{{+1}}Royal Wulff{{-1}}

With origins in the 20's the Wulff is as much a style of fly as a fly in its own right. It is certainly one of the quintessential dry flies and in some shape or form you will find variants in most fly boxes. Whilst the originals were tied using elk hair tails and upright upright divided calf wings I lean toward variants that have buoyant deer hair tails and divided wings. As an alternative I do carry Hair winged royal coachman, Humpy and Trude flies.

Materials

Hook	Thread	Tail and Wing	Hackle
#10 to #14 dry fly	Black	Deer hair	Cock

Process

A	Tie in a bunch of deer hair as if you are forming a deer hair post Deer hair posts

B	Divide the post into two equal halves. Whilst holding the closest half with your left hand take several wraps of thread on the horizontal to help permanently separate the two wings.

C	No take the back wing with your left hand take several wraps of thread on the opposite horizontal to complete permanently separating the two wings.

D	Take several wraps of thread around the base of each wing. These should be soft wraps as if you make them too firm the deer hair will flare out.

E	Tie in a deer hair tail as long as the hook shank. Deer hair tails

F	Tie in two strands of peacock herl at the band of the hook. Form it into a herl rope and wind it forward one fifth of the distance along the hook shank to form the rear third of the body. Tie the herl rope off. Roping peacock herl Unwind the herl rope , do not trim the herl just lay it over the front of the fly between the posts. Tie in a length of red floss where you tied the herl rope off.

G	Wind the floss forward in touching turns the next one fifth of the hook shank forming the middle section of the body. Pick your thread up and tie off the floss.

H	Trim the excess floss. Reform the herl rope.

I	Wind the herl rope forward one fifth of the distance along the hook shank forming the final section of the body. Tie the herl rope off. Unwind the remaining herl rope and trim the excess herl. Tie a hackle in directly in front of the third body segment with the dull (concave) side of the feather facing forward. This is important because if you tie a hackle in the opposite way the hackle fibres will face back in the way you expect for a wet fly. I have used a natural furnace hackle here with a dark center so as to extend the vision of a longer body when the fly is viewed from below. These hackle are often called Cock-y-bonddu hackles. Dry fly hackle Take your thread forward to just behind the eye of the hook.

J	Wind the hackle forward in touching turns taking around the same number of turns of the hackle behind and in front of the wings. Tie the hackle off behind the eye of the hook and trim the excess. Build up a neat thread head. Neat thread heads Whip finish the thread and varnish the head.