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Bonefish are an amphidromous species which means they migrate from fresh to salt water or from salt to fresh water at some stage of the life cycle other than the breeding period. They live in inshore tropical waters and moves onto shallow mudflats and sand flats to feed with the incoming tide. Adults and juveniles may shoal together, and they may be found singly or in pairs.

Favourite food sources include worms, fry, molluscs and crustaceans including crabs and shrimp.

They are a much sought after target species for fly fishers and an important aspect of the flies used is that it's important to have flies of various sink rates.

With its lead shot gut and strong pedigree as a very successful fly this little fly 'punches well above its weight'.

Tan, olive and pink Super Hair bodies all work well.

Materials

Process

A	Split the lead shot so that the hook shank can be laid in it. Put a drop of super glue in the cavity and lay the hook shank in the cavity. Adding weight to a fly

B	Using a pair of pliers tightly squeeze the cavity closed around the hook shank locking the lead shot in half way along the hook shank and with the lead shot slightly flattened and horizontal. Tie the thread in directly behind the lead shot. Understanding hooks

C	Tie your overlocking thread or other selected body material in behind the lead shot gut on top of the hook shank and back a distance equal to the diameter of the lead shot.

D	Build up a cone shaped body of overlocking thread directly behind the lead shot applying a little glue to the thread as you build up the body. Take your thread forward in separated turns over the cone shaped body, over the lead shot and all the way forward to the eye of the hook.

E	Trim away the excess body material Cut a set of two eyes off a length of haberdashery beads and tie them in on top of the hook shank directly behind the eye of the hook. As an alternative you could use burnt monofiliment eyes. Monofilament eyes Take the thread back to in front of the lead shot.

F	Tie in 3 or 4 strands of Pearl Flash or Krystal flash between the eyes and the lead shot with the loose ends extending over the lead shot gut and behind the fly. Managing synthetic fibres

G	Take a bunch of Super Hair and tie it in firmly between the lead shot and the eyes with the wing material laying over the lead shot and extending around the business end of the hook and behind the fly. It's important that you don't over-dress this fly.

H	Prepare a small quantity of 5 minute epoxy.

I	Using a tooth pick carefully coat the haberdashery thread body, lead shot gut and where the superhair is tied in with the 5 minute epoxy. Be careful not to allow the epoxy to encroach up the wing as you want that to be free moving or forward over the eye of the hook for obvious reasons. Working with epoxy

J	Rotate the fly whilst the epoxy goes off so as to ensure a nice symmetrical and round head. When the fly is finished trim the body of the fly so that the finished fly is about twice as long as the hook and so that the wing is not too square at the end.

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