull out once we start taking wraps, rearward with it.

So I'm gonna secure that down. Now what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna quickly do a little half hitch knot, get my thread outta the way again. And now when I do my first wrap, I want to do one complete wrap. All the way around 360, so I have my collar. Okay. Gotta create that collar before I start going back down the fly.

And then I'm gonna palmer down the fly. This nice even spaced with the hackle. If you moisten your fingers a little bit, you can always get that maribou to stay outta the way. It has a way of soaking up water and kind of cooperating when you add a little bit of moisture. Now I'm gonna take this all the way back, right at the base where we Tied in that maribou. And now I'm gonna grab my wire and I'm gonna bring my wire over top going the opposite direction. Okay. Cause I need it to grab and make that securing wrap on the first time around. And then all I'm gonna do is I'm gonna palmer this back forward and you'll see it. I'm gonna move it in and out to try not to Trap Any of that hackle that we just put on, and you'll notice that this is now cross wrapping over top of the stem of that feather, and that gives this fly a ton more strength. So if I catch a fish on this woolly bugger,  its teeth get into that feather, it could break the feather and it would all unwind. Whereas this way, The whole feather is being individually secured, constantly up the fly.

I'll bring my thread back in. I'm gonna get a thread wrap in front, thread wrap behind. Gonna repeat that process, making sure that the wire's not gonna go anywhere now. Either go ahead and grab your pair of Dana scissors, or you could helicopter it off. I'm just gonna grab these scissors here. This will dull your scissors, so don't use a good pair. And now what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna whip finish this fly right here. I'm gonna trim out that thread. I am gonna put just a small dab of some uv. I'm using bone dry by Solarez here. I just wanna put a small dab on the thread that I can see there, and that way I know this isn't gonna go anywhere. Here's real quick, it's real thin. Touch that with the torch.

And there you have it guys. You can see how that taper worked out quite nicely. All I gotta do now is go in and trim out the stem of that feather that we left at the back, and that is your bead head woolly bugger.  Super popular pattern for many different species.