Flat knitted nymph

 

Because the nymphs of many mayflies and caddis spend a good part of their life cycle living under rocks in both still and running water its not surprising that many have taken on a relatively flat form.

This knitted grub has a relatively flat body mimicking many of the naturals and also has plenty of structure on the body suggesting the various body segments.

Materials

Hook Thread Tail Body Thorax
Knapek grub #8 to #12 Olive Pheasant tail Hands body glass Seals fur

Process

A
  1. Wind the thread from the 95% position to half way round the bend of the hook.
  2. Tie in a short tail of 4 o5 pheasant tail fibres.
  3. Return the thread 3/4 of the way up the hook shank.

B
  1. Tie a length of body glass on each side of the hook shank.
  2. I generally use two different colours but two strands of the same colour also works well.
  3. Once I have tied the body glass in I generally do a couple of half hitches of the thread and trim it off so that it wont be in the way when knitting the body.
  4. I also generally add a drop of super glue along the hook shank to ensure that the body of the fly will not rotate on the hook shank.

C
  1. Knit a body along the rear 3/4 of the fly.

D
  1. Re-tie the thread in directly in front of the body.
  2. Tie the body glass off directly in front of the body and trim the excess.
  3. Take the thread back to the 3/4 position.

E
  1. Using the single strand dubbing technique dub on a thorax of seals fur on the front 1/4 of the fly.
  2. Build up a neat thread head behind the eye of the hook.
  3. Trim the thread and varnish the thread head.
  4. If needed use a strip of Velcro to tease out some of the seals fur dubbing to represent legs and feelers and to add some movement to the fly.



Last Updated: June 4, 2011
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Categories: Flies, Nymphs
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