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Over the years I have identified three flies that have elements of their ties that are similar. Depending on who ties them they can be almost the same or can be diverse as two Woolly Buggers tied by two different fly tiers. The three flies I refer to are of course the Flash Harry, the Dirty Harry and the Humongous. I tie a fly with many of the same elements and call my version a Flash Harry because that is how I always think of my father in law who died a few years ago. He was one of my favourite people and this is one of my favourite flies. It's one of those flies I'll always give a swim particularly if the water is a bit discoloured or if its windy and rough. I like to fish it on a fast sinking line either roly-poly or with a stop and start jerky retrieve. Chuck in plenty of pauses in your retrieve and make sure you hang the fly before recasting. This fly also fishes well across species and is attractive to Bass, EP's, Silver Perch and Yellow Bellies as well as tout.

I tie it in small and large sizes and yellow, silver, red, white, chartreuse, gold and root beer versions and with black or olive tails.

Materials

Process

A	You can tie this fly either with or without a bead. If your using a bead the longer Hanak 900 BL hook with a bead leaves you with about the same length of hook shank, bite and gapes as the Hanak 260 BL hook does on the non bead head version. The picture at right is a #8 Hanak 900 BL opposite a #10 Hanak 260Bl with a 3 mm tungsten bead. Bead heads - adding weight or eyes to a fly If your adding a bead slide a bead head onto the hook shank and position it behind the eye of the hook. If not proceed to the next step.

B	Wind the thread in touching turns to the bend of the hook. Understanding hooks Tie in a woolly bugger type tail of marabou with a couple of strands of sparkle flash. The finished tail should be as long as the marabou available and at least 3 or 4 times as long as the hook. Woolly bugger type tails If I am not adding a bead I like to weight this fly so I tie in 10 wraps of .015 lead wire forward of the % position on the hook shank taking care not to encroach on the the last 5% of the hook shank where you will tie in the head of the fly. Continue winding your thread to the bend of the hook and tie in a length of body material there. Adding weight to a fly

C	Wind the body material forward in touching turns an tie it of short of the bead or the eye of the hook. The front hackle is optional but it does add life to the fly. If your tying in the front hackle as I generally do tie the selected feather by the tip. Woolly bugger hackles

D	Trim the point of the feather where it is tied in. Take two or three turns of the feather in the gap you left between the body and the eye of the hook or the bead. Tie the feather off and trim the butt with a blade rather than scissors. Stroke the hackle back and whip finish a head (or a thin collar if your tying the bead head version). Varnish the head or the collar.

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